b'Garys Cornereveryone indicated that they trained on fall protection,does not emphasize and/or require safety compliance.but I was disappointed that several applicants did notTo this end, it is important to train your employees indicate they provide any training on ladder safety,with regards to your safety enforcement program. Your hazard communication training, fire safety and theemployees need to understand that for their own safety use of PPE. Only a very few applicants indicated thatyou cannot and will not tolerate any employee who they train employees on hazard recognition and/or onfails to comply with Company safety rules. This their safety enforcement program. As I have alreadyarticle is not intended to address what type of safety indicated, my primary focus when it comes to safety andenforcement program you should have, but rather that OSHA is real employee safety. There are times that it isyou absolutely need a safety enforcement program and apparent to me (and I am sure to you) that the federalyou need to be sure your employees fully understand government gets caught up in its own bureaucracy init. After you instill that information in your employees, adopting safety and health standards. They seem toyou then need to consistently and objectively enforce lose focus on what should be their real mission. So, inthe safety program. grading the applications, I am usually understanding if the response demonstrates a real attempt to protectThe other topic missing from many safety orientation employees even if all of the Ts have not been crossedprograms concerns hazard recognition. Even those from an OSHA compliance standpoint. applicants who listed hazard recognition as a topic With this in mind, the bottom line is that whetherdiscussed in orientation frequently misinterpreted what yoursafetyrulesentirelyagreeornotwiththeneeds to be covered with this topic and the importance of it. Most companies, when they discuss their hazard recognition training program limit training to expected thoserulesarehazards in the work environment. While this training worth nothing tois essential, hazard recognition training needs to go far beyond this. In fact, hazard recognition training youandtoyourshould be tied into a distracted working program. employees unless you haveIt is important that employees are tuned in to their a mechanism in place to seework environment, whether they are in a manufacturing setting or on a roof, 100% of the time. They need to be that employees comply withconstantly aware of their surroundings, including both those rules.sights and sounds, so that they can immediately be aware of changes in those conditions that may indicate a hazard entering their work area. They should also be applicable OSHA standard,those rules are worthtrained that when such a situation arises they do they nothing to you and to your employees unless youdo the following: have a mechanism in place to see that employeesStop what they are doingcomply with those rules. Please do not forget the goal is to keep your employees safe. So, your safetyInvestigate the source of the changeorientation training program should takewhateverTakewhateveractionisnecessarytoprotect time is necessary to cover all of your safety rules tothemselves if they detect a new hazard entering the extent necessary to ensure that your employeesthe work areaunderstand those rules, and the fact that you will be an forcing those rules. I know that the new employeeThis is part of, and needs to be included in, any hazard is not contributing to production while he/she is sittingrecognition training program.in a classroom learning about your safety program. But he/she is going to be worth even less to you ifThe second area, which is Question #4 on the early in their career with your company they are injured2020 application, addresses the need for safety audits/because you did not spend sufficient time with them injobsite inspections. This is part of a safety enforcement training to be sure they understood all the safety rulesprogram. In my opinion, a safety enforcement program that govern how they are to do their job. The same iswithout a means for monitoring the performance of true if they see that you have a work environment thatemployees in compliance with that program is less than Continued on page 22www.mrca.orgMidwest Roofer 21'