Operators are facing a number of challenges while trying to regain their footing as COVID restrictions wind down. However, there are ways you can still invest in food safety technology, even while profits are recovering. Let’s look at what roadblocks are potentially introducing risk into your food safety program and how you can still create an effective food safety culture to protect employees and guests.
www.propertycasualty360.com/2021/07/1…
Regardless of the industry, if hazardous chemicals are on a job site the chance for accidental release is present if they aren’t properly controlled, which lifts the possibility of a potential disaster.
To combat deaths and injuries from industrial accidents, Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) requires businesses that deal with a volume of hazardous chemicals at or above a threshold, set by the administration, must develop a process safety management program that follows a list of requirements from OSHA.
“These 14 components are a list of smart things you have to do to make sure bad things don’t happen. They are simple things like having a written plan, a way to store and compile information and hazard analysis,” explains Jeff Muto, chief marketing and strategy officer for Veriforce, LLC. “One thing interesting to us; they specifically call out contract workers. That is where the market feels the most pain.”
Written provisions for contractor safety, per OSHA, include evaluating a contractor’s safety performance before starting a project. Once a contractor passes clearance requirements, the company is responsible to inform the contractor of potential risks and health hazards. The contractor then must relay that information to the contracted team and train them appropriately.
Fines are levied against companies that are found out of compliance with safety regulations, with the charges reaching as high as $130,000 for repeat or willful violations, according to Muto.
www.streetinsider.com/Globe+New…’+Safety+Management+System+Recognized+by+the+FAA/18657450.html
DENVER, CO., July 08, 2021 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) – On Tuesday, January 6th, Air Methods (AMC), the leading air medical service in the country, received its letter of acknowledgement from the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) accepting AMC’s Safety Management System (SMS). In the United States there are 1,977 Part 135 operators, and Air Methods is one of 21 to receive this recognition.
“At Air Methods, safety is our number one priority and the recognition by the FAA regarding our SMS program is a significant accomplishment. When you think about the complexity of our operations and what happens during a patient transport, the process of SMS is vital to bringing all those pieces together that make up a safe air medical transport mission,” says JaeLynn Williams, CEO of Air Methods. “This is not a requirement of a Part-135 operator but to be among the 1% of organizations to have achieved this level of SMS accreditation is outstanding. This is a testament to our level of commitment and innovation in the air medical safety environment.”
In line with the prevention of incidents and injuries, each Air Methods teammate is accountable for the performance of our Safety Management System (SMS). SMS defines teammate responsibilities and standards to manage and control the risks inherent in our operations – be it in flight, the workplace, occupational health, or environmental protection.
www.hellenicshippingnews.com/mca-colla…
The Maritime and Coastguard Agency (MCA) has collaborated with the Health and Safety Executive (HSE) to build on the existing Safety Climate Tool by making it more applicable to the Maritime industry. The tool is designed to assess the attitudes of individuals within an organisation towards health and safety issues, then deliver an objective measure of the safety culture. It comes as part of the UK Flag’s continued drive towards improved safety awareness, with the MCA supporting a maritime version of HSE’s safety climate tool. It has been shown that a poor safety culture is the root cause of many incidents within the workplace, and the remote nature of a lot of seafarer roles means an incident is often serious, even fatal. The tool has been designed by scientists at the HSE, with advice from experts at the MCA and shipping companies, to measure the perceptions of the workforce on health and safety issues. It will offer insight into the safety culture of the organisation to provide ways to continually improve and raise standards, with hopes it will lead to a reduction in the number of incidents.
MIAMI, June 30, 2021 /PRNewswire/ – Breakthrough Service was founded by Stephanie Leger, Luis Gallotti, and Lisa Miller with years of experience at Forbes Travel Guide, AAA, Ritz-Carlton, and Four Seasons. They came together to create a disruptive hospitality program revealing the authenticity of the modern luxe traveler. The expertise of Breakthrough Service is helping guide all luxury properties from the ordinary to the extraordinary with world-class audits and personalized training programs.
As the hospitality industry celebrates the coming out of a year that has accelerated a diverse trend in the hospitality industry, personalization is still a driving force. Breakthrough Service dedication helps leaders and front-line team members provide a different approach tailored to the modern luxury traveler. The hospitality horizon has changed, and the partners at Breakthrough Service navigate through the changes. They look at the guests’ journey and how other areas such as the property story, ambiance, and safety culture engage with the guests.
www.securitymagazine.com/blogs/14-…
Because the security and safety hazards for hospitality workers are so diverse, physical security leaders within the organization need to protect frontline staff with a proactive, comprehensive approach to their well-being.
It starts, with culture.
Safety culture and network Creating, promoting and practicing a culture of security and safety where breaks are encouraged and staff aren’t afraid to speak up about safety concerns and issues is paramount.
In addition, by providing safety-related training workshops or even casual conversations and online hangouts, a security leader can encourage team members to respect each other and watch out for each other. Such opportunities also improve communication and collaboration between security guards and frontline staff who tend to work alone.
Fire doors are a central element of a building’s passive fire protection system. They help stop the spread of fire and provide people with safe exit points. By law, workplaces across the UK must have fire doors installed on external walls throughout the premises.
Fire doors must be regularly inspected to ensure they are operating correctly. Fire door inspections should only be carried out by trained staff. To maintain a safe workplace for all, employers should provide their workers with access to fire door inspection training.
In this article, we will take a closer look at the functions of fire doors in the workplace and why fire door inspections are a crucial part of maintaining health and safety. We will also detail the benefits of creating and sustaining a strong health and safety culture.
Topics: Jop’s research methods. How to interpret and explain procedures. Why rules don’t always lead to a work stoppage. Why stop-work happens. The perception vs. reality of stop-work. Myths and expectations of safety culture. The main takeaway.
Quotes:
“I think I’ve probably been guilty myself of not fully defining what I’m talking about.”
“Only one case I found where a rule actually led to stopping work.”
“First of all, compared to current interventions we see around stop-work…they all paint this picture of real significant decisions…and well, I found that plenty of stop-work decisions are basically considered insignificant.”
While National Forklift Safety Day is June 8, forklift safety is more than just one day, and it is also more than just the forklift. A holistic and consistent focus is key, especially given the important role forklift safety plays in the supply chain.
To build and maintain a strong safety culture, managers need to consider every important aspect that can contribute to employee safety while stressing the role of the individual. Here are five essential safety components to keep in mind:
Training that is accessible, personalized, and extends across the workforce. Whether classroom-based or streamed online, training for operators, supervisors, and pedestrians should be interactive, engaging, and tailored to the individual.
Compliance management that controls access and automates processes for streamlining safety adherence. Through data collection and analysis, managers can control access to equipment, automate processes that streamline compliance, and receive a more complete view of adherence to safety regulations.
Equipment design that prioritizes safer operation. Product design is sometimes overlooked as a component of safety management, but it can play a vital role. Auditing your existing equipment to identify missing key safety features is an essential step toward creating a strong safety program.
Connectivity that provides more visibility, awareness, and opportunities. Connected devices and equipment that enable the collection and analysis of data across the workplace offer a new tool for identifying opportunities for supervision, reinforcing training, and effecting behavioral changes.
Data analytics that inform safety goals. Real-time and historical data from forklift fleet and operator management systems are invaluable in identifying and responding to safety-related incidents, as well as identifying correct and incorrect behaviors.
This topic interested us mainly because of a paper we encountered. It’s a very new peer-reviewed study that has only just been published online. We will use that paper as the framing device for our conversation.
Join us for this interesting and exciting conversation about the capacity index.
Topics:
The belief in required metrics. Low injury rates and what they actually mean. The regulator paradox. The six capacities. Due diligence. The problem with the study’s names for metrics. Measuring activities. Practical takeaways.
Quotes:
“Injury rates aren’t predictive of the future, so using them to manage safety, using them as your guide, doesn’t work.”
“And while I think you could always argue that there are different capacities that you could measure, as well, I don’t think there is anything inherently wrong with the capacities that they have suggested.”
“Basically, what we’re doing is we’re measuring activities and all of those things are about measuring activities. Now, unless you already know for sure that those activities provide the capacity that you’re looking for, then measuring the activity doesn’t tell you anything about capacity.”
connectedaviationtoday.com/evolving-…
Creating a culture of safety has always been a critical part of developing an efficient and ordered National Air Space (NAS). It is with that mindset that the FAA has developed a Safety Management System (SMS) mandate which provides a framework for a more safe and secure aviation industry. As the NAS becomes more crowded with new entrants, the SMS will need to evolve to meet the FAA’s safety mission. The current SMS mandate was put into place for commercial airline operators by March 2018. However, since safety is vital to every aspect of aviation, it’s also necessary to ensure that other types of operators have SMS in place as well. Still, it’s not quite as simple as applying the SMS for commercial aviation to business – or other types – of operators. During a virtual town hall event hosted by the National Business Aviation Association (NBAA), Ed Bolen sat down with FAA Administrator Steve Dickson to discuss the challenges that current SMS poses for business operators. They discussed the crash that killed Kobe Bryant, seven other passengers, and the pilot on January 26, 2020. “The [Island Express Helicopter] appeared to check all the boxes for how an SMS should operate,” Dickson said. The crash painfully illustrated that there is much more to be done to build a safety-first culture in the business aviation industry.
Amazon (NASDAQ: AMZN) workers, and the world, are about to find out how aggressive their employer can be in what could be the largest experiment in workplace safety culture ever undertaken.
Amazon announced Monday that WorkingWell, a program that provides employees with physical, mental and nutritional support, among other wellness services, will be rolled out across the entire U.S. operations network by year-end, with the aim of cutting recordable incident rates — an OSHA measurement of worker injury and illness — by 50% by 2025.
The company, which has faced criticism over worker conditions as its size and customer demand have grown, is investing $300 million in safety projects this year, though it did not break out spending on this program specifically as part of that budget.
WorkingWell is not entirely new to Amazon employees, nor is the plan to cut injury rates. It was first piloted in 2019 and has already reached a huge number of workers, 859,000 employees at 350 sites in North America and Europe. In Amazon’s most recent earnings report released in late April, the company indicated it was going to expand the program, though it did not offer full details.
Safety Culture in a Post-COVID-19 Nuclear Sector
The recent pandemic has taken a significant toll on workers in many industries, exacerbating feelings of exhaustion, burnout, and fatigue while creating separation between once-unified teams. Meanwhile, physical distancing guidelines, newly decentralized work arrangements, and shifting consumer demands have created new challenges for industry leaders.
Meanwhile, the nuclear industry in the United States seems to have flourished during this pandemic, maintaining high safety standards while furthering research, development, and innovation initiatives.
Utilizing a teamwork-based approach and a safety culture that encourages dialogue, leaders, regulators, and everyday workers innovated and collaborated in critical ways, reorienting the sector and creating a new normal with incredibly positive results.
Often, these efforts are built upon existing protocols to meet the moment. For example, the nuclear industry prides itself on being a learning sector that openly shares lessons learned and best practices throughout the world. Nuclear has always recognized that pandemics could impact safe operations.
The protracted COVID-19 pandemic is no longer just a disruption to the way we work but has transformed permanently the world of work, Chan Kok Seong, UOB’s group chief risk officer, says in an interview with finews.asia.
The future of work is shaping into a hybrid model that optimizes employee flexibility, autonomy and performance across locations. While much attention has been focused on enabling virtual teams through technology, it is important to balance the risks of remote working with productivity and agility.
A paper recently released by the Monetary Authority of Singapore and the Association of Banks in Singapore identified two key categories of risks for financial institutions: operational risks and people and culture risks, which all companies across sectors should note as they digitalize their businesses.
www.auntminnie.com/index.asp… Burns and colleagues outlined three actions radiology departments can take to ensure safe care transitions:
Focus on individual behaviors. Train staff on potential sources of error (i.e., order requests, report transcriptions, ineffective listening). Use tools like notetaking, repeating information back, checklists, screen-sharing, and virtual consults. Focus on team behaviors. Designate particular handoff times rather than conducting them “on the fly.” “Wet reads and curbside consults are especially vulnerable to communication and accountability errors,” the group noted. Reduce noise in team environments and limit interruptions. Make use of safety checklists for procedures. Develop organizational strength. Automate parts of the handoff protocol, such as reminders, exam orders, and reporting using the electronic health record. Establish a safety culture: “An organizational culture that prioritizes patient safety more closely aligns with provider goals, builds a stronger shared mental model of the role of handoffs in care transitions, and transforms handoffs from isolated communication events into true transfers of professional responsibility,” the group wrote. Improving patient care transitions is crucial on so many levels, and requires cooperation between individuals, teams, and organizations, according to the authors.
www.airlines.iata.org/analysis/…
Unveiling a safety culture
There is a saying among auditors in the management systems community that measurement is at the heart of management—that is, you cannot manage what you do not measure. The big data era has given the aviation sector the tools required to do both.
Though technology gave the airline industry the ability to capitalize on the vast amounts of data it generates, it is a strong safety culture that will ensure that lessons learned are put into action. Insurers are looking for evidence of extensive data capture that suggests a strong culture of hazard and event reporting, practices that also allow airlines to build understanding of their own risk environment.
www.fullyloaded.com.au/industry-…
The National Heavy Vehicle Regulator (NHVR) should change its approach to fatigue enforcement as a key part of its next safety strategy, Australian Trucking Association (ATA) CEO Andrew McKellar says.
The call comes as ATA releases its submission to the NHVR on its draft 2021-2025 heavy vehicle safety strategy.
“The ATA was very pleased to see that the draft emphasises the need to build a positive safety culture in the industry,” McKellar says.
“The key to doing this is fairness.
“People are not going to report safety issues if they feel they will be unfairly blamed or issued with an infringement notice.”
EPISODE SUMMARY On today’s episode, we discuss the visibility of high-vis clothing. Are they actually “high-vis”?
Topics: Why the results between lab and natural environments vary. How studies determine visibility. Which colors are best for high visibility. What makes humans most visible. Using high-vis colors to identify objects and humans. Practical takeaways. Quotes: “The general goal of this, is they just want to compare a whole heap of different factors.” “The ability to just spot high-vis and the ability to spot a human wearing high-vis, seem to be actually two different mental tasks.” “There’s been some suggestion in the research that we should actually standardize a human high-vis color.”
Christopher Chiantella, chief medical officer at Inova Loudoun Hospital, which received an A grade, said in a statement that “feedback received in our regular safety culture surveys guides our strategies to reduce patient harm.”
“This awareness accompanied by accountability, ongoing education and performance improvement intervention across all teams, prepared us for the challenges of the pandemic,” Chiantella said.
www.safetyandhealthmagazine.com/articles/…
Washington — During an April 2 public business meeting, the Chemical Safety Board announced it has revised a board order on board member roles and responsibilities in response to criticism of the agency in recent Environmental Protection Agency Office of Inspector General reports.
CSB Chair and CEO Katherine Lemos called the measure “a major step forward for the efficiency of the agency,” which has carried on with only one of its five board seats filled since Kristen Kulinowski stepped down May 1 – three months before her five-year term was set to expire.
EPA OIG’s most recent report on CSB – issued in July – found that various management challenges – namely the abundance of board vacancies and unclear policy on board member responsibilities – “will impede the ability of the CSB to function effectively.”
The revised board order outlines multiple responsibilities of board members, including:
Voting on investigation reports, safety studies, special investigations and other board products related to chemical incidents and hazards Voting on and advocating the resolution of safety recommendations to federal, state and local agencies; private organizations; and members of the public pertaining to reducing recurrences of chemical incidents Voting on reports of cause or probable cause(s) of chemical incidents, reporting all necessary information, and making and advocating public safety recommendations Propose amendments in accordance with the product review process, to the extent possible and as desired, to any agenda item at least two days before any public meeting scheduled to consider that item Prepare for and participate in site visits, as necessary or appropriate Prepare for and participate in public hearings and other safety inquiries Complete all training on schedule
Topics:
What double-checking is. The difference between a practice and mandatory policy. Armitage and his history of papers regarding the medical field. Deference to authority. Formal risk assessment and internal risk assessment. Independent checking. What the evidence shows. Practical takeaways.
Quotes:
“How do you know whether an error has happened, if no one notices it?”
“I think you’re doing a good job of qualitative research, if readers want to then go and actually read the raw data.”
“And I am completely unwilling to say, ‘This is a bad practice, we should get rid of it’ until we’ve got the evidence.”
The National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health Worker Well-Being Questionnaire (NIOSH WellBQ) provides an integrated assessment of worker well-being across multiple spheres, including individuals’ quality of working life, circumstances outside of work, and physical and mental health status. The questionnaire measures “worker” well-being as a holistic construct rather than simply “workplace” or “work-related” well-being. The NIOSH WellBQ is intended to help researchers, employers, workers, practitioners, and policymakers understand the well-being of workers and target interventions to improve worker well-being, among other applications.
Maintaining a Strong Safety Culture The top 6 considerations in establishing your safety strategy, and the culture it will create.
Safety culture, for many safety professionals, is a system.
The system consists of attitudes, beliefs, values and principles that encourage safe behavior in the workplace. All the moving parts need to come together to upkeep this system. The pieces of safety culture include management and employee involvement, hazard analysis, control and abatement, communication and training, and evaluation. Each of these steps is necessary and needed to create and upkeep a safe work environment.
Callahan Construction Managers Holds Safety Stand-Down
BRIDGEWATER, MA– Callahan Construction Managers announced that it hosted a mandatory company-wide safety stand-down last month. During the stand-downs, teams at each Callahan jobsite reviewed hazards associated with the type of work they do and identified ways to eliminate them.
The goal of the safety stand-down was to refocus the importance of safety, eliminate complacency, and reflect on hazards to make every Callahan jobsite safer. All Callahan project executives, managers, superintendents, and subcontractors participated.
“Callahan is proactive when it comes to safety and we used this as an opportunity to refocus and avoid complacency and promote our zero-injury safety culture,” stated Justin Azbill, Director of Safety at Callahan. “We want to lead by example and do everything in our power to ensure every employee on site goes home safely at the end of the day.”
Stand-downs on each jobsite were led by Callahan Superintendents where the teams discussed complacency, situational awareness, fall protection, hand injuries, and COVID-19 compliance. Each subcontractor team also discussed hazards associated with the type of work they do and identified ways Callahan can help them eliminate job hazards. Callahan’s objective is to use this information to improve communication across all jobsites to continue to build a solid zero-injury safety culture across the entire company, which had a 98% rate of zero lost time incidents in 2020.
Creating Workplace Safety Culture: Key Steps
The worldwide public health crisis of 2020 has renewed the interest in organizational safety, with businesses and nonprofits being forced to invest in new equipment and policies. However, it soon became apparent that piecemeal solutions are the least cost-effective from the strategic perspective. Creating workplace safety that is both efficient and sustainable is only possible with the organization-wide commitment to the cause. Below is an overview of key steps for creating the culture of safety along with the common challenges organizations can face in the process.
What is Safety Culture?
In the broadest sense, safety culture is a way of doing things that brings down the number of potential risks to a minimum. It can be considered as an integral part of the organizational culture – a set of rules, procedures, and beliefs shared by all employees that pertain to workplace safety. The easiest way to describe safety culture is in terms of rules and policies. However, the term is actually more encompassing and includes many subtle components:
– Beliefs – Values – Behavioral patterns – Knowledge and experience – Attitudes – Decision-making
The concept came to prominence in the late twentieth century in parallel with risk management. It also became clear that all major accidents in the workplace are usually not due to unlucky coincidence but rather the lack of coherent effort to achieve safety systemically. In other words, safety culture is about fostering commitment to safety within the organization rather than enforcing rules.