Ready or not here comes safety .... where are all the employees?
In my experience as a supervisor, employees tended to disappear when a safety manager walked out on to the manufacturing floor which made it hard to actually see what was truly going on. What do your employees do when your safety representative goes out on the shop/work floor? What have you done to make this a positive instead of a negative?
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In my experience, our manufacturing and warehouse employees were notorious for scattering when it came time for safety to do their monthly inspections. The previous safety representative would only go out on the shop floor when it was a formal (internal) audit, and they only reported out the bad things to managers so employees were getting in trouble. They didn’t trust safety because all that ever came from it was discipline, while the unsafe conditions were never addressed. To change this behavior and mindset, I spent a lot of time on the floor talking to employees outside of audits. When I asked employees questions about their training, I rephrased it if they seemed confused to give them another opportunity to answer. I also asked what their concerns were and followed correcting the issue through. So my advice here is that even if you need to dedicate more time to shop floor banter, ensure your safety representative is a reliable resource who cares about making the employees feel safe in their environment.
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In my short time so far as the "Safety Guy" as my fellow employees call me I have learned that people look more than they hear. What I mean when I say that is they need to actually see you working on the concerns vs just working on them behind closed doors. If your fellow employees can't see anything actually being done about a concern that they have then to them it isn't actually being worked on. I see the biggest thing I can do to build that relationship with my fellow employees is to make it so that they can actually be a part of the solution and not just the people that bring up the problems. Be interactive during the good times and when the bad times arise they will bring them to you because they can trust that you are not just out to get them and that you are actually there to give them help and support them through the problems times and to educate them on why they should follow the safety rules, give them creditable things that they can see vs just telling them this is the law and you will obey them. They have to feel that you are with them and not against them. I have been with my company for 11 years this September and although I have not been in this position long I have built a reputation around the shop that when concerns are brought to my attention I will get them fixed as long as they are valid concerns and not just someone fussing about something that they don't like. but you also have to build the respect from the employees by not only following through with what you say but also making sure they understand that you are there to do a job and them following the safety rules is part of their job, but you advocating for the employees to the hire ups that something is actually a concern and not just a fussy employee will show them tat you are working with them and not against them.
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