In honor of Health and Safety Week (formerly known as North American Occupational Safety and Health Week), we break down why workplace safety is important to employees – and why it should be a top area of focus for employers. Why is workplace safety important? The importance of safety at work is consistently ranked highly by employees as a chief concern. In industrial and manufacturing settings, there are a number of factors that can present risks and challenges to workplace safety, including:
- Proximity to moving parts – including machinery, equipment, workpieces and more
- Poor lighting or poor environmental hygiene
- The need for protective elements such as guard rails for walkways
- Poorly maintained or misused equipment
- Unclear safety procedures
- Lack of up-to-date safety training
- Uneven or otherwise unsafe walking surfaces
When you implement safety measures to address these and other challenges, employees in turn feel more confident and motivated that they will not be injured while on the job. Additional benefits of workplace safety measures include:
- Improved productivity
- Better-maintained equipment
- More efficient production
- Increased worker satisfaction and motivation
- Easier recruitment for open positions
You can implement workplace safety strategies through a few steps:
- Assess the current state of your facility and address any missing safety features or measures.
- Implement a dedicated maintenance strategy with safety at its core.
- Train and retrain workers on safety measures, equipment operation procedures and other key processes that are important for them to know.
Check out our infographic above for more facts on why workplace safety is important.
