TOOLBOX TALK

workplace accident will hit home harder are likely Not because people are naturally averse to the word itself or the idea of being safe. I mean no one leaves home in the morning looking to kill or maim themselves or someone else by the day’s end. No, rather the opposite is the case, everyone desires nothing more than to return home safe and sound to their loved ones at the end of each day, whether from work, play or social engagements. Question then is why do we sometimes do things that endanger us and others around us? Things as mundane as not wearing seat belts, motorcycle crash helmets, driving within speed limits, using the mobile phone while driving, reading while descending or ascending the stairs and so on. Why? My guess is because safety is an intangible quantity, namely, we can’t touch it nor see it. We take it for granted until there is a change of state like when one is injured, something is broken or some emergency occurs resulting in some severe loss. Then safety becom...

Road traffic collisions (so called accidents) kill thousands of people in Nigeria every year. This is apart from thousands of others who are injured in the process, not to mention damage to property and the environment. Popular studies indicate that driver error is a major causal factor of upwards of about 80% of those crashes.That is to say that much volume of the total numbers could have been prevented if the drivers involved did the right thing and acted correctly, and n time. While it may be true that a driver's action or inaction plays a critical role in what eventually happens, it is also true only those with the necessary knowledge, skill, training and education are the likely likely to act correctly in time to avoid a looming disaster. Any driver short of good and proper schooling in the art of safe driving education  can on a good day be a problem to self and others. Unless it is possible to give what you do not have. For according to local authority sources, most dri...

Road traffic collisions (so called accidents) kill thousands of people in Nigeria every year, aside from thousands of others injured, not to mention damage to property and the environment as a result. It is estimated that in about 80% of those occurrences driver error is the principally the primary cause. That is to say that as many as eighty percent could have been prevented if drivers involved had acted differently when it mattered most. However, drivers can only prevent collisions if they know what to do to respond correctly in time to dangerous situations. Acting correctly in time comes with proper training and constant practice. Any driver not properly schooled in the art of safe driving is a problem to him/herself as well as to others because like they say, it is impossible to give what you do not have. According to local authority sources, most drivers plying our roads lack basic safe driving skills because they did not pass through approved or standard driver training sc...

This happens frequently with some business owners and senior managers in countless workplaces. “ No. I don’t want to hear about safety today, I am swamped". The real business is crying for my attention. So many things are going wrong all over the place all of a sudden. I have got to do something fast otherwise there might not even be a business left to talk about, much less your precious safety. We just have to take a scrubbing brush to the whole thing and give it a good shine. So this safety thing of yours just has to wait, am sorry. But where do I begin? See? It’s all falling apart and only the good Lord knows why. If only people will do what they’re supposed to do! This is one tough call, Bro. I won’t lie to you but there is no giving up – not on my watch anyhow, no way. They say a Spartan dies but never surrenders. Come to think of it I always wondered if there is any real sense in such a finite philosophy but, this is not Sparta. This here is Rollard Iron Works, Inc. ...

Emergencies are a part of life and they can happen anytime whether at work, home, on the road or in your community. So preparing for them ahead of time is the only sure way to take the sting out of what impact or effect they may be packing wherever, wherever. For an office block for example your Emergency Response Plan (ERP) should include the following: * Begin by drawing up emergency evacuation plans for each floor and make sure that they are conspicuously displayed for all to see * Ensure they are simple and easy to read and understand * Boldly mark the location of exits and fire/emergency appliances clearly * Appoint designated Fire/Emergency Wardens or Superintendents for each floor and assign specific emergency roles/duties * Train all occupants on orderly evacuation of the building in an emergency and post directional signs to designated safe muster zones for head count * Train occupants to avoid the temptation of trying to retrieve or save their valuables ...

  Once there has been some major occurrence with serious impact on people, assets and the environment, the next best thing from onlookers is to ask what caused it. Well truth is try as you will, there's never been just that single cause of any accident, be it at home, work, play or in the community. What usually happens is that a chain of seemingly small and inconsequential and unrelated events gang up over a space of time to explode in that single forceful reckoning commonly referred to as an accident. What caused it? The real failing is us not recognizing what is ahead after the series of inconsequential, unrelated events or subtle warning signs that intrude on our set daily routine. Take a simple case of a vehicle, dripping brake fluid from a pinhole leak in the hose connecting the reservoir to the chamber. Most drivers will be aware of it happening but will fail to grasp its ultimate importance to their own safety. Or better still, some will be willing to take a chance ...

What % of your operating budget do you save when you look the other way while unauthorized changes and deviations are a norm in the workplace under your supervision? Would you 5, 10, 15 or maybe 30%? You are not too sure how much, if anything at all? Well, it is highly unlikely that you will ever save on your Opex if employees are free to make up their own rules as they go along or can decide which step on the job comes next instead of what the approved procedures say. In fact working with scant regards for the Right Way of doing things condemns you to an ever spiraling  operating budget spend. Because you'll find that you are constantly grappling with 'digging a hole to fill a hole' throughout the life of  the project. In the end, there are no prizes for guessing that your project will come in grossly over budget and way outside the delivery schedule because of all the issues of rework, unplanned stoppages, delayed logistics, repairs and replace...

The Big Idea is you don't value it till you lose it. That's why all the feverish activities once there has been a so-called accident just so you can salvage what can be salvaged while searching out ways and means to prevent a future recurrence. And hoping that everyone concerned shall remain 'sufficiently scared straight' for the immediate times ahead and that lessons arising will remain eternally fresh to make the difference between doing the right and the wrong. But does it always pan out as envisaged? Well, not exactly. At least, not all the time. So you might then wonder why. You see, SAFETY is an intangible quantity (or shall I say, invisible quantity?)  so most people hardly notice when routine operations are smooth sailing i.e. no unplanned stoppages, no product loss or damage, and no dicey close calls. That is how you can tell that everyone is doing what they're supposed to be doing the right way. No errors, forced or unforced; no short cuts, no superior...

First word: They say it is not speed that kills but change in speed. Confused? Don’t be because simply put, if a vehicle travelling at 100km/hr is suddenly forced to 0km/hr in a few seconds, the results can be devastating. The occupants could be in for a lot of trouble especially if they were unrestrained by seatbelts while the vehicle was still in motion. That then is the logic behind the saying that it is not speed that kills but CHANGE in SPEED! Excessive speeds + Loss of control accounted for 35%+17% respectively i.e. 52% of crashes recorded in the country – Federal Road Safety Corps (FRSC) Corps Marshal. – (Jan-Nov. 2012). Speed Limits World Health Organization (WHO) identified the issue of speed as a risk factor in road traffic injuries, influencing the risk of a crash as well as the severity of injuries resulting. In fact, WHO and the Global Road Safety Partnership, in a publication, Speed Management: a Road Safety Manual for Decision Makers and Practitioners recomm...

Today, 865 000 people will either die or be injured doing their job. Every year, lost work days, medical treatment, workers’ compensation and rehabilitation of occupational injuries and diseases will cost $2.8 trillion. – Sandy Smith, 28 th . April 2016 International Labor Organization (ILO) Director-General Guy Ryder used the occasion of World Safety and Health at Work Day to remind us that ensuring decent, safe, and healthy working conditions and environments is the responsibility of us all. Ryder took office on Oct. 1, 2012 and sees the ILO as absolutely central to the questions of the day: jobs, social protection, the fight against poverty and equality. Ryder wants the ILO to play a role in difficult global situations – such as economic crisis – and on the national agendas of countries undergoing change, especially where the world of work is at stake. The news is punctuated periodically by intense coverage of dramatic, heartbreaking stories that capture global atten...

  First word: Dealing with contractors can be tricky in that there can be many a slip twit the operational cup and the lips by way of whose or which safety rule should apply, given that both parties have their own rulebooks on how safety is to be managed in their respective businesses. Such that if the two sides do not move to agree on a common front ahead of time they’re likely to end up with gaps and conflicts potentially harmful to the common interest as a situation of ‘one rule for them and one for us’ can rapidly take shape which can in turn, translate to different safety rules, different standards, different approaches, different interpretations and different philosophies within same work enclosure. Nothing leads to chaos and confusion faster than that, seeing how The Right to Choose is not exactly compatible with good workplace safety management. It places a serious and conspicuous question mark on the overall safety of the site. So if contractor employees feel that...

Managing safely is synonymous to safe and efficient production. Yet not many businesses make that connection until it’s too late. All too often they suffer a death blow before sitting down to examine what went wrong. Experience shows that Managers who pay little attention to safety only end up paying a big time price attending to all kinds of post-incident business loss activities. Issues like absenteeism, lost workdays, spiraling medical bills, sagging public image, poor workforce morale, increase insurance premiums, dwindling production and a shrinking bottom line. It follows that poor safety performance directly translates to poor returns on investment and you don’t have to look too far to see it or why. It’s clearly signposted all over the workplace place; in the employees’ body language, asset use and misuse, mounting unresolved environmental issues, etc. Like they say, you can run but you can’t hide because safety issues are like a pack of dominoes, one falls and they all...

First word : Time and time again chief executives and business owners moan buckets about how their safety programmes don’t seem to be working for no reason (or a lot of reasons!). They’ve tried every trick in the book but their people just won’t cotton on for reasons of laziness, hard headedness, indiscipline, lack of interest and so on. And after all the pile of money they’ve invested in safety for the workers' sake, including very attractive SAFETY INCENTIVE SCHEMES no dice. Incentives! Hmmm.. Do you reckon your people are that oblivious of the fact of what’s good for their health, safety and security at work? Or it’s a case of you going at them with a baseball bat each time, in the name of protecting them from their ‘death wish selves’? You really believe those guys look forward to being stretchered out to some hospital ER ward instead of returning home hale and hearty at the end of any work day? Think again boss. Things are not always what they seem. You see, your ways and ...

  Ok, let’s get real. Everybody has their pet challenge with safety, what yours? Money (obviously!), people, material, tools, work environment, client sales or what? In the circumstances, Safety is a ‘hated’ word for some, if not most, especially the small timers. Right now, times are HARD – extremely hard, no doubt! With no money anywhere and the business snoozing fitfully on the slow lane, what does anyone expect? In fact things are so bad that you feel like chucking in your hand and giving up for good. But what good would that do you and your outfit, and how clever is that anyway for a business strategy? Zero! And what’s the point of a self-knockout blow before your opponent’s first punch? Not very clever is it? So why not meet the challenge head-on, if only to give the business a fighting chance? You never know, after all attack is the best form of defense. Be bold and valiant therefore, go for it. Begin by asking yourself some illuminating questions. Why IS safety not a...

Managing safely is synonymous to safe and efficient production. Yet not many businesses make that connection until it’s too late. All too often they suffer a death blow before sitting down to examine what went wrong.   Experience shows that Managers who pay little attention to safety only end up paying a big time price attending to all kinds of post-incident business loss activities. Issues like absenteeism, lost workdays, spiraling medical bills, sagging public image, poor workforce morale, increase insurance premiums, dwindling production and a shrinking bottom line.   It follows that poor safety performance directly translates to poor returns on investment and you don’t have to look too far to see it or why. It’s clearly signposted all over the workplace place; in the employees’ body language, asset use and misuse, mounting unresolved environmental issues, etc. Like they say, you can run but you can’t hide because safety issues are like a pack of dominoes, one ...

And you don’t know why it’s happening. Well, not surprising. Plenty of businesses are in the same boat because they simply do not see the BIG picture. A Game for the Big Boys A number of small and medium scale enterprises, SMEs, tend to think that loss control is one massive mountain only scalable by the BIG BOYS! Nothing is further from the truth. The smaller you’re the bigger the hit on your operating resources as a result of hidden, silent operating losses you routinely incur. It may not be obvious to most but they do add up in the end. Because each time some material, tool or spares are misused, damaged, lost or misplaced in the cost of work, money goes down the drain. But not many know so because the system simply does not recognize or capture those as losses . Unrecorded, Insignificant Sundry Events In the end, thousands of operating dollars are lost to unrecorded, insignificant sundry events because they involved neither injury nor product loss/damage. So long as...

Smaller, Nippier and No Lights Coping with pedestrians in traffic can be big, big trouble because they are the most vulnerable of all road users. Motorists must take this fact into consideration each time they are out on the road. Because pedestrians do not have headlights, it is generally more difficult for them to see and be seen; especially at night and in poor weather conditions.   They are slower in acceleration but can stop faster and in shorter distances than any powered vehicle. Quicker on the turn and weighing a lot less than the smallest vehicle, they are more susceptible to serious injuries and permanent damage than all other road users combined in the event of a collision.   Easily Lost in Blind Spots Being relatively small in size, the pedestrian is easily lost in the driver’s pockets of vision, otherwise known as blind spots . Objects hidden in blindspots are always exposed to real danger while drivers are turning left or right, and w...