There’s no question that toolbox talks can be a valuable way to communicate with employees about workplace safety issues. These informal safety meetings offer supervisors an opportunity to remind workers about hazards, the importance of PPE and other EHS issues.
But even well-planned meetings that include new toolbox topics for every month can get stale if they’re presented in the same format, day in and day out. Sometimes you need a new approach, a new look to your toolbox talks and tailgate meetings that will revive workers’ interest and engagement levels.
To that end, here are three ideas that safety professionals, supervisors and other frontline leaders can work into the mix for their safety meetings. They still offer the opportunity to discuss safety protocols, hazards and the like. And they can also liven things up to help keep safety top of mind throughout the workday.
Play if-then
Typically, crew leaders use toolbox talks to review common workplace hazards and various safety best practices. It’s usually taken for granted that workers will understand and remember how to respond to these hazards once you’ve offered a quick reminder, and will follow the steps you’ve articulated to them in order to execute best practices. But it never hurts to give them a bit of help with a toolbox talk focused on if-then statements.
An if-then statement is a conditional scenario that contains two parts: a hypothesis, and then a response or conclusion. In a safety context, it could look like:
– If I need to lift something heavy then I will test its weight first.
– If I sit down on a forklift then I will look for pedestrians before starting the engine.
– If I put my utility knife down then I will look at it to confirm the blade is retracted.
In a toolbox or tailgate talk, crew supervisors can verbally provide workers with the if (or conditional) part of the statement, and then ask workers for the then (or response) part of the statement. You can work through a series of them rather quickly, although it’s always a good idea to move at a slow enough pace to allow you to confirm that everyone understands and is following along.
Why do if-then statements work in toolbox talks? It’s because
if-then statements eliminate the need to think about the options of what you’re going to do in a scenario because the course of action has already been determined. Our brains are wired to make these simple connections so they are powerful reminders for action. This helps to make these decisions habitual, reducing the amount of thought required in the moment and, as a result, reducing the likelihood that an alternate action will be taken. And they’re perfect in toolbox talks because of how to the point they are.
One additional benefit: if you haven’t conducted an if-then toolbox talk in a while then it provides a refreshing new approach to your safety talks that can notably boost employee engagement. It’s also a great way to get folks more actively thinking about a range of relevant safety concerns.
Get employees to analyze the workplace
One of the features of a good construction toolbox talk is the ability to get workers talking about specific features of their workplace. A quick method of generating discussions is with safety meetings like “Where’s the smoke?” and “It’s my first day.” In the former, ask workers if they have noticed any signs or indications (or “smoke”) that might signal that a safety incident (or “fire”) could be more likely to happen. In the latter, tell workers that it’s your first day, and it’s their job to teach you about how you’re most likely to get hurt on the job, and what you can do to keep yourself safe.
The key to both of these types of safety meetings is to get workers to analyze their environment and talk about work conditions that could lead to safety issues. These toolbox talks work well for any industry and are particularly well suited for situations where risk levels tend to fluctuate from day to day, or week to week. They’re also good for supervisors who want to disrupt complacency, and for times when there are a number of newer workers mixed with more experienced folks.
What about human factors?
A variation on the if-then statement is to ask workers to walk through some of the tasks they have to complete in the day. After each task, the person conducting the toolbox talk can ask how a human factor might affect their ability to complete the task safely.
Human factors include mental and physical states that can influence our ability to process information, make decisions, and act as we normally would. If we’re tired then we might be more prone to trip over an obstacle or even over our own feet. If we’re in a rush we could be more inclined to take a safety shortcut and less likely to notice a hard-to-spot hazard. Thinking about human factors ahead of time can make workers more prepared to recognize and respond to them when they occur throughout the workday.
So if a worker says during a toolbox talk that they’ll need to move some heavy materials, ask “And what if you’re fatigued, how could that affect your safety?” And when a worker says they’ll need to drive a work vehicle from one site to the next, ask “And what if you’re in a rush, what would that do to your level of risk?” Crew leaders could then ask follow-up questions about mitigating the human factors and other issues related to the task at hand.
The one trick to running a human factors-centric toolbox talk? It’s a lot more effective if the company has implemented human factors training. For this type of toolbox talk to really hit home, employees need a base level of practical knowledge regarding human factors that can only come from a proper program. But once they have that foundational knowledge, you can help sustain the training and apply it in the workplace with this kind of toolbox talk.