Workplace Safety: 5 Steps You Can Take After A Near Miss

No matter how vigilant you are as a safety professional or supervisor, or how well trained your employees are, you can’t always stop an accident from happening. If you’re lucky, an incident in your workplace or on the road will only be a “near miss,” without any injuries or damage to equipment or product. But safety is a vital aspect of your job, so even a near miss can still give you a lot of insight into what can be improved to optimize the safety of your work environment, vehicles, cargo, and team members.

Workplace Safety After A Near Miss

Instead of waiting for the next near miss, undertaking a proactive approach can help you to pinpoint areas for improvement. Below are 5 things you can do to avoid workplace close calls in the future.

1. Evaluate What Happened

Before implementing any sweeping changes, figure out what went wrong and why. A thorough assessment can help you determine any workplace safety concerns, risky patterns of behavior, or weak spots that had previously been overlooked. This gives you a good starting point in understanding common warehouse hazards.

2. Re-Check Your Processes

If the steps your employees have to take to perform their jobs or report an unsafe situation are too complicated or unclear, you may be missing a number of continuing issues. Try to find where processes can be made clearer or more effective. Your safety leadership team or HR department may be able to provide suggestions.

3. Review Employee Training

Are there gaps in training or reporting? Does your employee handbook or warehouse safety plan need to be reviewed? If possible, provide ongoing education and refresher training for your staff to ensure that workplace safety and awareness are always at the forefront of operations.

4. Consult with Experts

Though you know your business and processes best, it can be helpful to get an outside opinion. Hiring the services of a consultant can help you to narrow down more ways to keep your team members, warehouse, and transportation fleet safer without spending a fortune on materials or implementation.

5. Focus on Prevention and Protection

Your business should emphasize workplace safety and responsibility at every level, meaning your people should feel like they’re part of a company-wide effort to create a “culture in which workers feel responsible not only for their own safety, but also for the safety of their co-workers,” one that “promotes identifying and reporting hazards” without repercussions.

Find Better Safety Solutions

Consider a near miss an opportunity to also look for products that can help to improve safety in the warehouse or on the road. Sometimes a simple solution, made well and engineered to perform flawlessly under the demands of repeated heavy use, can make an enormous difference.

Rack safety straps and Bednet cargo nets from Adrian’s Safety Solutions, for example, offer the strength, reliability, and durability you need to better protect your inventory and workers. These easy-to-install, scalable products keep stored items and cargo secure, helping you to reduce risk without massive expense.

Near misses can’t always be avoided. But when the safety of your workers is at stake, it pays to learn from what could have been a much graver situation. Check out our rack safety systems and request your free sample today!