Not all new workers are the same, but they do have a lot in common.
They lack relevant experience in the workplace they’re at, with the task they’re doing and/or with the team they’re on. They lack crucial hazard recognition abilities. Often, they don’t know what they don’t know.
They are, as OSHA says about young workers, more susceptible to stress resulting from the fact that they “might not receive adequate in-person training and mentoring, and they may feel confused about their job duties and expectations, unsure where to go for guidance, and concerned they will not perform well.”
They might not understand their right to refuse unsafe work. They might not be able to recognize unsafe work in the first place. Or they might feel reluctant, for any number of reasons, to speak up if they feel like a task is dangerous.
They will be slower while they’re learning, which often means they’ll have to rush to keep up with the workflow. Their new job will also be more cognitively and physically demanding than it is for more experienced employees, leading workers to be more tired and less able to respond appropriately to unexpected events in the workplace.
They’re also missing the three C’s: common language, cultural awareness, and the concept of human error and managing human factors.
Put these all together and it’s clear that most new workers are at a greater risk of injury because of the same issues. And three of these safety concerns stand head and shoulders above the rest: hazard recognition, stop-work authority, and the three C’s. The three C’s of new hire safety are such a big issue that we’ll have to deal with them separately. Here, let’s take a closer look at the other two: recognizing hazards and stopping work when it seems unsafe.
Hazard recognition
Some hazards are easier to spot than others. No one needs to be told that it’s a bad idea to step in front of a forklift in motion. But even obvious hazards can have major blind spots: Is there likely to be a forklift driving just around the corner? Does the organization follow all the best practices for powered industrial truck safety? Long-tenured employees will know, but new hires won’t.
And while some hazards may seem obvious, they’re actually anything but. A recent study of companies in the construction sector—the industry that is publicly recognized as having the most workplace fatalities —found that workers could only recognize hazards that contribute to the Fatal Four construction deaths 57% of the time. This means that over 40% of the time, workers failed to spot something that is widely known to be life-threatening to them.
The statistics get even more grim when you look beyond the Fatal Four. Over half of gravity, electrical, motion, and temperature hazards went unrecognized, and workers were able to identify pressure, chemical, and radiation hazards less than 10% of the time.14 This study includes all employees and not just new workers. So imagine how much worse the ability to recognize hazards must be for new hires—especially for new hires in industries where the dangers are less obvious than in construction!
What may seem obvious to a seasoned safety professional can be imperceptible to a new hire. This is especially true for idiosyncratic, unusual or it-just-works-this-way-here types of hazards. Many workplaces have them, and they need to be taught to new hires.
No one shows up to work wanting to be injured. But then, no one shows up to a new job knowing what will injure them either.
Stop-work authority
Stop-work authority is one of the pillars of workplace safety. It’s an especially important measure for new workers who are most likely to feel the need to halt work because they feel uncertain or unsafe.
There are two critical components to stop-work authority: a worker’s recognition that it exists, and a worker’s comfort and willingness to make use of it. And that’s a problem when it comes to new workers.
As one insurance company says: “They may also be less aware of their rights and responsibilities related to safety and feel less comfortable notifying their employer about hazards or unsafe conditions.” 15
Rodd Wager is a New York Times bestselling author and a member of SafeStart’s assessment and diagnostics team, where he looks under the hood at organizations’ safety performances. This gives him a unique vantage point of how workers view stop-work authority. And according to Wagner, an unfortunately high number of workers don’t feel comfortable exercising that right. Here’s how he puts it:
“Most industrial firms grant universal stop-work authority; anyone who sees the elements of an accident or serious breakage coming together is empowered to shut down operations. It’s fair to assume most managers believe their staff will use that explicit authority when it’s needed.
Yet to the statement “I feel empowered to stop a job at any time if I am concerned about unsafe conditions,” we usually see about 15 percent of workers answer “Neutral,”“Disagree,” or “Strongly disagree.” And at one company where everyone got a stop-work authority red card sized and punched identically to their work badges, three in 10 frontline workers were neutral or disagreeing.
Many of those reluctant to invoke their red cards don’t believe their supervisors really mean it; they believe their employers give lip service to the policy but prefer that everyone keep the machinery running, if at all possible.
Instilling a belief in management’s commitment to stop-work authority is paramount. So is educating workers on when, where, why and how to exercise their right to pause work if they feel unsafe. It takes more effort than you may think to get new hires to understand and buy into the stop-work process—but it’s one of the most important steps in bringing a new employee into the workplace.
This blog post is adapted from the safety guide Fitting in Fast: Making a Safe Workplace for New Hires, which examines the ins and outs of how to keep new workers safe as they join the workforce. Download the guide today to discover key practices to protect new hires.