Everyone knows how important workplace safety is. No one wants to see their workers injured on the job because they cut corners when it comes to safety.
It’s so important in fact, that there’s a legislative act—Work Health and Safety Act 2011—which underpins all Aussie businesses. And it’s up to you to make sure it’s followed in your workplace.
Creating safer workforces is why Avetta exists. And we do this, in large part, using data.
Why data?
Many organisations lack the insight into their workforce to make informed decisions. They may collect data, but it’s of little use if it’s difficult to decipher and doesn’t allow them to act.
Good data—the right data—helps to inform business decisions and lead to better workplace performance and outcomes. It also reduces workplace risk, which leads to improved safety. It’s a win, win.
There’s also much to be learnt from data.
The current picture
In their recently released Key Work Health and Safety Statistics, Australia 2021, Safe Work Australia gives cause to celebrate the improvement in workplace safety over the past 20 years.
The good news?
- Workplace fatalities have decreased by 50 per cent from the peak in 2007, down to 194 worker deaths in 2020.
- The Australian serious claim frequency rate has decreased by 23 per cent from 2009-10 to 2018-19.
The not great news?
- In 2020, the most dangerous occupation for workplace fatalities was machinery operators and drivers. This was closely followed by labourers.
- Agriculture, forestry and fishing has the highest worker fatalities by industry (13.1 per 100,000 workers).
- This is followed by transport, postal and warehousing (7.8) and construction (3.1).
Where to from here?
All of this begs the question—what can I do to make my workplace safer? It’s where Avetta and the data collected in our platform comes in to play.
5 Ways to Enhance Workplace Safe with Pegasus
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Capture what everyone is qualified to do
How much do you know about the people working for you? Capture their qualifications, their training, insurances, licences. Find out everything you can and have it loaded into your workforce management solution.
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Learn more about your workforce
When you have contracting company and worker data captured, take a look and see if there are any skills gaps missing. Is more training needed? Do you have enough people covering the positions you need to meet your business goals? Do workers have skills and qualifications needed in another area of your business?
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Have business rules
Business rules help your contracting companies and workers know what you need from them to work for you. Providing this fundamental level of understanding sets the tone for your workforce, letting them know that you expect the best and safest work practices.
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Analyse the data of incidents and injuries
This is the time to comb through your data and see what incidents and injuries have happened on your job sites or projects. Is there a common denominator? Do injuries around lifting and manual handling frequently occur? If so, it might be time to update your procedures and figure out where you went wrong. You could set a regular training requirement through the LMS to make sure your workers get a regular refresher of best practice to avoid injuries on the job.
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Effectively manage your risk
To make your workplace safer, you need to have an effective and thorough risk management process which is constantly updated, in consultation with your workers. We covered 6 steps to manage workplace risk here.
Talk to Avetta about how to gain insight into your data to keep your workforce safe on site.