Page 26 - Occupational Health & Safety, October 2017

CONSTRUCTION SAFETY
tion that host employers treat temporary worker safety the same as they do with permanent employees. While the extent of this responsibility varies depending on the specific employment ar- rangements of each case, the agency maintains an overall view that staffing agencies and host employers share joint responsibility for temp worker safety and must work together to ensure that OSHA’s training, hazard communication, and recordkeeping requirements are being met.
Training is a particular area of concern for OSHA when it comes to temporary workers because there appears to be much confusion over who is responsible for providing it. The agency emphasizes that it’s both the host employer and staffing agency’s responsibility to ensure employees are trained properly. However, it places the bulk of responsibility on the employer that directly supervises the employees during work shifts and in their day-to- day tasks. This also means the host employer must supply safety training specific to the workplace equipment and hazards tempo- rary workers encounter.
Training management software assists employers in verifying that training requirements for temp workers are being met, offer- ing them full visibility and control over training workflows across multiple work sites. Instead of trying to track the moving pieces with a paper-based system or cumbersome spreadsheets, training management software provides greater transparency of training re- cords and easier access to training schedules and deadlines. It’s this real-time training data that helps employers ensure all employees are getting the training they need.
Safeguarding Workers from Hazardous Chemicals
Access to hazardous chemical information—like that found on SDSs and workplace labels—is vital to worker safety. SDSs, in par- ticular, provide important information about required personal protective equipment, proper chemical handling and storage, and spill response procedures. While storing printed SDS documents in paper binders may work for facilities surrounded by four walls, making them accessible to construction workers across open and ever-changing job sites is exponentially more difficult. Too often SDSs go missing, aren’t up to date, or just are not even accessible in the first place.
OSHA’s adoption of GHS brought significant changes to its Hazard Communication Standard (HazCom), which has only in- creased confusion among employers. As part of GHS alignment, SDSs and labels underwent major formatting changes. Confusion surrounding the adoption timeline among manufacturers also caused delays in getting many reformatted SDSs into the hands of downstream users, while other downstream users, unaware of the changes, may not have realized they’d received an updated document and disposed of it. As a result, many employers’ SDSs libraries contain outdated documents, putting them at risk of non- compliance with the HazCom standard, which annually ranks among OSHA’s most-often-violated standards and one that’s high on inspectors’ priorities.
A good chemical management software solution with a web- based SDS inventory not only makes it easier for workers to access documents remotely, but also can automatically supply updated documents as they become available. Such systems simplify a va- riety of complex chemical management tasks and provide sophis-
ticated chemical inventory tracking across multiple sites. The best systems offer mobile accessibility so that individual SDSs can be dispersed electronically to job sites where the chemicals are in use; workers have on-demand access to documents and chemical in- ventories can be easily tracked using a smartphone or tablet to scan container barcodes, QR codes, and UPC codes. Some providers even offer chemical management mobile apps so employees on job sites where Internet connectivity is limited or unavailable can have access to the lifesaving hazardous chemical information they need.
Comprehensive Incident Management
and Recordkeeping
Recording and tracking incidents, implementing corrective ac- tions, and ensuring that work sites are in compliance with appli- cable standards is a daunting task for any safety manager. That job gets considerably harder in construction where a large, diverse workforce is spread out over multiple job sites. Unfortunately, this difficulty often results in inaccurate incident reporting and recordkeeping. Without complete and accurate documentation of incidents, employers are unable to identify incident root causes, let alone develop and schedule corrective actions to ensure an incident doesn’t occur again.
Many employers also will need to comply with OSHA’s new electronic reporting requirements that go into effect at the end of this year. Under the rule, all covered establishments with 250 or more employees will be required to electronically submit their OSHA 300 and 301 forms on an annual basis. For those not already using an electronic system to track, document and report injuries, the implications of this new rule will be significant.
Mobile-optimized incident management software and down- loadable incident reporting mobile apps help make safety a part of everyone’s job, allowing workers to report incidents and near misses, perform hazard IDs, and schedule corrective actions di- rectly from the job site when the information is most accurate. Some incident management apps even integrate mobile device cameras and voice-to-text features, helping workers document in- cident data even faster and in greater detail. When combined with robust incident management software, that data can then be used to automatically generate completed regulatory documents to help streamline reporting requirements.
Hosting Regular Safety Briefings
Regular safety meetings are a trusted and invaluable resource for communicating and addressing specific job site hazards, especially those locations where conditions and workers change rapidly. Aside from their proven role in reducing the number of severe incidents and injuries in the workplace, safety meetings are required by law in a number of jurisdictions throughout the United States, Canada, Europe, Asia, and Australia. Many labor unions also require safety meetings as part of their collective bargaining agreements, and in- surance providers frequently offer incentives for employers who conduct them on a regular basis.
Despite the benefits, though, coordinating and managing safety meetings can be a major pain point. Coordinating multiple work- ers on tight schedules to find a time for everyone to come together can be a real challenge. As a result, many safety meetings are often rushed, fail to provide workers with necessary safety information,
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