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Vol 12, Issue 6            

June 2012

Greetings!  

 

Are you being diligent with your confined spaces? Read our Confined Space Awareness article to discover how to keep your confined space workers safe and healthy.

  

Bob Lapidus' Points to Ponder series continues this month 

with a look at loss causes that may be generated by management and supervision.

    

Don't miss an issue, subscribe! You may also sign up to receive our other mailings including class updates and information on the Sacramento Regional Safety Forum and the Safety Forum of the Inland Empire. Save on your next training at Safety Center with the discount coupon below.

 

Confined Space AwarenessArticle
Confined Space Awareness
Confined Spaces or Confused Faces?
by Michael Estep, PhD, RescueTech
 

 

Despite the existence of regulations regarding confined space, there is still a rise in the rate of incidents resulting in loss of life.  Every employer has an obligation and duty to provide the appropriate levels of training and equipment, and to put in place an effective confined space program.

 

An effective confined space program is having the program in place in the work environment and being sure that it is effective and functioning daily.  Review the program annually to update and change it as needed.  A trained and experienced employee should be leading the confined space program to ensure its compliance with OSHA requirements.

 

Elements of an effective confined space program: 

  • Establish an OSHA compliant and effective program. 
  • Get proper training that meets the needs of your specific workplace. 
  • Have the appropriate equipment and PPE for employees. 
  • Provide proper guidance and support to those who work in confined spaces. 
  • Review and keep your program updated.
  • Provide frequent and effective ongoing training. 
  • Provide for appropriate entry and non-entry rescue. 
  • Evaluate the effectiveness of your program on an annual basis by reviewing all entries over the course of the previous year. 

Investing in training is the key to equipping employees with the critical skills and abilities for working safely inside these deadly spaces. For further information on confined space consultation services or training, please contact Quen or
Kei at Safety Center Incorporated, Sacramento, CA at
916-366-7233. 

Points to Ponderpsi

Loss Causes That May Be Generated

By Management and Supervision: 

Decision Making - Improperly Evaluating a Problem  

By Bob Lapidus, CSP, CSMS 

 

In the old days, whenever an employee was injured on the job, the employee was typically blamed for the injury and his or her immediate supervisor was blamed for not training the employee properly.  Today such blaming still goes on in some organizations, but many 21st century companies now see the light.

 

The light illumines the fact that an employee error is, in most cases, the final trigger that causes an injury to occur. There is now a true realization that employees can literally be set up to make that final error.

 

There are four major categories establishing the parameters around those loss causes that may be generated by management and supervision setting up employees to get hurt on the job.  These categories are: 

  1. Decision Making
  2. Accountability
  3. Facilities, Equipment, Materials
  4. Knowledge, Skills, Judgment

Decision making includes those choices managers and supervisors make that negatively affect how an employee performs or how a work environment is managed.

 

Making an incorrect decision (error or omission) can be based on such things as:

  1. Improperly evaluating a problem
  2. Not creating expectations, policies, procedures or rules
  3. Creating improper expectations, policies, procedures or rules
  4. Not giving employees authority to take preventive action
  5. Placing unreasonable pressures or demands on employees
  6. Not providing an adequate number of employees to do the job, task or activity
  7. Not following their own expectations, policies, procedures or rules
  8. Not correcting an already-identified problem 

Improperly evaluating a problem often leads to many erroneous decisions.   We make thousands of decisions every day.  Some decisions are as trivial as turning left versus turning right.  Other decisions can deal with life and death situations for us and others. 

 

Most of our decisions are made on the spur of the moment as we go about our day.  On the other hand, some decisions should not be made quickly, especially those decisions affecting the safety of our fellow employees. 

 

We should take our time to gather all the facts and details of the situation.  What are the ramifications of deciding to do one thing as opposed to another?  Evaluating a problem means understanding the root reasons why the situation is the way it is.  Knowing the reasons why a certain condition exists will help target the causes for the condition, and therefore help us make the better decision.

 

In the field of safety, many of our decisions are based upon what standards, codes and regulations require us to do.  Remember many times such governmental directives are just the minimum.  Often we need to decide to provide a higher level of safety for our employees to ensure they are not hurt.

  

In future articles, we will further discuss loss causes that may be generated by management and supervision.  The ideas for these articles come from Safety Center's course Safety Management for Employees-Who-Supervise, created and conducted by Bob Lapidus, CSP, CSMS, Safety Management Consultant.

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Video of the Month:
 

C46 Confined Space Entry

Many workplaces contain spaces that are considered "confined" because their configurations hinder the activities of employees who must enter, work in and exit from them. This video addresses the major areas needed to comply with OSHA standards on entering, exiting and working within confined spaces. 

DVD 20 min.

  

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