Jobsite safety should be a top priority in any industry, but for those who work in the field with dangerous machinery – often under intense physical conditions – the stakes are even higher:
- A construction worker has a 45% chance of experiencing a disabling injury during a 45-year career.
- The oil and gas industry has a 7X higher fatality rate than any other industry in the U.S.
- The manufacturing industry reported 846,700 injuries in 2019 (15% of all injuries and illnesses in the private sector).
- The utilities industry averaged 25.6 fatalities per year from 2016-2020 and has a 32% serious injury and fatality (SIF) exposure rate.
While regulatory organizations like OSHA exist to help decrease these statistics and ensure the safety of employees in the workplace, there are many practices and implementations that companies with workers in the field can make to reduce injuries and death. By enhancing safety education, hazard reporting, corrective action response time and data analysis, on-site safety in risky environments can significantly improve.
Here are 9 ways to improve jobsite safety for your operations.
#1: Capture visual evidence of hazards
Allow your team to capture thorough visual evidence of hazards during inspections. The most effective way to do this is to utilize a software that gives workers the ability to take photos and videos of issues in the field and embed them directly onto a digital inspection form – all from a single mobile device.
FastField is a digital forms and workflow solution with built-in rich media capture to provide complete evidence of on-site hazards. The ability to annotate directly on top of photos provides further clarity and directives for corrective actions, as well.
This type of visual reporting of safety hazards leaves no words lost in translation and can lead to more effective decision-making and issue resolution.
#2: Report Issues Instantly From the Field
When safety issues are identified, it’s important to report them as quickly and effectively as possible before any harm is done. This is where digital reporting, as opposed to paper-based reporting, proves its worth.
A digital reporting platform, like FastField, enables anyone on your team with a mobile device to clearly submit reports of safety issues directly from the field. Without having to go through the dangerously slow process of handing papers off through the chain of command from the field to the back office, reporting with FastField is instant. Safety issues can easily be identified, reported and corrected as fast as your team can handle them.
#3: Automate Your Inspection and Work Order Workflow
In addition to being able to instantly submit reports from the field, the resolution of safety hazards can be further enhanced through an automated forms workflow. This would allow managers to predetermine the delivery method and destination of inspection forms and work orders based on inspectors’ input.
For example, if a worker is conducting an inspection of a construction site and notices faulty wiring, they could indicate and describe this hazard on the digital form. This would then trigger an action that would automatically send this report to the responsible party, such as an electrician, as well as any other necessary stakeholders.
This ability to automate the destinations of inspection reports and work orders ensures that they will reach the appropriate personnel without wasted time, leading to quicker response times to prevent danger.
#4 Recieve Alerts for issues that arise
Another way to mitigate safety hazards in the field is to receive automated alerts of issues when they arise. By enabling push notifications or SMS alerts for reported safety concerns, corrective actions can be taken immediately.
Alerts can be automated and set up for specific data points that matter to you and the safety of your team. From low safety scores to reports of specific hazards, you can make sure the right people are instantly aware of safety issues when they arise.
#5 Keep Organized Maintenance Records
Keeping organized maintenance logs for machinery and equipment has multiple benefits when it comes to the safety of your team. For one, maintenance records will help make sure you are conducting routine inspections at regular intervals, allowing you to identify issues before they become bigger safety hazards.
Detailed safety logs also help you monitor self-inflicted damage. Self-inflicted damage refers to the damage of machinery and equipment due to the negligence of your own employees who operate them. With maintenance records that include the prior operator(s) and cause of damage, you could start to see trends over time that indicate self-inflicted damage from certain employees. From there, more tailored training could be provided in order to prevent damage that could reduce the asset’s lifespan and avoid safety risks.
With FastField, all maintenance reports are automatically saved and organized into one database for easy reference. You can easily search for specific reports or filter based on the submitter, date, or form name to identify trends.
#6: Standardize Procedures
Make sure everyone on your team is on the same page – literally. By creating simple, easy-to-use digital safety inspection forms, workers can quickly be reminded of procedures and verify that operational conditions are safe. All your workers need is a mobile device to open up a pre-operational safety inspection form and check off the list while verifying that everything’s good to go.
FastField allows you to create forms that are easy to follow and reduce human error. From checkboxes to dropdown select menus, FastField’s mobile form features streamline safety checks while helping you remind employees of best practices.
When procedures or circumstances change, it’s easy to update forms. Simply make your changes in the FastField Portal and all dispatched forms will automatically update universally, helping you to instantly standardize your safety procedures.
#7: Use NFC Tags for Safety Procedures
Near-field communication (NFC) technology uses tags to transfer data over short distances (usually within 10 inches). This is the same technology used when you pay by “tapping” your credit card. In the field, NFC tags can be used to enhance safety in a variety of ways.
For one, NFC tags can be used to trigger safety instructions for tools, equipment and machinery.By attaching an NFC tag to an asset, workers in the field can hold a smart device near the tag, which would trigger a document to appear on their screen. This document can provide operational instructions and safety reminders before use.
NFC tags can also be used to trigger an asset’s maintenance history and other necessary information to make sure it’s safe to operate. A maintenance request form with prefilled identifying information about that asset could also be used to quickly address hazards.
#8: Enhance Safety Briefings
Safety briefings are an important part of creating a culture of safety for an organization. They serve as short and sweet reminders of best practices and potential hazards on a jobsite. While often informal and conversational, safety briefings can be enhanced in a number of ways to make sure every member of your team is educated and in compliance:
- Track attendance & compliance
Have each worker on site quickly open up an attendance form on their smartphone or tablet to verify their participation in the safety briefing. This can be further enhanced through e-signatures and automatic time/date stamps.
With FastField, all submitted attendance forms are automatically saved and organized into a database for you to view trends and monitor compliance across all sites and teams.
- Use data
Support your safety talks with data that directly impacts your team. Pull out your smart device to reference your Dashboard for real-time and relevant safety data, such as incident rates, to share with your team and guide your talk.
- Keep a meeting log
If you’re holding daily or weekly safety briefings, you may find yourself forgetting which topics you’ve covered and which ones you still need in order to ensure OSHA compliance. Keeping a log of each talk will help you stay organized. Be sure to record the topic, speaker and any notes for reference.
- Track attendance & compliance
Have each worker on site quickly open up an attendance form on their smartphone or tablet to verify their participation in the safety briefing. This can be further enhanced through e-signatures and automatic time/date stamps.
With FastField, all submitted attendance forms are automatically saved and organized into a database for you to view trends and monitor compliance across all sites and teams.
Ensuring the safety of your team while staying OSHA compliant involves keeping records and acting on data. To stay organized, address worthwhile safety issues and improve your safety briefings, FastField’s digital forms and data collection software is an all-in-one solution. Create custom attendance and feedback forms that your attendees can easily access on their smart devices and submit instantly. All data is saved, organized and translated into meaningful information you can use on your FastField Dashboard.
#9: Track Incident Rates
Despite best efforts to follow best practices and take safety precautions, on-site incidents still occur in
each industry. While the ultimate goal is to reduce the number of incidents to zero, you can still learn from data when incidents take place to improve certain processes and monitor safety KPIs.Data from submitted incident reports can be used to track your
Total Recordable Incident Rate and identify trends to help identify common causes of incidents to be addressed. FastField lets you customize and monitor real-time safety data in one place. You can also receive alerts when incidents do occur to keep you informed and help you act on real-time data to prevent further incidents.
Safety is no accident
Equip your team with the tools and resources necessary to perform their jobs safely. Recent developments in technology have improved how we can report and respond to issues, act on data, educate employees and standardize safety procedures.Try FastField’s data collection and automated workflow solution to improve jobsite safety and increase productivity.
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