Here's a SMART Way to Approach Safety Training
It’s not enough to simply say, “We’re going to improve safety training.” If only it were that quick and easy! That’s where SMART goals come into play. Read on to learn how to use SMART goals to improve safety in your organization.
Let’s say we’ve set a goal to improve safety training for four high-risk areas in the workplace—tool safety, eye injury prevention, forklift operator, and lift safety training. How would you use SMART goals to actually get this done.
SMART goals are:
S: Specific
Your goal should clearly define what you want to accomplish, who’s responsible, and what success looks like.
M: Measurable
Attach numbers or milestones to your goal so you can track progress and know when you’ve hit the mark.
A: Accountable
Assign clear ownership so everyone knows who’s responsible for driving the goal forward.
R: Reasonable
Set a goal that’s challenging but achievable given your current resources, workforce, and timeline.
T: Timely
Give your goal a firm deadline to create urgency and keep the team focused and on track.
Applying SMART to Safety Training
Now, let’s say we rework the goal of improving safety training to “We will achieve 100% safety training completion in the four safety courses we currently offer by March 1.” Wow, that’s already much better!
As of January 1, none of the 40 employees in the workplace had been trained on those high-risk areas of tool safety, eye injury prevention, forklift operator, and lift safety training. With a goal of getting everyone trained by March 1, where do you start?
The first step is to set the SMART goals for each area. Then, drill down with some specific questions. For example:
Once you have your SMART goals completed, the safety training initiative should be off and running.
Now, let’s say by February 1, you’re seeing positive attendance rates in tool safety, eye injury prevention, and lift safety, with between 30 and 35 employees completing these trainings. But, only ten employees have completed the forklift safety. So, why isn’t the forklift operator training program progressing at the same rate? It’s time to do some additional analysis by breaking down the problem and coming up with some potential solutions.
We can think of 3 potential reasons why the facility may not have been able to meet its forklift safety training so far:
- It requires driver’s practice and a test
- The forklift isn’t always available for practice
- Department managers don’t know anything yet about administering a test
And here are a couple of practical solutions for addressing the issue:
By addressing stumbling blocks that may be impeding the forklift training initiative, it becomes more clear what additional steps may be needed to improve safety training overall.
Measuring SMART goals
Once you’ve set up SMART goals, it’s important to measure your progress. This will also make it easier when company leadership asks about safety and health because you’ll be able to point to actual data showing what you’ve done to improve workplace safety.
Here are some leading indicators you could measure focusing on Management Support:
Tracking this sort of data can help keep SMART goals on track.
SMART goals are easier to measure and meet with the help of EHS Software
Use Novara’s reporting and insights tools to analyze your findings and take corrective and preventative actions. Schedule daily/weekly/monthly email reports to be sent to you and your team including recent reports, pending follow-ups, training status, inspection status, and more.
Give your safety team the tools to easily measure and track learners’ progress and overall retention. Develop your onboarding training program to get your new hires up to speed and productive as quickly as possible. Track training completions and follow-up on overdue training. Novara’s EHS Software can help >>
