U.S. manufacturing companies reported 326,400 non-fatal work injuries in 2023, resulting in around 67 lost workdays per injury. These injuries are not only costly but have a major impact on productivity, as manufacturing companies suffer over 21 million days lost of employee productivity. Although the figures show progress, it is crucial for industry professionals to be equipped with the correct methods to minimize safety incidents. Technology is key, and tools are readily available that can effectively enhance the culture of health and safety in the manufacturing workplace, specifically among newer and younger employees.
Like an iceberg, manufacturing production facilities and processes involve much more below the surface than what is initially apparent. The same goes for safety measures. Personal protective equipment (PPE) is a standard, bare minimum measure, but manufacturing professionals should consider cultivating a mature safety culture within their facilities by following safety procedures that go beyond basics and create a workforce-centric environment.
It is no secret that the industry is facing a major skilled-labor shortage, with up to 4 million job vacancies needing to be filled by 2030. This potential surge of younger and inexperienced workers will only heighten safety risks, as 30% of all injuries occur within the first year of a new recruits’ experience.
Training shapes how safely an employee will perform, but onboarding is not the only process that requires attention for maintaining health and safety procedures. Adult learners need more than outdated, ineffective training methods such as a classroom environment. The training carried out as compliance sees learners understand, retain, and recall key safety details to their stations, but only when necessary, and can be limiting to long term safety. As part of the safety pillar training program, reports and audits again fall short of inspiring workers to reach their set targets.
Using the Safety Maturity Curve to measure a company’s safety culture
Creating a strong culture around health and safety in the manufacturing industry is key. Unfortunately, many organizations are in the very early stages of maturing their safety culture. Manufacturers can measure how mature their safety culture is using the Bradley Curve of Organizational Safety Maturity. The Safety Maturity Curve is a four-phased model designed to measure the sophistication of an organization’s health and safety programs, procedures, and workflows, highlighting how a proactive and collective approach can help reduce the number of incidents.
Early in an organization’s safety maturity journey, the focus is on compliance-based practices and meeting regulations — safety measures are minimal, and responses are primarily related to incidents. By contrast, a mature organization takes a more proactive, preventative approach where there is a collective responsibility. In these companies, safety is a core organizational value integrated into all levels of operations and decision-making.
Manufacturers can ensure that safety is a core business value by implementing proactive measures, continuous improvement, and employee engagement. Although a strong safety culture requires strong leadership, it is important to avoid a top-down mentality, where safety measures are imposed, and near misses are punished. By empowering employees to take ownership of safety, the right behavior will follow.
Digital tools for improving safety
Connected worker platforms give frontline workers access to continuous learning, communication, and productivity tools right at their workstations. These apps make it easy to document and centralize safety standards in a visual format that is easy to understand, retain, and access. Once set up, these one-point safety lessons can be easily accessed through a QR code — when and where they are needed.
Beyond formal training, safety practices should be built into daily work using task checklists, which are useful for critical tasks such as Lock-Out/Tag-Out. Unfortunately, when these checklists are done manually on paper, steps are often skipped. Digital checklists are faster to access and complete and give real-time visibility into what is happening on the factory floor.
Similarly, inspections and audits done on paper are problematic. As team members conduct important safety checks, whether a fire extinguisher inspection or a safety walk, the purpose is to gain insights into safety risks. Data collected manually can only be analyzed when it is keyed into safety databases — wasting safety managers’ time, which could be put to better use.
Near-miss and safety-based observation reporting helps further reveal opportunities to take preventative action. For this reason, management should do everything possible to encourage reporting. Unfortunately, when reporting is done on paper, workers are less inclined to submit reports because it takes time to find and complete the right form. When near misses are submitted through a connected worker platform, notifications can be automatically sent out so that action can be taken immediately. The digital audit trail also helps ensure accountability, traceability, and visibility — fostering confidence among workers that the reports they submit are being acted upon.
Daily scrums are a great opportunity to remind team members of safety best practices. To complement these in-person moments, digital communication, directly to workers in the news feed of a connected worker app helps to further reinforce a strong safety culture. News posts can include a celebration of days without incidents, recognition of a team member reporting a critical risk, or notification that a new safety instruction has been published to address a newly identified risk.
Universal safety for all
Investing in workplace safety culture is both a moral imperative and a strategic business priority. By empowering workers in support of a safer factory floor, a company will:
- Keep work safe: When everyone is collectively empowered and responsible to promote safe work, workplace incidents and injuries go down. In fact, the companies with the most safety maturity often enjoy near-zero incidents.
- Go above and beyond playing by a rulebook: Manufacturers that do not view regulations as checkbox exercises but rather meet and exceed requirements will be the ones that avoid costly fines, sanctions, and operational disruptions.
- Boost workplace efficiency: With an average of 67 lost workdays per injury, it is clear how quickly productivity can improve by preventing accidents from occurring. The shortage of of skilled workers makes it even more important to ensure that every team member can show up to work each day and perform at their best.
- Encourage a healthy work culture: Safety has always been one of the main concerns among factory workers, with 71% of employees stating that their job is dangerous. But by adopting a tech-supported safety culture, manufacturers become more attractive to potential employees and encourage current employees to stay. In today’s labor shortage, attracting a skilled workforce is key to maintaining high standards of quality and productivity.
Putting knowledge into practice — the safety cycle
The value of using a comprehensive connected worker platform to engage workers in safety practices is huge. Integrating safety training delivery, skills tracking, reporting, and inspections into a single, worker-centric platform helps maximize adoption and creates a constant feedback loop through which the organization can improve. Workers’ reporting on safety observations can be used to identify training gaps and priorities. Reporting also facilitates sharing of safety best practices across shifts, lines, and sites — vastly expanding valuable safety knowledge across the entire organization at scale.
Achieving health and safety culture maturity
A mature safety culture suggests a shared accountability for maintaining training procedures in the workplace when it comes to health and safety regulations. But this accountability is not possible without encouragement. Connected worker apps are a proven method that is not only engaging for frontline workers but an innovative way to maintain and promote work safety.
Maintaining safety is vital in manufacturing because of the industry’s ever-changing machinery and continual workforce turnover. Technology such as connected worker apps can influence and enhance human-focused safety schemes. With the support of this technology, manufacturers can more easily nurture a safe workplace as well as drive efficiency and productivity, which will lead to success for the business in the long run.
