Three Steps To Developing A Health & Safety Learning Programme That Gets Results

Heashot of Aisling Miller By Aisling Miller, an expert in workplace learning and H&S provision, EcoOnline.

Manual handling training is widely provided here in the UK, and yet HSE statistics estimate there were 8.9 million days lost due to work-related musculoskeletal disorders in 2019/20.

The kneejerk reaction at many organisations hoping to protect their employees is to sign everyone up to a training course and consider the job done. However, training alone is not enough. A 2018 research review identified that, in controlled studies, workers who received manual handling training had a similar rate of lower back pain to those who hadn’t received any.[1]

This problem is not unique to manual handling training. Most people who have an accident have had safety training. So, the question remains: How can you ensure your workplace health and safety training programme is effective?

Simply put, managers need to think more strategically. It’s important to follow a cycle of preparation, delivery, transfer and measurement. Training is only one element of a first-class learning programme, the end goal of which is a competent workforce, carrying out their tasks without risk of harm.

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Here are three essential steps that will improve the effectiveness of your employees’ health and safety training:

Don’t carry out training in isolation

Leaders sometimes generalise training needs, for example deciding all staff should have the same H&S course, when different solutions might be more appropriate. For instance, if staff don’t wear protective gloves when working with hazardous substances, do they need to be taught about the perils of occupational dermatitis? Or do they need more suitable gloves that don’t make their hands sweaty, or make tasks more difficult?

By carefully risk assessing hazards and applying a hierarchy of controls, an organisation can be more targeted in identifying the true competence needed for risk reduction. Training might then be one of the tools used to achieve that competence. However, as a human-centric control measure, training is one of the least effective ways of reducing risk as humans are fallible. Removing, replacing or isolating the hazard should always be the priority.

Build collaboration into your learning programme

Employee participation in maintaining good health and safety standards is essential for success, so the whole process must be a collaboration between staff and management.

Teams should be consulted in the risk assessment process and in the required competence identification process. They should be made aware of what the risks are with, and without, the competence control measure. Learning outcomes of any training related to that competence should be clear, relevant and achievable. The business and workplace should solicit and act on practical suggestions from employees on how to further reduce the risk. This might be allowing additional time to carry out tasks, hiring extra people or putting in place different patterns of supervision.

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Always measure effectiveness to keep improving

While attendance, feedback forms and competency tests serve a purpose, the ultimate measure of effectiveness of a health and safety training programme must be whether it protects people from harm. For some hazards, you might have measurable results – for example, do people have fewer accidents after they have been trained to recognise slip and trip hazards? It’s vital to review if the training achieved competence and is that competence actually the right control measure to reduce the risk of a hazard?

To comprehensively track progress over time, it’s important to also look for associated indicators that relate to the behaviours and outcomes you want to encourage or discourage. This might be, for example, the number of requests to look at the asbestos registers, the recorded usage of hearing protection or correct completions of permit forms.

Developing a first-class health and safety learning programme may feel like a daunting task. But by following the steps of the learning cycle I’ve outlined, it’s possible to create a programme which delivers real value, helping to improve the safety and wellbeing of your people, and setting you up to do better business in the years to come.

[1] Clemes, SA, Haslam, CO, & Haslam, RA (2010). What constitutes effective manual handling training? A systematic review. Occupational Medicine Oxford, 60(2), 101–107.
Sowah, D, Boyko, R, Antle, D, Miller, L, Zakhary, M and Straube, S. (2018) Occupational interventions for the prevention of back pain: Overview of systematic reviews. Journal of safety research, 66: 39-59.