W10: Office Safety – How Much Risk Will You Take?

I’m sure you’ll agree that people in offices are less likely to have serious accidents.

However, so are hurt badly and many thousands hurt in less serious ways – mainly through slips trips and falls and silly things such as carrying heavy load and being electrocuted!

So how do we get office workers engaged in talking about safety and seeing the hazards that could hurt them.

Safety Improvers has developed a short and fun workshop of up to 15 people, that brings home just how much risk they are taking!

Participants work through 15 scenarios of unsafe conditions and have to pick the best way forward. Have a look at these two samples:

Your 74-year old mother-in–law is staying with you and your family for two months. She is a very nice person but can be a bit temperamental. She is in the kitchen cutting some carrots to make soup. You notice that she is cutting the carrots in half, length-wise and then is trying to cut them into quarters length-wise. However, she has the half carrots not on the flat side but on the round side and as she is cutting they are wobbling. You are worried she may cut herself. What should you do?

• a) Ask her to turn the carrots over onto the flat side so she doesn’t cut herself?
• b) Express surprise that she doesn’t know how to do things safely at her age?
• c) Say nothing because she might “blow up” and besides the chance of her cutting herself is slim?
• d) Offer to help cut the carrots yourself?

You arrive at your desk one morning to see an electrician up a ladder fixing a light fitting. The ladder is too short and he is leaning too far and it looks as if he will topple over. What should you do?

• a) Just leave it because it will only take a minute and besides you know nothing about electrics?
• b) Go and hold the ladder for him?
• c) Politely ask him to stop and go and find a better ladder?
• d) Go and tell a supervisor about a potentially unsafe act?

As you’ll guess, considerable discussion gets people to use all their existing knowledge and training and commonsense about safety. It reinforces existing procedures but more importantly gets people to think about what they are actually doing. It doesn’t matter, if they don’t agree with the “best” option – with time they will!

People can fill in the full 15-scenario survey before the workshop ( on paper or online) or we do it in pairs for about 20 minutes at the beginning of the workshop.

Give me a call to explain how new could do this for your office staff and help them build their hazard awareness – no obligation whatsoever. +44 773 857 1945.

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