Category: Tips & Resources

5 Things Every Workplace Risk Assessment Should Include

Posted on by Charlie Patrick

Risk assessments play a vital role in keeping your workplace safe and are an essential pillar of an effective health and safety strategy, whichever industry you are in. Identifying and managing your workplace risks regularly enables you to protect your employees by mitigating the hazards and supplying the necessary training, whilst also ensuring you remain compliant. However, many risk assessments fall short due to missing or skimming past some of the most crucial elements.

So, to help you strengthen your processes, here are five essential components every workplace risk assessment should include.

1. Clear Identification of Hazards

The first step of any risk assessment is to thoroughly identify all the potential hazards across the workplace. This includes all physical, ergonomic, or long-term hazards, many which may not be immediately obvious. This creates a clear outlay of the risks, so that you can work towards a plan to mitigate them effectively.

During your assessments, you should also consider the impact of any changes occurring throughout your workday, including any lighting, weather, personnel or processes that may differ. Reviewing your incident reports regularly can also help reveal common health and safety risks and failings.

2. Who is at risk?

When working towards achieving safer workplace practices, understanding who might be affected by each hazard is crucial in order to pinpoint how to best protect the individuals. This includes not only employees but also contractors, visitors, and even members of the public – depending on your workplace layout and operations.

This allows you to adjust the processes according to their level of experience and knowledge via a range of techniques, whether that be improving your staff training, moving staff around, or even changing the processes entirely. This also opens up the opportunity to spot developing patterns, thereby potentially preventing any individuals from being overexposed to hazards.

3. Implementing Control Measures

With the vulnerabilities now identified, you must evaluate the level of risk each hazard presents and identify all existing control measures. Commonly this can be done through a rating system such as a risk matrix/register, to easily prioritise the most dangerous areas. Determine if the control measures are adequate or if further action is required to bolster your health and safety practices to reduce the risks.

In this step, it is also crucial to consider how hazards may overlap and interact with each other, as often long-term risks and fatigue can increase the chances of a health and safety failing.

When implementing mitigation techniques, it is important to remember the hierarchy of controls, providing a guide to the most effective strategies:

  • Elimination – Removing the hazard completely
  • Substitution – Replacing the process or hazard with a safer alternative
  • Engineering Controls – Changing the systems to minimise risk exposure
  • Administrative Controls – Changing practices to reduce the potential risk
  • PPE – Directly protecting the individual from the risk

4. Employee Involvement and Consultation

No one knows your workplace quite like your staff, as interacting with different parts of their working environment day in day out gives them a unique perspective and understanding of potential health and safety issues and concerns. Co-operating with your employees during a risk assessment is crucial to revealing the overall picture, helping you be aware of hazards that may have otherwise gone unnoticed whilst also enhancing your health and safety culture – making staff feel heard and valued.

During this step, it is also vital that you ensure all staff are up to date with the latest emergency plans and processes to verify their safety and others in the event of an emergency.

5. Introducing a Review Schedule and Documenting

Finally, workplace risk assessments are not one-off exercises. They should be living documents, updated and reviewed whenever there are changes in procedures, equipment or personnel, with significant changes demanding a full re-assessment. With this in mind, scheduled review intervals are essential to upkeep a safe workplace. Depending on your working environment and the risks involved these timescales can fluctuate, being unique to your organisation, generally sitting between every quarter to biannual reviews

On top of a regular review cycle, make sure you are thoroughly documenting your finding. This is not only good practice, but it’s a legal requirement across the UK. A clear and structured record shows that the risk assessment was completed properly and outlines who is responsible for actions and their deadlines.

Documenting and scheduling reviews is often made easier through the use of standardised templates, helping your reviews to meet the same criteria. This can be further aided by risk assessment software to maintain consistency and keep within deadlines.

Conclusion

Workplace risk assessments are a fundamental part of your health and safety management, but their requirements can be blurry, so completing them correctly is vital to ensure the safety of your work premises. By ensuring your assessment includes these five key elements, you will create a strong foundation for a safer and more compliant workplace. Whilst the inclusion of staff into your practices will improve your workplace’s safety culture, ultimately creating a much safer working environment for everyone.

Who is Responsible for Fire Safety Awareness in the Workplace?

Posted on by Melusi Chirikure

Among all health and safety responsibilities in the workplace, fire safety is perhaps the most important – and certainly the most prominent. With more than 13,000 fires attended by Fire and Rescue Services last year in workplaces and other non-residential buildings, accidental and deliberate fires remain a huge concern.

Most people think that the responsibilities for fire safety rest solely on the employer, but fire safety in the workplace is a shared effort among employers, employees, fire wardens/marshals, and even governmental organisations.

Here’s a brief look into who plays key roles in ensuring fire safety awareness in the workplace:

Employers

The employer, also most likely the ‘responsible person’, bears the primary responsibility for fire safety in the workplace. As the overall decision-maker and provider of business resources, they are pivotal in fire safety awareness.

According to the Regulatory Reform (Fire Safety) Order 2005, employers must:

  • Conduct a comprehensive fire risk assessment to identify potential hazards
  • Implement fire prevention measures and emergency procedures
  • Provide fire safety training to employees
  • Ensure fire extinguishers, alarms, and exits are maintained and accessible

Employees

While employers create the framework, employees are ultimately responsible for adhering to fire safety rules and procedures. Their roles include:

  • Staying informed about fire safety training and procedures
  • Reporting potential fire hazards or faulty equipment
  • Acting responsibly during emergencies and evacuation drills

When employees actively participate, this builds and strengthens the overall fire safety culture of the workplace.

Fire Wardens

In Article 18 of the Regulatory Reform (Fire Safety) Order 2005, employers are required to appoint one or more trained people to help in carrying out preventive and protective fire safety measures. In many organisations, the duties of fire wardens/marshals involve:

  • Assisting the employer with routine fire risk assessments
  • Spotting, fixing, and/or reporting any fire hazards
  • Regularly checking fire alarms, extinguishers, and emergency exits
  • During an emergency, acting quickly to ensure everyone is alerted to a fire
  • Acting as points of contact during emergencies

Appointing and fully training fire wardens ensures that fire safety standards are consistently upheld.

Government Authorities

Local fire authorities and government bodies provide the regulatory framework for workplace fire safety. They enforce laws, offer guidance, and conduct inspections to ensure organisations meet their obligations.

The main pieces of fire safety legislation are:

  • Fire and Rescue Services Act 2004
  • Regulatory Reform (Fire Safety) Order 2005

Additional fire safety guidance is also crucial and can sometimes differ depending on industry, because some workplaces are more prone to fire accidents or arson than others.

To enforce the law, fire safety inspectors have the power to enter premises to carry out an inspection to ensure that a business is not breaking any laws.

Altogether, these authorities form the backbone of fire safety policies that employers and employees must follow.

To conclude, fire safety awareness in the workplace cannot be the responsibility of a single entity. It requires the collective effort of employers, employees, fire wardens, and governmental authorities to create a safe and compliant environment.

By understanding and embracing their roles, everyone in the workplace contributes to minimising the risk of fires and ensuring swift action in the event of one, whilst also protecting lives and property.

How to Create a Positive Health & Safety Culture

Posted on by Melusi Chirikure

Health and safety management extends much further than just being a box-ticking exercise. How you treat your health and safety can have vast implications on your workplace culture, whether you intend it to or not. Taking the time to foster a positive safety culture has the potential to bring a host of benefits to your business such as reducing injuries and costs, whilst creating a positive environment at work; which will boost your organisation’s productivity, morale and reputation.

However, altering your business’s safety culture takes time and can be challenging, requiring strong teamwork to instill your new behaviours, attitudes and values across your team. So, in order to help, we have picked out the 4 key areas that typically impact your workplace culture and how you can influence a positive change.

Policies

Starting with your health and safety policies, these play a vital role in the upkeep of your health and safety, ensuring that everyone knows and follows the set rules and guidance. But when was the last time you reviewed your policies and procedures?

Your policies should already be reviewed regularly, but this is especially important when trying to build a positive safety culture. Updating your policies not only shows your team that health and safety remains a top priority, but you should also ensure that your updated policies are centered around the best practices possible, placing safety above everything.

Management

How you manage your business and staff members has a drastic impact on your safety culture, with your words and actions weighing in heavily on your staff’s behaviours and attitudes towards safety. With this in mind, you should reinforce the idea that “safety comes first” – encouraging staff not to skip or brush over any checks or processes, even if they are in a rush.

You should also be mindful of how you communicate this, promoting this culture change through your actions as you lead by example. This means regularly assessing your workplace hazards and addressing risks proactively, whilst also encouraging employees to contribute to safer workplace practices.

Training

Training is arguably the biggest factor in your health and safety, because without the correct knowledge and training, even the best policies will fall short. This highlights the importance of a well-structured training plan, required to keep your staff well-equipped with the knowledge and understanding to be able to complete their day-to-day tasks safely. 

Your training plan should:

  • Follow a schedule – with frequent training to keep your employees’ knowledge and skills up to date.
  • Be role-specific – consider each employee’s role and ensure that they receive the relevant training required to complete their job safely, accounting for any PPE, machines, or unique risks they may face.
  • Be delivered to a high-quality – engaging high-quality courses are critical for your staff, ensuring that they retain the necessary information and lessons throughout their training.

Communication

The final pillar in improving your organisation’s safety culture is communication. You must be open to your staff and encourage them to step forward with any health and safety concerns which they may have. This is vital to create a strong level of trust and confidence throughout your team, enabling you to act quickly upon their concerns and cement your attitude towards health and safety within your team.

You should regularly provide your staff opportunities to communicate, whether that is through meetings or proactively asking them. This will be a welcoming addition to improving your organisation’s communication. Alongside this, including your team in health and safety decisions will further make them feel valued and open to communicate more.

Over time, implementing all of these steps combine to build a strong positive health and safety culture where it is understood and shared by your staff that safety comes first. This will influence your team’s attitude and behaviours towards health and safety to ultimately build a safer workplace, also boosting your team’s morale and reducing injuries & costs, whilst building a strong health and safety reputation as a bonus.

Health and Safety Considerations for Lone Working

Posted on by Charlie Patrick

Lone working is when employees work in isolation without direct supervision, and is increasingly common in various industries. But, whilst it offers more flexibility and autonomy for workers, it also presents a unique set of health and safety challenges.

Here is a comprehensive guide to understanding and addressing these considerations:

Workman Climbing a ladder whilst working alone outside.

Risk Assessment

Conducting a thorough risk assessment is a crucial first step in ensuring the safety of lone workers. Identifying all potential hazards such as equipment malfunction, health emergencies, or even the risk of violence. Doing so, Enables you to assess the severity of these risks and prioritise them to develop strategies to effectively eliminate them, creating a safer work environment.

Training and Awareness

To prepare individuals for lone working, you must first ensure that they have thorough training on the correct safety procedures, emergency responses, and the proper use of any equipment they will be using to properly carry out their job.

After following a comprehensive training plan, lone workers should be able to recognise potential hazards and know how to respond effectively. Afterwards, regular refresher training can help to keep their safety knowledge up-to-date, reminding them of the potential risks they may face.

Smartlog Laptop on the desk

Access to Communication

When someone is working on their own, communication is extremely important. It is crucial to establish robust communication systems, including regular check-ins by phone (or other instant communication devices), GPS tracking, or even emergency alert systems. Ensuring that lone workers can quickly and easily call for help in the event of an emergency is crucial to mitigating the risks.

Emergency Procedures

In more detail, you should clearly define emergency procedures which are tailored to lone working scenarios. This includes knowing who to contact, how to access emergency services, and the location of first aid kits. Having a clearly established and well-practiced emergency plan can make all the difference in a critical situation.

A pile of evacuation plans and fire alarms.

A Safe Working Environment

Ensure the working environment is safe and secure for lone workers. This includes keeping the workplace brightly lit, maintaining secure access points, and confirming all vehicles and work equipment are in good working condition. Regular inspections and maintenance can prevent breakdowns or accidents, and create a safer workplace.

Health and Psychological Support

You should keep on top of the health and well-being of lone workers, especially those in physically or mentally demanding roles. Often, lone working can lead to feelings of isolation or stress, and providing access to psychological support, such as counselling services or peer support groups, can help address and prevent these issues.

Encouraging regular social interaction, even if virtual, can also reduce feelings of isolation. For physical wellbeing, regular health check-ups can identify potential issues before they develop into anything more serious.

Different health metric symbols, signifying the importance of lone working support.

You should always ensure that you are fully compliant with health and safety regulations. This includes understanding your legal obligations as an employer, keeping up with all changes in legislation, and ensuring that all safety measures meet or exceed regulatory standards.

Remember, non-compliance can both jeopardise worker safety and lead to serious legal repercussions.

Encouraging Feedback

You should encourage regular feedback from lone workers to identify any areas of concern. Not only will this help them feel valued, but it will allow you to implement any improvements based on their experiences, helping to create a safer work environment. Also, remember to regularly review and update safety protocols to ensure that they remain effective.

By addressing all these health and safety considerations, you can ultimately create a safer and more supportive environment for lone workers in your organisation. Prioritising their wellbeing not only enhances productivity, but also demonstrates a clear commitment to their overall safety and security.

Winter Safety: Keeping Your Workplace Safe

Posted on by Charlie Patrick

With Winter fast approaching, how is the unpredictable weather impacting your workplace safety? From an increase in slips and trips from icy walkways to a lack of focus caused by inadequate clothing in the cold, keeping your employees safe this winter can be challenging.

It is crucial to plan ahead and foresee the potential risks that can impact your working safety, therefore we will now dive into some of the key things to look out for to ensure your workplace’s safety this winter.

Close up of a half gritted walkway, with snow on the righthand side and a person walking on the left.

Visibility

With darker and longer nights becoming the norm, it is vital that you ensure good visibility around your workplace. This will help you to avoid any slips and trips from poor lighting, or injuries from not knowing someone else is around.

So to avoid these situations, keep your site well-lit (especially around walkways), so people can easily identify any hazards in their paths, and also introduce high-visibility clothing if needed, to ensure that everyone can be seen – this is particularly important when working with machinery.

But also make sure you don’t overlook low-traffic areas, as often these can be the most dangerous. And if you need to, shadow colleagues to ensure that you are keeping your workforce safe throughout the day.

Heavy rain in the night sky lit up by a floodlight.

Changing Weather

In winter the weather is often unpredictable, making it challenging to upkeep a safe workplace, quickly jumping between icy winds, sudden downpours and freezing temperatures. Therefore, ensure that you evaluate the working environment carefully before carrying out any tasks. Consider whether the conditions and your personnel’s experience are adequate to safely complete the tasks at hand, or if there are better times to take on those riskier tasks eg. such as working at heights or during cold nights.

To combat the rainy weather, it is also critical to introduce anti-slip flooring, particularly around doorways as wet floors are often a recipe for slips, regardless of the wider conditions.

Ice and Dropping Temperatures

Arguably the most dangerous risk that Winter brings to your safety is ice and sub-zero temperatures, which quickly develop into new hazards and risks across your workplace. If these are not correctly dealt with, they can harm your working safety. However, one of the most effective ways of dealing with the dropping temperatures is through pre-emptive action.

During the colder months, staying on top of the upcoming weather forecast is crucial to safely planning out what your workplace needs in order to keep safe this Winter. So when low temperatures are forecast, make sure to grit your walkways the day before and ensure that all of your walkways are as clean and dry as possible. This gives you the best chance to avoid any icy or slippery floors, helping you fight back against any slips and trips – which is the leading cause of workplace injury.

Another crucial step to keeping your employees safe is ensuring that they are well-dressed to deal with the temperatures, especially when working for long periods outside. This can be done by encouraging them to keep warm and take regular breaks inside when it is especially cold.

Finally, when dealing with ice and snow you should encourage people to actively think about their winter safety. Whether it’s avoiding shortcuts off the gritted pathways, planning ahead to prevent rushing around, or even considering the best times for each task, to keep them as safe as possible.

An example of poor winter safety precautions where a man has slipped on an icy pathway.

Communication

But the final, most powerful tool you have when it comes to health and safety is communication. Regularly asking your employees, or even shadowing them for a while will potentially give you a new perspective on the safety of your workplace. Ensuring that they feel safe and at a comfortable temperature throughout the day is also crucial to workplace morale and safety; helping them stay focused and always remain health and safety conscious.

To conclude, keeping your staff safe throughout the winter should be critical to all businesses. Although it does come with its unique set of challenges, with the correct pre-planning and monitoring, these actions will significantly improve your workplace safety, aiding your Risk Assessments and checks to ensure you keep your employees safe this Winter.

The Importance of PPE in Your Workplace

Posted on by Charlie Patrick

PPE plays a vital role in keeping people safe at work by protecting the individual from risks that can’t be eliminated through standard risk mitigation. However, this makes it crucial to understand when and where it is needed to ensure your organisation’s health and safety practices are up to standard. So, let’s dive into it.

A safety helmet demonstrating an example of PPE.

What is PPE?

First, let’s cover the basics: Personal Protective Equipment –  often referred to as PPE, is all equipment intended to be used by a person at work to protect them from the risks present in their working environment.

This includes everything protecting you from hazards, such as high-vis clothing for conditions with poor visibility, to harnesses protecting you when working at height; no matter the severity of the risks it’s protecting you from.

When must PPE be used?

PPE must be used to ensure that any remaining risks/hazards, identified in your risk assessments, are adequately controlled, and should only be used when the risks cannot be eliminated by other means. This is due to the other means of risk mitigation being safer and more effective.

If you can avoid or eliminate the risks directly, this creates a much safer environment than applying protective measures; making PPE most suitable as a ‘last resort’ option. This is also reinforced by the HSE placing it last in its hierarchy of controls:

“Elimination – physically remove the hazard

Substitution – replace the hazard

Engineering controls – isolate people from the hazard

Administrative controls – change the way people work

PPE – protect the worker with personal protective equipment”

This makes the use of PPE necessary in high-risk environments such as construction sites, where for example, falling objects and moving machinery can’t be eliminated as a risk, making a hard hat, high-vis clothing and steel-capped shoes the minimum requirement.

A variety of PPE displayed out on a table, showing protective boots, gloves, ear protection, safety glasses, a hard hat and a high-vis jacket.

What does the legislation say?

The use of PPE is covered in many different laws and regulations, however the main two safety acts are the Health and Safety at Work Act 1974 (HSWA), and the Personal Protective Equipment at Work Regulations 1992 (PPER).

The HSWA prioritises creating a safe environment for your staff with risk mitigation and training, highlighting your duty to provide the necessary equipment and the training/knowledge to achieve this. Whilst the PPER goes into more detail with the requirements:

“Every employer shall ensure that suitable personal protective equipment is provided to his employees who may be exposed to a risk to their health or safety while at work except where and to the extent that such risk has been adequately controlled by other means which are equally or more effective.” – PPER 4.1

This regulation specifies the employers’ duty to provide suitable PPE to protect the employees when any risks are unavoidable and pose a present health and safety hazard.

However, it is crucial for the equipment to be in good working condition, and critical that the staff is trained to safely assess and use the provided equipment. This is because misuse of PPE results in thousands of injuries across the UK every year.

Workers having a safety debrief, covering the importance of PPE usage.

The Importance of PPE

PPE is the crucial last step in your organisation’s health and safety, protecting from the remaining hazards in your workplace to ensure that your staff remain safe. With the right training and maintenance, PPE provides effective protection to help prevent incidents and encourage a safer working environment.

How To Prevent The Most Common Workplace Hazards

Posted on by Charlie Patrick

The working environment is constantly evolving, making it challenging to keep on top of health and safety. But with reports showing that almost 4 million working days are lost because of injuries every year in the UK, the presence of these common workplace hazards are clear.

Although every workplace has its own unique set of hazards, here are the most common workplace hazards that are likely lurking in your environment.

Slips, Trips and Falls

Accounting for almost a third (32%) of all injuries in 2023, slips, trips and falls are the most common cause of workplace injury in the UK, despite being one of the simpler hazards to spot and prevent.

One of the key preventative measures is ensuring good visibility. You should make sure that everyone can clearly see their path ahead, allowing them to double-check for any hazards eg. wet surfaces, objects in the way, uneven ground or steps. Areas should also be well-lit with walkways kept clear and dry, therefore ensuring that the path ahead can be seen.

It is also important to highlight any ‘problem areas’ to alert others to be more attentive. Some common methods to highlight these areas are:

  • Signs – ‘Wet floor’ signs or ‘Caution when wet’ signs are some of the most widely used options.
  • Highlighting steps – often bright grip tape is placed on ledges to highlight the elevation change to prevent trips.
  • Slip-resistant flooring – Commonly placed near entrances to stop wet walkways from becoming a hazard.
Safety tape on a staircase.

Fire Hazards

Fires remain a persistent and common hazard to businesses across the country, with a reported 22,000 workplace fires every year. To combat this, regular employee training is a necessity, and this can be done as a group session or online via a fire safety training course. Afterwards, taking this training periodically will refresh your employees’ knowledge.

It is also necessary to ensure that countermeasures are accounted for in case of a fire breaking out. This means checking your fire alarms and fire extinguishers regularly for damage, ensuring they are unobstructed and functional. Additionally, an evacuation plan should be in place, ensuring that everybody has a safe route out of the building – with any assistance necessary if needed.

Man inspecting a fire extinguisher, to monitor the common workplace hazard

Electrical Hazards

Often forgotten, electrical hazards can pose a huge risk to your workplace safety if not regularly maintained. Shorting out circuits could potentially cause safety systems to fail, thereby increasing the risk of fires.

Simple yet regular checks are often the best way to keep on top of electrical risks, with formal maintenance and inspections carried out by a professional when necessary. Some key areas to check regularly are:

  • Cables – are they all intact and insulated correctly, with no signs of damage?
  • Outlets – are they in good condition and properly grounded?
  • Overloading – are the outlets overloaded?
Overloaded electrical outlet creating an electrical hazard

Ergonomic Hazards

Ergonomics often get disregarded when it comes to health and safety, but with almost half a million workers suffering from work-related musculoskeletal disorders every year in the UK, their importance is clear. Despite this high prevalence, it is one of the easier risks to eliminate.

Increasing awareness is the most common method to mitigate the hazards in the workplace, as employees can take more responsibility of their own workspace and adjust it accordingly. The best way to raise awareness among your staff is through training. A short eLearning course can effectively cover everything they need to know, and also gives you a record of when that was last completed.

Following on from the training, staff will then need to alter their workspaces to suit. This will involve adjusting everything from screen height for office workers to introducing equipment for heavy lifting for the more active sectors. Accommodating these changes will eliminate the ergonomic hazards, helping you prevent any injuries occurring because of poor ergonomics.

Poor ergonomics due to poor workplace hazard management

By identifying and eliminating these common workplace hazards, it can massively benefit both your business and your employees. This will help you to create a much safer and more efficient working environment, which will boost not only your business’s productivity but also its reputation. These implementations can all take place whilst also improving your staff’s morale and well-being by taking the ‘edge’ off your working environment; making it feel safer, whilst reducing staff injury and ill-health.

Sources:

HSE (2023) ‘Health and Safety at work statistics’. Available at: https://www.hse.gov.uk/statistics/overview.htm (Accessed: 27/06/2024)

Dorset Fire Protection (2023) ‘Common Causes of Workplace Fires’. Available at: https://dorsetfireprotection.co.uk/common-causes-workplace-fires/ (Accessed: 27/06/2024)

How To Build An Online Training Course

Posted on by Charlie Patrick

Building an online training course can be a fantastic way to deliver training to your staff, allowing you to personalise and customise the learning experience, to ensure that all users take in all necessary information. However, that being said it is crucial to prepare properly before creating any eLearning course, to ensure that your courses deliver the required lessons. As often jumping straight into the creation phase, will result in missing content and ultimately a lower-quality course.

A user learning how to build an online training course

1. Course Objectives

Establishing what you want to teach is the first and the most crucial aspect of building an eLearning course. This ensures that the course covers all the crucial lessons that you need to teach, whilst allowing you to plan out how to best achieve this.

Start by setting the objectives of the course, these don’t have to be listed at the start of the course, but it can be helpful to establish to the learners what the key takeaways are. So what are the key lessons you are covering?

  • Filling in gaps of knowledge?
  • Teaching a user how to use something?
  • Where are health and safety measures required?
  • Site specific considerations/information?

2. Research

Research is the next important step in creating your own eLearning course. As before you start to piece together your course, you need to make sure that what you are teaching is correct. This will ensure that you fully understand the course content and iron out any mistakes/gaps in your knowledge to make sure that your training is as high quality as possible.

This step may not be necessary depending on the course content, so use your discretion. However, even if you are experienced in the subject at hand, finding credible sources to back up your statements only adds to the validity of your course, whilst ensuring that your learners can trust what they’re being taught.

A magnifying glass on a keyboard symbolising research

3. Audience and Format

When building your own online training course it provides an unmatched opportunity to tailor the content and format to your audience. This will also help condense the course, helping you to avoid being that dreaded training course that is too drawn out for its own good. So factoring in your audience and altering the content and format to suit, is key to avoiding this and build a high-quality condensed training course.

This will also allow you to change the format to best suit their training needs. For example, if your online training course is primarily for an experienced workforce, then you can tailor the content to be more ‘recap-focused’, to keep their training as concise and engaging as possible. However this therefore wouldn’t be as suitable for new starters, potentially lacking the detail required to fill in any gaps, highlighting why considering your course audience is crucial to ensuring that it delivers on the objectives.

A user learning from a elearning course

4. Course Outline

Once you have your foundations of the content, it is key to plan out an outline for your course. This will help you determine the best way to deliver the lessons to get your point across.

Start out by placing the key slides into your Training Course Creator tool and reorder them until they sit logically – covering all the key points in the order in which they should be covered. This will ensure that your course doesn’t bounce between topics to often and keeps the learning organised into digestible sections.

5. Content

Once you have your key slides in order, its now time to fill out the bulk of the course. This is where you compile all of the previous steps and complete the course with all of the relevant content.

Be sure to keep this in-line with your audience and formatted to suit, to create the best learning experience. Attaching any media, information sources and site-specific knowledge where necessary. This will also help keep the course engaging, which is critical to creating the best learning environment.

6. Quiz Questions and Types (Knowledge Checks)

With the bulk of the online training course now built, you can now test your learner’s knowledge. This is crucial to ensure that they have learnt the course content and meet the level of knowledge required to pass the course.

There are many ways in which questions can be integrated into the course, so make sure to consider the options to find the most appropriate fit. This means considering:

  • How many questions are needed?
  • How are the questions going to be spaced out?
    • Is one big block appropriate?
    • Do you space them out evenly?
    • Are short ‘Knowledge Checks’ the best fit?
  • What question types are you using?
    • Multiple choice
    • Drag and Drop
    • Sortable lists
  • What are the key topics to test for?
Puzzle question piece

7. Quality Checks

Finally, you need to check the quality of the course, ensuring that it works as intended, with no errors throughout the course, whether that is a weird glitch in the test questions or certificates not being awarded properly. This is also where you can refer back to the course objectives you set in the earlier steps, ensuring that the training delivers on its goals and has no content missing or being skimmed over.

During this step it is also important to check for any grammatical or spelling errors as well as formatting errors – are the pictures high quality? Are linked videos running smoothly? Is there any clipping or weird text placement?

Conclusion

Overall, there are many steps that go into the creation, research and formatting of an engaging high-quality training course. But these steps are crucial to ensuring the course lives up to the many benefits of custom courses and make it worth the added effort. When done correctly creating an eLearning course provides a unique learning opportunity and will enhance your training standard.

How to stay aware of Asbestos

Posted on by Charlie Patrick

Asbestos, we have all heard of it but what actually is it?

Asbestos is a material used in older construction and when disturbed it releases tiny fibres into the air, which become extremely dangerous if inhaled. The material comes in many different forms and can be found in buildings built before the 2000s.

It was commonly used as insulation but is now a banned product in construction, with it being completely banned in 1999. Some common places it was used are:

  • Fireproof panels
  • Cement roofing materials
  • Sprayed insulating coatings on metalwork
  • Pipe insulation
Discarded asbestos material

The risks of asbestos

The main and most dangerous risk of asbestos is inhaling the fibres, this can lead to fatal lung diseases. However, this means it is only a threat when the material is disturbed, so if it is left alone, it poses little to no risk but should be respected.

Staff are particularly at risk of this as they will be the ones moving around your site and interacting with everything. This could put them in a situation where they are exposed to it directly, highlighting why it is important for staff to be aware of the risks.

The workplace as a whole is also at risk to asbestos, as if disturbed it could potentially harm anyone in the vicinity and will require that area to be shut off and assessed. Potentially harming workflow and productivity while the issue is ongoing.

How to prevent the risks

As part of “The Control of Asbestos Regulations 2012” the law states that the duty-holder of non-domestic premises must ensure:

  • The type of asbestos is identified and the condition of it.
  • The risks are assessed, and control measures introduced to reduce the risk of exposure
  • They protect anyone using or working on the premises from the risks of asbestos
  • Findings are recorded in an asbestos register

Risk prevention can be simplified into a few practices, one of which is providing information. You should be transparent with your staff both teaching them about the risks and informing them on where it is located in your premises. This can be done by providing information on the risks or more simply an asbestos awareness course. Your asbestos register should also detail where it is present on your premises so you can either show them that or talk them through the relevant locations.

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Asbestos should only be handled by licensed professionals, so make sure your staff know what to do if they find or worst case are contaminated with asbestos. This should be part of their awareness course and all staff should be aware if they are at risk.

Finally, if a staff member finds unknown asbestos they should stop immediately, warn others to keep out of that area and quickly report the finding to the manager. Where they can take the necessary steps to ensure the area is as safe as possible (this includes both a risk assessment – identifying the type and dangers and a plan to mitigate the impact).

Conclusion

Asbestos has the potential to be dangerous, however, with correct care and management, the risks it possesses can be minimised. As long as the correct measures have been taken to reduce the risks – such as a thorough risk assessment, an asbestos register and complete staff training – the risks will be minimal to both your staff and business, but it still must be treated with respect.

References

HSE (2023) ‘Introduction to Asbestos’. Available at: https://www.hse.gov.uk/asbestos/intro.htm (Accessed: 27/11/2023)

Why Health and Safety is crucial for all businesses

Posted on by Charlie Patrick

Every year, hundreds of thousands of people get injured, develop an illness or are killed at work. Although these numbers are mostly trending downwards over time, year-by-year the lives of many people are permanently changed through often through unsafe working conditions and employer negligence.

Health and safety risks can be found in every working environment, so all business owners are required to provide a workplace that is both safe for employees and the public.

However, these risks vary in severity, therefore it is recommended that companies use Risk Assessments and also take preventative measures in order to reduce the risks identified, regardless of their severity.

Whilst some may find the overall process to be time-consuming and, in some cases unnecessary, keeping everybody safe and healthy should be a priority for any organisation – good health and safety practices can boost overall productivity along with making staff feel safe and cared for.

With this in mind, we have put together some of the ways in which good health and safety practices can help.

Preventing Accidents

In 2022, the Health and Safety Executive (HSE) reported that around 565,000 employees suffered an injury at work, with 150,000 of these people being absent for at least 7 days due to their injury and over 6 million working days being lost.

These statistics show the direct relationship between safety in the workplace and productivity. Every time an employee is absent, it costs the employer both money and resources, which is one of the reasons why avoiding injuries through good risk management should be a top priority for organisations.

It should be noted that not all of the accidents within these statistics will be due to poor health and safety practices, but it is likely to be a key factor.

The effects of stress

Research has found a link between stress and poor health, especially the low-level, chronic stresses often found within the workplace. As well as potentially leading to sickness and absence, due to a weakened immune system, stress can also be demotivating which can lead to employees becoming less productive.

Some of the main factors that contribute to workplace stress include:

  • feeling powerless (no control over your current situation)
  • feeling as if you are wrong for your job
  • witnessing traumatic events within the workplace
  • a poor working environment

Although health and safety practices do not cover all of these issues, any way in which you can relieve stress for your workers will not only benefit them individually, but also the business.

Creating a safe working environment

The conditions of a working environment can affect productivity in a variety of different ways. For example, employees that are often uncomfortable are not going to work to the best of their ability.

On top of that, certain conditions can even affect the health and safety of your employees and therefore lead to absence. Environmental factors which can cause this include:

  • temperature
  • humidity
  • lighting
  • air quality
  • bathroom facilities
  • the presence of dangerous particles (such as asbestos or moulds)

All of these need to be factored into a business’ health and safety practices, with measures in place to protect employees from the risks identified.

The impact on reputation

Health and safety is also a key aspect of a business’ reputation, which can either be positively or negatively affected by your health and safety standards.

Companies that have a reputation of providing a safe working environment, are more likely to be respected and therefore favoured by potential employees. The same is also true of the opposite; a business with a poor reputation for health and safety is less likely to attract workers.

With more avenues for public reviews such as social media channels, and companies such as Glassdoor providing a platform for current or former employees to provide first-hand insight into a business’ practices, the potential for reputational damage is bigger than it has ever been. Additionally, for more serious incidents, the HSE publishes a list of all convictions and notices which is publicly available to view.

Health and safety reputation is also built into the way customers perceive companies, which in turn will affect their choices concerning your products or services. This perception could stop customers from buying a business’ product, therefore creating another crucial reason to upkeep your health and safety standards.

Conclusion

Health and safety can often be complex, and therefore requires good management and commitment. Good practices will not only safeguard your employees and your customers but will also help protect your organisation from lapses in morale and productivity.

Bibliography

HSE (2022) ‘Health and safety statistics’. Available at: https://www.hse.gov.uk/statistics/ (Accessed: 06/07/2023)

NHS Inform (2022) ‘Handling Stress’. Available at: https://www.nhsinform.scot/mind-to-mind/handling-stress (Accessed: 06/07/2023)

Glassdoor (2023) ‘About Us’. Available at: https://www.glassdoor.com/about/ (Accessed: 07/08/2023)

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