Teaching Material Versus Training In Safety

In 1999, new training regulations for forklift operation took effect, and since that time, the number of operators and workmen that have been injured or killed by either forklifts or the materials they were handling has dropped. Companies have still been mired down with an exorbitant amount of lawsuits, and plaintiffs that have been awarded millions, and it’s more than likely that you will have heard of incidents like this in the news.

Historically, the biggest issue with safety in the workplace has been because companies pay more attention to a compliance to safety regulations instead of changing the unsafe behaviors of their employees.

So it’s understandable that a company will become hyper-focused on the primary costs of safety violations, lawsuits and fines. Conversely, making changes that shift the focus to a safer workplace, including the mind-set of the employees involved saves a lot more money for companies when looking at the bigger picture.

When companies make their safety goal a simple satisfaction of compliance with OSHA regulations, they miss the bigger picture. Training should be an ongoing and perpetual motion machine. The reason is simple: warehouses are not stagnant; they constantly change and evolve with new equipment, personnel, facilities, products, procedures, etc.

With each change, there is almost always some sort of training that needs to occur in order to ensure that each and very employee is familiar with the changes.

According to OSHA guidelines, each time that a significant change occurs that could affect the safety during the operation of a truck, re-training with a new forklift training course must occur. This is a vague definition that could be defined as changing the products kept in the facility, to how those products are handled or stored.

The standard proactive of having an annual training day for your operators doesn't even come close to keeping your company in compliance with regulations, but, just as importantly in a fiscal sense, it does not keep your warehouse operating at its best level in the areas of safety and productivity

In order to make the biggest impact, we need to look at the core differences in teaching versus training. To train means to instruct in order to make the student proficient, while teaching means to simply show a student what to do to or how to do it.

Historically, most in-house "training programs" are nothing more than a "teaching session". Let's start at the beginning with a properly trained instructor. OSHA requires that any person who instructs an operator training course or evaluation of a trainee has a complete understanding or the forklift training course, knowledge and experience in order to impart those same things onto another industrial operator.

A basic three-day course on safety for operators is simply not enough to qualify a person as a trainer. It is imperative that a trainer has an abundance of knowledge and on-hand experience with every part of handling the equipment and the operation. Equally important, is the trainer's ability to take that knowledge and relay it to students in a way that is easily understood by trainees. Again, this would cultivate change if the goal were real training and not just compliance.

Again, training must be more than just one or two days worth of training session. Training needs to be included in the regular schedule of your organization. For more information on forklift truck training and course visit http://www.aftt.co.uk.

In order to institute an ongoing training program, a company needs to establish ownership at all levels. Change does not have to start in the corporate office; change can start at any level. Every single employee must be ware of the safety expectations and think big about how to change and improve safety conditions, and be able to approach management with their ideas.

They must also hold regular meetings as well. During safety meetings, new training needs should be discussed, as well as a review of OSHA regulations and your company's site-specific needs.

When management takes the time to walk around a work area with employees, it provides an opportunity for both parties to make note of improvement possibilities and changes. Regarding forklifts specifically you should ensure that daily inspections are mandatory.

During meetings and inspections, it is helpful to have a notetaker and keep a filing of them. Individual training records should be kept in each employees file, but it is advisable to keep just a simple data spreadsheet accessible of all training for all employees, what was covered, when the training occurred, and when recertification should be.

Safety is a big part of the routine and there are an infinite number of ways to keep safety reminders in front of your employees all the time. Companies can have contests, give out prizes, hang posters, print reminders on pay stubs, etc., the imagination has no limits on the avenues in which you can flood your employees with safety information, and make safety a part of their daily lives.