Safety Awareness Campaign

THINK SAFETY ALWAYS !

By Capt. Huy / Nam Anh Inter Co., Ltd - Steer Your Dream

It’s no secret that safety policies and procedures are only effective when everyone understands them, critically thinks about them before performing work, and utilizes them properly. What if there were simple techniques that one could implement into their workplace to make people stop and think about safety before they begin their work? Many individuals may believe that safety processes, such as training and evaluations, are the most effective ways to get workers to contemplate safe work practices, but instituting safety awareness campaigns could be that extra step taken to get people analyzing safety at all times outside of the workplace.

One may be asking themselves – What constitutes as a safety awareness campaign, and how could it ever be introduced into the workplace? Truth be told, it’s quite simple and takes minimal effort and time! Something as simple as workers coming up with a safety acronym that they will stop and think about before performing hazardous work is a great example of a safety awareness campaign. One example of this could be the acronym ‘SAFE’, which workers could use as a pre-planning tool before performing a hazardous job task: 

• Stop and gather information regarding hazards
• Analyze the situation currently presented
• Figure out additional resources that may be needed to complete that certain task
• Evaluate if you’re able to safely proceed with work. If conditions are still unsafe, start the process over until hazards have been resolved

With an acronym like this, a worker could recite this to him or herself before beginning a hazardous job task, such as operating a forklift. Before that work was to even get in the forklift, they could think to themselves, am I being ‘SAFE’, and take the correct steps to ensure their safety before proceeding with their work. Acronyms are an easy and fun way to get workers continuously thinking about safety, and it’s even more effective if they are involved in the process of creating the acronyms or other awareness campaigns. The overall goal of a safety awareness campaign is to get workers to contemplate safety in situations where they may have become complacent, or just weren’t thinking about safety in the first place.