CreditWe’ve all heard the tales of what happens when you suffer an accident at work. However, we rarely hear the other side of the story from the business owner’s point of view. It can be very scary when an employee has suffered as a result of your company’s poor foresight, and you probably will feel quite guilty about it. However, it’s happened now, so it’s time to move on. Here are a few things you need to start thinking about.
First of all, you need to ensure you treat work accidents accordingly. If they haven’t been severely harmed, break out the first aid kit and treat them as needed. If your staff don’t know where the first aid kit is located, you’ve made a mistake somewhere. They should always know where to find first aid in the workplace. You need to record the accident in an accident book of some kind to make sure you’ve got a record of it. If the accident is severe, you must instantly call for medical attention for the fallen employee. Do not be tempted to tamper with the accident scene in any way, unless it might directly affect the employee or other employees.
Depending on the country you live in, you’ll need to do any number of things next. You will almost always be required to inform the necessary parties of what has occurred. From here, it will normally be determined whether an investigation into what happened is necessary or not. Again, this will depend on the severity of the injury and the type of accident that has taken place.
CreditOnce this has happened, it’s time to start looking at why the accident occurred. You should prepare a thorough risk assessment to look at the reasons why, and how to prevent it from happening in the future. It could be anything, from damaged equipment to employee negligence. Whatever it is, you’ve gone wrong somewhere, and you must implement new strategies in the future to ensure it never happens again. Use this as a chance to reconsider your health and safety policies, and you might even need to hire new staff to ensure the workplace is made even safer.
Even if the accident wasn’t the fault of an employee, now is a great time to hold a few training days. We’ve already mentioned that everyone should know the location of first aid kits, so make sure this is the case. Also, basic first aid training could save the life of one of your employees one day, so consider implementing this. You also need to make sure all employees understand how to use equipment safely without hurting themselves. Don’t be disappointed that you failed to do this in the first place; just make sure you do it now.
Accidents happen, and that’s a simple fact of life. Don’t beat yourself up too much, but use this opportunity to change things for the better. You can’t change what happened, but you can make sure that no one has to suffer from the same type of accident in the future.
