Workplace safety culture during COVID-19

Having a deliberate and positive safety culture is one of the core missions of the WorkSafe Employer program. The intended outcome is a workplace where staff are, and feel, safe. During this time where normalcy and routine have been removed from most organizations, it is important to continue to review howemployers are keeping staff safe and healthy, and to look at how safe their workers perceive themselves as being.

Belief in safety – communication is key

Workplace culture extends beyond the objective reality of safety and compliance programs and includes how workers internalize – and the degree to which they believe in – the programs instituted. A worker knowing the set procedure for safely accomplishing a task and believing that really is the way they should do it are two different, albeit related, things.

In the current circumstances a key worry of many workers is “is my employer keeping me safe?” In helping ease this concern for staffers it is critical that organizations and departments dedicate time to explaining what they are doing for safety – and potentially explaining why somethings are not being implemented that employees are hearing about in the news. Employees may also worry that updates in recommendations from the CDC, Department of Health, and L&I are not being followed, either at all or quickly enough, in their workplace. These worries can be valid.

Keep safety culture positive

To keep workplace safety culture positive in the current climate AWC Retro has three recommendations.

1. Educate staff on how the organization has assessed their exposures and made determinations on their exposure level. Use resources from NIOSH and the CDC, L&I, etc. to show why you have reached decisions on their exposure level and explain how the organization is responding to those exposures. Some of this work may already be one, but for many cities this will be work that is being freshly done or revisited considering our new reality.
2. Reiterate your organization’s commitment to take seriously safety concerns raised by employees and remind/retrain them on your procedures for raising these concerns. Let them know that they can take their concern to any supervisor or management member, but you can also have a preferred method you share with them. We want employees to feel that the organization wants to hear their concerns. Knowing your concerns will be taken seriously is a critical part of being bought into a culture of an organization.
3. Remind workers of resources that are available to them for indirect impacts of new safety concerns. We know there can be increased mental strain because of coronavirus. Have HR or other resources again show employees how to access the Employee Assistance Program (EAP) and other services that can be beneficial during this time.