Health and safety is of course vital for any company, keeping your employees safe from harm and preventing additional cost for your workplace. No business wants an employee to be injured on their premises, or be responsible for long term health problems. For this reason, it is vital that every business meets the Government's guidelines for health and safety.
There are additional benefits to ensuring your employees are health and safety trained, particularly if they are trained to a standard like IOSH. IOSH training can mean that your business has an enhanced reputation, reduced injuries, increased productivity, reduced absence rate and even reduced legal costs!
The role of managing health and safety is ultimately down to the Managing Director of the company, but this is often delegated to various Managers and Supervisors, depending on the size of the company. Whoever is responsible, it is vital that they undertake the correct training in health and safety to ensure they understand the law and the practices they must follow in order to maintain a safe working environment.
So, let's look closer at the number of benefits the health and safety training can bring to your business.
It's been suggested that appropriate health and safety training can help to reduce your insurance premiums. The reason for this being that you are less likely to make a claim if you have appropriate training.
We mentioned that your business may have an better reputation. This is because, your employees are likely to tell friends if they are well looked after within the organisation. Word spreads, and the more people who know you are an employer who looks after your employees, the better it will be for you.
Of course, there is also reduced absence. It is likely there will be less accidents as the Manager will have more training in health and safety. This means there will be less people off work due to illness or injury. As a result this can also increase productivity. This is due to the simple reason that a staff member who experiences back or wrist ache is going to be less productive than someone who is completely healthy.
A Manager who has completed a health and safety course will have more experience in dealing with accidents and will therefore be able to carry out risk assessments, preventing other accidents occurring. What health and safety training qualifications do your Managers hold?