Safety at Work: How and When to Train

Hey there, happy to see you here another week🧡

Yesterday afternoon the tornado sirens🚨 started to sound! At first, I thought that the city was doing their monthly drill of the horns to be sure that they were working, but I continued to work without paying any attention. It was not until I received an emergency alert on my phone that I knew this was not a drill. 

So, we immediately started to follow our tornado evacuation procedure. As I walked to check on everyone, there were lots of questions coming from my employees….”What happens if my car gets damaged”…”How long do we stay down”…and then some students (and an employee) started crying. This got me thinking about Maslow’s Hierarchy of needs, specifically Safety.

This week, I would like to talk about how to make sure your employees feel safe at work, which in turn will help you with retention and recruitment.

Did you know there are 3 types of workplace safety for employees ?

As leaders, it is our responsibility to ensure the work environment is safe. This is an opportunity for you to think about how you can elevate your work environment by creating a culture of safety.

When onboarding a new employee, we talk about the center environment through the safety glass lens🔍

🤷‍♀️What to do if they see something unsafe?

🚰Where to go to keep their water bottle filled so their body can stay hydrated?

🧹How to keep their classroom space clean and organized to ensure safety?

🦺How to properly use equipment safely?

Engage employees in work safety training!

Here are a few examples of training topics all my employees have during their first 90 days of hire:

• Safety best-practices🛟

•  Inside the classroom🎒

• Outside on the playground🛝

• Handling behaviors🤸

• Using equipment in the employee area🖨️

• First Aid, child abuse recognition, and CPR⛑️

• Food Safety in the classroom🍇

• Emergency preparedness⚠️

• Transportation safety🛣️

• Fieldtrip safety🚐

After they complete this, they all get a “Certificate of Safety” to proudly display in their classroom.

Empower your employees to be vigilant in noticing and correcting safety issues that they may see around the classroom, center and playground.

Here are 2 ideas💡 I have implemented in my centers:

1. Create a safety checklist for employees to use as a starting point.

2. Encourage teachers to engage the children in the best safety practices, such as creating classroom rules or even adding a safety inspector on their classroom job chart.

Grow an employee in the next step of their career. Create a growth opportunity for a safety coordinator. This would give you the ability to delegate some of your responsibilities and start growing the employee’s leadership skills.

As a leader ensuring safety in your environment will help with retention and recruitment with in your early childhood program! Taking time to review “obvious” safety policies will ensure your employees understand that safety is a part of your programs culture.

Till Next Time,

Jen

P.S. If you would like some guidance on creating safety trainings, or procedures, please connect with me 🙂 [email protected]