From the Staffing Experts

ResponsAble Safety Staffing From the Staffing Experts blog archives.

Creating an Environment of Safety

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environment of safety

In the type of work you do, safety is no joke. The responsibility for your staff’s safety and wellbeing is a heavy load. Here are a few tips for creating a culture and rhythm of prioritizing safety in your workplace.

Include intensive safety training in the onboarding process. When you hire a new staff member, don’t skimp on the onboarding process. This training is critical to staff competency and efficiency. It also sets expectations and defines priorities for the work environment that you want to create.

Provide clear guidelines and checklists. Make sure your employees know what the safety protocols are and are equipped to follow them. 

Host monthly safety lunches. Provide lunch one day a month and have a project manager present relevant safety topics. Discuss topics that apply to current jobs or projects so that workplace safety is fresh. When you make it a priority to present information, your staff understand it as an important workplace consideration.

Post safety information in the workspace. Hang posters, reminders, and instructions around the workplace as visual reminders of safety considerations and information.

Orient staff on new equipment. When new tools and equipment are introduced, set aside time to go over instructions for use and safety considerations of the new equipment. Many suppliers will include safety information that can be easily shared with your staff as they begin use.

Lead by example. Your company’s leadership should prioritize safety as much as they desire the staff to. They should implement the same precaution and follow the set guidelines as are expected of all employees.

The liability is not worth the risk of safety. Promote an environment of safety in your workplace by creating intentional touchpoints and rhythms that communicate it as a priority to your staff. This investment will pay dividends over time.

Important Qualities in a Safety Staff Member

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safety staff member

Safety staffing is a niched industry with unique skills and experience to consider. If you’re an employer thinking of hiring through ResponsAble, here is a peek at the qualities we’re looking for when building our growing database of staff. We recruit year-round so that when the time comes, we’ve got an ongoing stream of talent equipped to handle any job that comes your way.

If you’re looking to apply to the ResponsAble team, here are some requirements for becoming a part of our task force. The following are characteristics that our staff pride themselves on. If it is a good fit, you’ll be onboarded and placed through ResponsAble so that you’re prepared for every job that comes your way.

Checklist of RA Safety Staff

  • Interested and available for contingent and project-based hiring.
  • Resourceful and solution-minded, not a roadblock.
  • Ready to hit the ground running after training.
  • Desiring to be in-the-field rather than behind a desk, willing to be available to other workers on the jobsite and support team members in safety needs.
  • Professional demeanor and behavior in the work environment.
  • Organized and prepared for job responsibilities at all times.
  • Leader by example and influence, not authority or position.
  • Experienced in safety work.
  • All staff must have completed:
    • a basic orientation from the Safety Council
    • the TWIC credential
    • a hard skills test based on the position they’ve applied for
    • a behavioral based soft-skills interview

Depending on the job applied for or requested, our staff also are prepared for jobs with these characteristics:

  • Heavy Industrial Labor positions.
  • Able to repeatedly lift and hold heavy weights.
  • Physically and emotionally prepared to work within confined spaces.
  • Understanding nature of the work will often include 10-12 hour shifts 5-7 days a week with exposure to natural elements of temperature and weather.
  • Willing to work night shifts.

The characteristic that sets ResponsAble staff apart is their dedication to represent and work toward safety compliance as a leader and employee. ResponsAble helps you find the right people with the necessary skills to effectively and safely complete the job. Big or small, temporary or permanent. Let’s get the job done. https://responsablestaffing.com/contact-us/

ResponsAble’s Hiring Process

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hiring process

Are you interested in becoming a staffer with ResponsAble? Want to be included in our database of desired workers and experience the consistency that working with our distinct agency can bring? We’re here to tell you where to start!

The RA process from start to finish

Apply

Apply online at ApplyForSafety.com! Each applicant must have a basic orientation from the safety council and TWIC credential to complete the application process. If you’ve got both of those, then go ahead and get started! Qualified applicants will be contacted by a member of the ResponsAble team to schedule an interview at our office.

The Interview

Once at our office each person must take and complete a hard skills test based on the type of position applied for (safety technician, CSA/FW, labor).  If you don’t pass the test the first time, then we’ll offer another date after 30 days where the applicant can come back to re-take the test.

Once the test is complete, we then do a face-to-face interview with each candidate to assess their soft skills using behavioral based questions (tell me about a time you had to stop a job, what was it for and how was it handled; tell me about a time you had to work with someone you didn’t particularly like, how did you encounter this and how did you handle it).

We also track types of work environment each candidate is experienced in (refinery, chemical, construction, nuclear, offshore, etc.) as well as specific facilities/companies they have experience with, along with any certification or education they may have.

Through our assessment of their hard skills and soft skills, we’re able to appropriately qualify a candidate’s true safety knowledge and capability outside of just “safety certifications”. This allows us to match the right candidate to the right job and customer every time.

Paperwork

Once a candidate is qualified and considered eligible for hire, we have the qualified candidate complete all new hire paperwork and begin the onboarding process.

The Database

ResponsAble maintains and manages an ever-growing database of qualified and experienced staff. Once an applicant’s paperwork is completed, they become a part of this incredible group. While we may not have an opportunity on their day of hire that best fits a staff member’s capability, the database ensures that when an opportunity we can place them quickly (we have a lot of opportunities where we’re the last to know and first to show).

We frequently contact eligible candidates within our database whom are not working. We look for opportunities to engage with them and maintain communication and interest/availability status. This is such an important part of our culture that we track/measure how many qualified candidates we engage with as a KPI.

Getting to Work

Once on opportunity is presented to an employee, they then go through the final steps of our onboarding process and job-specific training required by our client. After this step, it’s time to get started on your first job!

Ready to start the hiring process with ResponsAble? We love to talk with applicants and determine their best fit. You can start your application online at ApplyForSafety.com and get the process started!

Tips for Keeping Your Shipping & Receiving Center Running Safely

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shipping receiving safety

While OSHA does not have specific safety regulations for shipping and handling centers, there are many aspects of the safety procedures that apply to these staff. Any employee that is exposed to hazards or risks should be protected to the extent possible on the job site. Consider these employees as you create workplace procedures and protocols.

Some Common Threats

This type of work requires frequent lifting and moving of incoming and outgoing materials. Back and muscle injury is easily incurred.

Use of equipment such as dollies, forklifts or hand trucks are also common. Accidents can occur, particularly with potential injuries to appendages.

Stacked packages or out of reach materials also produce a falling object hazard.

Additionally, tools for cutting, packaging, and strapping materials also create risk to staff in shipping and receiving.

Shipping & Receiving Safety Tips

It may be time to add some additional regulations for you staff in your shipping centers and warehouses.

Here’s a checklist that may be a helpful start point or reference.

  1. Make sure the warehouse area is clean and free of clutter and unnecessary items.
  2. Always use necessary equipment for heavy, large or bulky materials.
  3. When using cutting tools, always cut away from yourself and others and make sure that tools are closed or covered when not in use.
  4. Be careful when stacking or storing materials at height. Ensure the base of the stack is stable by placing heavy items closest to the floor with lighter items on top.
  5. When loading trucks, make the heaviest point of the load forward on the truck axle for stability.
  6. Feel free to take two trips whenever necessary rather than piling a load too high.
  7. When in doubt, ask for help with materials and work with one or more people to get the job done.
  8. Be sure to position materials on shelving in a way that fall hazards are reduced – far enough back from the edge.

These tips are generalized considerations for many shipping & handling centers. However, to ensure the safety and well-being of your staff the manager should conduct a safety audit of your specific workspace. Pay attention to any special considerations and create policies to keep your team safe. For more safety tips like these, view other articles on the ResponsAble blog!

Why Substance Abuse is a Manager’s Problem

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substance abuse

Is substance abuse really a consideration for you as a manager of a professional work environment? Here’s a scary fact you may not have considered… nearly half of all workplace injuries are traced back to substance use. Drug and alcohol abuse on the job is more prevalent than we may think. Or maybe you know, but just haven’t been educated on the implications in your work environment.

Alcohol and drug use is dangerous for a multitude of reasons. Substances inhibit motor skills and cognitive functioning, give a false sense of confidence, impair judgement, decrease efficiency, and negatively effects workplace performance.

As a manager, the cost of substance abuse in your workplace is too high.

So how do you recognize potential substance abuse among your employees?

Common Signs of Employee Substance Abuse

So how do you recognize potential substance abuse among your employees? If you’re not being attentive to the possibility of substance abuse, it can be easy to miss. Don’t make the mistake of assuming you would know if this was an issue among your employees. There are a variety of reasons an individual may engage in substance abuse, and while sometimes it may be obvious, other times it may not be the employee you expect. Here are a few behaviors to take note of and investigate substance abuse if noticed:

  • Consistent or extreme lethargy
  • Frequent breaks or unaccounted for disappearances
  • Erratic behavior or mood swings
  • Inconsistency in hygiene, appearance, or performance
  • Frequent avoidable mistakes
  • Tardiness or failure to show up to work

How to Address Workplace Substance Abuse

Evaluate your culture- alienation and a lack of resources to address emotional life events leads to a higher volume of workplace substance abuse. Offer help to employees and work to create an environment where they know they have resources and support. Some examples could include availability to counseling, team building, supervisor check-ins, bereavement days, etc.

Proper Supervision- A surprising number of staff report that using substances on the job is not as hard as you may think. Increasing supervision is the first line of defense against onsite drinking and drug use.

Safety Training- Use a weekly meeting time to educate employees on the dangers and liability of substance use at work. Make employees aware that you’re serious about safety and teach them about the long-term ramifications of their actions.

Substance Testing- Implement testing at whatever frequency you feel necessary in your workplace. You are within your legal rights to implement these policies in your workplace. Drug and blood alcohol testing are obvious deterrents to use.

Interested in substance use training in your work place? ResponsAble would be happy to come and teach your employees about the dangers and liabilities of workplace use. Call (225) 753-1909 or email us for more information.

Rest: A Workplace Safety Requirement

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Rest and workplace safety

Psychological research shows proven results that taking breaks from your work, in moderation, significantly increases productivity. Yet this is counter-intuitive to how many of our workplaces and even how our culture functions. Is this true for your work place? If so, there’s a few reasons why rest should be prioritized in safety staffing particularly.

Why is rest important in safety staffing?

Rest is important to safety for reasons that are probably fairly obvious. However, it’s so easy to lose perspective when the pressures and responsibilities of a job weigh on our shoulders. Adequate rest is critical to focus and decision-making. Ensuring safety staff have scheduled breaks allows your jobsite to be safer and more efficient.  

Staff fatigue can contribute to carelessness, lack of clarity, and higher risk for your company. A higher quantity of lower quality work should not be the goal of an employer. Particularly in safety staffing, cognitive energy is critical to effective work.  In the end, denying appropriate job-site rest only leads to increased liability, decreased productivity, and unmotivated staff.

Are breaks required on job sites?

Unfortunately, OSHA does not provide required mandates for employee breaks. There are not actually any federal laws in place to regulate work:break ratios. Some states do have guidelines for break requirements, but even here only 22 of the 50 states have these in place.

Therefore, standards for rest and break balance must be generated by the company. Even when these policies are in place it is not uncommon for employees to forego taking advantage of available breaks in an effort to get ahead or make an impression in the workplace. As a company, a culture that encourages rest must be encouraged.

How to implement a good break culture.

If you’re looking to begin to implement policies for rest in your workplace, here are some general rules of thumb to consider.

During a normal work shift of 8 or more hours:

  • • 15-20 minute breaks once or twice throughout the shift.
  • • A meal break of 30 minutes to an hour.

Once your break policies are in place, it is helpful for the manager and employee to introduce the practice in a way that encourages and uplifts utilizing the practice. Staff who feel safe to do so will be more likely to take advantage of the offer. Leadership should also honor the policy by taking advantage of it themselves. This results in a safer and more productive environment for staff and employer!

Your investment in creating a culture that honors proper balance and safety is worth it.