5 Tips for Improving Safety in a Manufacturing Facility

People get injured at work every single day. Some of the injuries they suffer are just minor injuries while some of them turn out to be fatal. As at 27 September, 120 workers in Australia have been killed at work in 2017. Of course, it’s up to business owners to make sure their employees are safe during their work hours.   

This is especially the case with those who are running a manufacturing facility, where there’s just so many was an employee can get injured.   

That said, we composed a list of 5 tips are going to help you improve safety in your manufacturing facility.    

Come up with a company-wide safety policy  

If you want to make sure your employees are safe all the time during their work hours, you’ll have to create a safety policy for the entire company. You’ll need to embed the safety rules into the daily routine of your employees and make each of them aware of their responsibilities.   

If you want to come up with a safety policy, you’ll also have to encourage an open-door policy where each of the team members can talk about safety hazards and what can be done in order to deal with them.

Follow a proper lockout routine  

Another great way to protect your employees is to create a lockout routine that’s going to assure you that all the machines are properly turned off before everyone is out of the facility.   

If the machines aren’t turned off properly, there’s always a risk of them starting on their own and potentially injuring your employees. One of the best ways to make sure all of your equipment is turned off at the end of the day is to have employees who operate in their vicinity turn them off.   

Sometimes, they’ll have to undergo special training in order to be able to do this.  

Form a safety committee

Forming a safety committee in your company is something you simply can’t go wrong with when trying to improve safety. Your committee should be responsible for enforcing and educating workers on safety in your facility.   

Ideally, you should have at least one representative from each department in the committee and have them discuss safety every now and then. Many companies today have “set it and forget it” mentality, but you should make sure your committee actually meets regularly.  

Invest in wall and floor protection  

No matter what kind of work you do, there are probably quite a few machines in your facility that work on electricity. This means there’s always a risk of circuit incidents that can cause a fire. And if a fire starts, it’s very important that your floors and walls aren’t flammable.   

Many companies in Australia have decided to strip their floor and walls of wood and wallpaper and replace them with something non-flammable. If you want to do the same, your safest bet is to go for concrete and turn to commercial painters from Sydney who’ll apply epoxy paint to it.  

Write an emergency action plan

Having an emergency action plan is the key to keeping your employees safe. Of course, if there’s an emergency action plan, everyone will know what to do in case of a major emergency. This won’t only prevent your employees from getting injured but it might actually save lives in case something goes wrong.   

Just make sure everyone knows exactly what to do if a fire alarm goes on or there’s a toxic substance release. Also, besides a good emergency action plan, you’ll also need signs that will point to the nearest exit if there’s a need for partial or total evacuation.  

It’s very important that you understand that safety requires ongoing efforts and constant striving for excellence. So, be adaptive and ready to reevaluate your safety policy from time to time.