Occupational Health and Safety (OHS) Training

Health and safety training is good for business. Providing health and safety training is good for business because:

Health and safety training is a sound investment: The money you spend on health and safety training saves money in the long term. A workplace that is not healthy and safe may have to face insurance claims, medical bills, higher insurance premiums, replacement labour costs and lost productive time.

Health and safety training is not optional: The law states that as an employer you are responsible for providing health and safety information and training to your employees.

Health and safety training is responsible: Training reduces the risk of pain and injury at work.

OHS training in the workplace.

To organise a successful OHS training, there is three key information that organisations should consider when implementing: 

1 - Health and safety skills and knowledge at work

First, the employer is responsible for ensuring that a new employee or trainee is given induction training and has the skills and knowledge to work safely. Induction training must include providing health and safety information such as hazards at work, how to interpret safety signs and information n how to work safely and use equipment safely, fire and emergency procedures, first aid procedures, who to report incidents or accidents to, who to discuss safety issues with, and how to get involved in health and safety. 

Second, conducting a health and safety training needs analysis will help ensure that the people in your organisation get the type of training they need. It will enable you to ensure that the training is relevant to the job and the changing needs of the workplace.

A training needs analysis involves analysing all aspects of work, including the work environment, the actual jobs people do, and each person's skills and knowledge at work. Once this information is collected, then you can start to plan what training your organisation needs.

Moreover, identifying health and safety responsibilities in the workplace plays an important role in handling health and safety problem.

2 - What to expect from a good health and safety training program

A competency-based training program should generate the following special features:

• The outcomes to be achieved as a result of training are stated clearly.
• The skills and knowledge that a person already has been recognised.
• The trainer is flexible about where, when and how training takes place.
• The trainer checks that learning has taken place by assessing each person doing the training.
• The trainer keeps records of all training undertaken and what each person achieves.

3 - Select a good health and safety trainer

A good trainer recognises that learners have different learning styles and come to training with different experience and knowledge levels. Also, a good trainer seeks to make training relevant and meaningful and to encourage learning. You can expect a health and safety trainer to have a knowledge and understanding of and experience in:

• the relevant health and safety legislation in your State or Territory as well as regulations, standards and codes of practice that affect your industry
• the hazard identification, risk assessment and risk control approach to health and safety training
• contemporary OHS management approaches
• specific health and safety issues in your industry
• the competency-based approach to training and assessment
• training and assessment skills - in particular, how to encourage adults to learn and how to use various techniques for training.

Thus, to ensure that you get good value from the money you spend on health and safety training, the three key points discussed above is what you need to take into account.