What to include in your organizational lone working safety policy

The concept of lone working and the significance of safety considerations while lone working may be obscure to many of your staff. Employee health, safety, and lone worker safety training are the most critical factors to consider when implementing a lone working policy. It can help you stay prepared and give lone workers more control over their safety in an emergency.

Here’s what you need to include in your policy’s scope definition:

A statement of the purpose of the policy:

It’s essential to lay out what the document contains and your legal obligations as an employer in the introduction. Your reasons for creating the policy and how it will assist keep lone workers safe should be communicated to build support for the policy.

There are health and safety concerns for lone workers that must be taken into account, and your organization should explain why this policy has been put into place.

Ensure that all of your employees know your company’s lone worker policy. All workers who work alone, whether they do so daily, weekly, or even once a month, are subject to the same guideline.

Identify Risks of lone working:

A well-crafted lone worker policy will detail the dangers that lone workers may encounter. In the process of drafting your policy, you can monitor employees working alone and chat with different team members to understand the many dangers they may face.

Lone worker threats may best be accessed via a risk assessment. When doing a risk assessment, you can consider many categories of risk, including personal risks, environmental risk factors, and occupational dangers that may be encountered while working alone.

Identifying and documenting the hazards you face is crucial to reducing and providing lone worker safety training to eliminate them.

Evaluating risks and deciding on precautions:

Take into account how probable it is to cause harm and at what level for each risk you find. Examine your current safety measures to see if they are adequate in light of the potential danger. If the danger cannot be eliminated, determine how you can lessen the risk to minimize the harm. Involving employees in this review and your proposed measures can help establish if a solution is viable or whether it introduces new dangers.

Define SOPs and training programs:

Set up a list of necessary measures that may help lessen the identified risks in the earlier step. SOPs are required to formalize these processes. Use training programs, role-plays, and exercises to ensure that all new and existing staff knows the standard operating procedures.

General Guidance:

Lone employees can benefit from including a policy that provides direction and information. Employees in the office who work alone, outside regular business hours, or remotely working may all benefit from these suggestions. The advice you give should take into account the various types of roles and responsibilities in your company and the dangers discovered through your risk assessments. Having a lone worker safety policy in place is the first step toward implementing a solution to protect your personnel.

 

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