Page 74 - OHS, July/August 2024

WORKPLACE SAFETY TECHNOLOGY
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Integrating emergency and visitor management systems effectively closes the gap, boosting the functionality of emergency protocols and contributing to a safer environment.
account for their guests, an approach often met with mixed results.
Stop-watches—if the officer even re- members to start it—are used to measure the performance of these drills, but there’s no certainty that they were started or stopped at the right time.
That’s all to say, safety drills are over- due for innovation.4 Today’s tools may be louder—megaphones and alarms, for in- stance—but they aren’t certain to be much smarter. In a world where algorithms can provide optimal bedtime or control ma- chines to produce complex parts and prod- ucts, it’s surprising that emergency evacua- tions have not evolved much.
Setting the New Emergency Standard
Safety officers are looking for ways to keep their workers safe and organized. Know- ing that there is technology designed to do just that, many have made the switch from manual processes to using an emergency and evacuation management system, al- lowing them to better control and analyze their safety drills and evacuations.
Remember the four Ws: who, what, when and where. The optimal emergency management system excels in four key ar- eas: who, what, when and where. Focusing on these areas allows an opportunity to assess whether a system provides enough control and ground cover during safety drills and real emergency events.
The ideal system can identify who is in a facility, which should include employees, temporary workers, contractors, guests and more. Beyond just identifying person- nel, the system should be able to display an accurate roll call list for safety officers to use at mustering points5 and allow them to “check off” individuals that are accounted for or who require further assistance.
Emergency management systems should be flexible and able to adapt to what type of emergency drill is being executed. Whether it’s a chemical spill or an active shooter, the communication strategy6 should differ to ensure safety and manage the expectations and actions of evacuees.
Timing is everything in safety drills. As the core metric of evacuation perfor- mance,7 the ideal system should be able to record when an evacuation is triggered and track the speed it takes to evacuate the premises, while more advanced systems al- low drilling down into everyone’s individ-
as these logs are often maintained on sepa- rate systems, or worse, a paper logbook. In a real-life emergency, the last thing anyone wants a safety officer to be doing is trying to find the day’s visitor log in a flurry or panic.
Disorganized safety drills and emer- gency evacuations can jeopardize the safety of employees and visitors and have a mate- rial impact on the organization. As safety officers work to rectify inconsistencies in roll call, this can lead to prolonged down- time, forcing the operation to make up for loss of productivity, whether in overtime or by running their operation at a faster yet riskier pace.
In an age of widespread digitization, it’s astounding that manual processes still dom- inate the emergency preparedness practices3 of manufacturers, warehouses, distribution centers and other industrial facilities.
Out with the Clipboards,
in with the EMS
The way safety drills are done today isn’t too dissimilar to what was experienced 20 years ago. An alarm is pulled. Employ- ees look around startled and confused and then proceed to follow their peers out of the nearest exit. Once they exit the premises, they’re met with a chaotic scene of work- ers and swiveling heads trying to discern whether they’re in the right place. Evacua- tion coordinators may attempt to herd the mass like a gang of blind sheep to little avail. An individual—often with a high-visibility vest and megaphone—will take headcount from the muffled blaring of the megaphone. If visitors or temporary workers are on-site, it’s unlikely they’ve been included in the count. Rather, a trust system is adopted, and the onus is put on individual employees to
72 Occupational Health & Safety | JULY/AUGUST 2024
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