Cosntruction Safety

B H

1. The first issue that jumped out to me is that the president and two vice presidents were the ones to develop the program. Our lecture notes and the text tell us that safety is one topic where management and employees can usually come to an agreement. Everyone wants a safe work environment. We are also taught that consultation is the best way to approach health and safety at work. Again, this means involving more than three people at the company. For starters, I would recommend that the safety program be dismantled and reconstructed by a committee consisting of at least 50% employees, not just senior leadership. I would keep this committee as small as possible and not have it controlled by one person only. The committee should be formed of employees from all sections and representing all possible departments where health and safety are potential issues.

2. The first issue that jumped out to me is that the president and two vice presidents were the ones to develop the program. Our lecture notes and the text tell us that safety is one topic where management and employees can usually come to an agreement. Everyone wants a safe work environment. We are also taught that consultation is the best way to approach health and safety at work. Again, this means involving more than three people at the company. For starters, I would recommend that the safety program be dismantled and reconstructed by a committee consisting of at least 50% employees, not just senior leadership. I would keep this committee as small as possible and not have it controlled by one person only. The committee should be formed of employees from all sections and representing all possible departments where health and safety are potential issues.

N S 

1. 1.Top of Form

There could be a number of problems with CMI's safety awareness plan. One major one is that they could not be promoting safety. That is the first step into getting the program to work...employee involvement. First the awareness program was developed by the president and the vice presidents. A safety awareness program can be more successful if employees are involved in the development, and remain involved as it is adjusted and refined. Rules should be in place, and employers must ensure that those rules are followed and enforced consistently. Incentives and competition could be another way to promote safety in the work place. Our text cites that having employees work in teams and have them determine the incentives will keep them involved and promote safety. Also, of course keeping employees up to date on all rules will also promote safety. 

2. I think the supervisor's response to employee complaints about John Randall is not appropriate at all. Even thought it is difficult, home problems should not be brought into the work place. Especially if coworkers are complaining about someone's behavior. This does not promote safety at all. To say that Randall will get over it and to disclose that he has personal problems is not appropriate. The supervisor should instead say that he will touch base with the employee and have an initial meeting to see if the behavior changes. There should be consequences and zero tolerance for violence in the workplace. If other employees are at risk, Randall should be dismissed if the behavior is not corrected. 

J V

1. This safety awareness program could be perfect in their mind and pocket, and that could be the major problem they are facing. The need of safety advisers and the opinion of others is what makes a safety awareness program successful. We need to consider what type of work this company is performing as well as which employees or tasks are creating the problems. Hiring a third-party company could help detect those how are the bad sheep, as well as to provide advice to upper management of all available trainings and possible ways to reduce the accident percentage. The certification of all supervisors, as well as to letting them know the possible accidents they could face in their work area and how they could avoid them. Give incentive to those who made a fantastic job on a monthly-basis. Make the employees feel that they are part of the family, that their safety is priority to them. With all of these in hand, a safety program could be created.Bottom of Form

2. First of all, everyone has problems outside the workplace. It depends on us if we drag them with us or just leave them at home. I think that the supervisor action should be to immediately have a private conversation with Mr. Randall, to see in what way he could help him go through rough times. Let him know the importance of work safety, and the possible consequences his actions could take him. I agree that employees should have patient but to some extent. If for some reason, Mr. Randal actions continue to be the same, and continues to bother other employees, it is the supervisor responsibility to notify upper management that this person needs counseling of some type before something happens.

M V

1. I believe the program they are implementing it may be a good program to him and his two vice presidents, but they didn’t take the time to review the program with the everyone else in the company. The program may be a good approach from upper management to help with safety but they created a program only based on information they get from a computer or statistics but not the actual people that perform the job and know what unsafe action have to really be fix and what is actually hurting the company in health and safety. Is good to have a standardized program but its always good to create the program than present it to the supervisor for them to review it with the employees in order for them to be able to adjust to program to the reality in production and not only with the books show. Testing the program for a month after the review and re-review for at least 6 more month on a monthly basis will help adjust the program until they can have a program that will really focus on the needs of the employee and not only on the need of upper management.  

2. I think the supervisors should be handling this issues more in depth and should be taking it more serious because any issues Josh has even if is personal it shouldn’t be affecting his behavior at work and if it is he should take care of the problem before it affect his employment. The supervisor is doing good on just letting the other employees that Josh has personal issues and that he will get over it but after making the other employees feel comfortable he should approach Josh and have a meeting with him to make him feel that you care and that you want to help him and guide him to professional help before the situation escalates to sometime bigger than just a small blow up. In the army we have a program called ACE which stand for Ask, Care, and Escort. This program has help a lot of soldier because as soon as you notice that something is wrong we go to the soldier and ASK specific question directly to the concerns that are been notice than we CARE which allow the soldier to know that he is not alone and that someone cares for him to get better and lastly, we ESCORT the soldier to get help from professional help and never leave the soldier by itself until properly help. Guiding Josh to the proper help will be great in order for him to get better and even allow him to take time off in order for him to fix his problem and come back to work and ready.

J W

1. At first glance, it doesn’t appear that CMI top executives involved a broad base of company employees in the development and implementation of the safety program. As Goetsch (2013) suggests, the employees usually know better than senior leadership where the day-to-day hazards exist thus more ways to try and mitigate incidents. He goes on to state that the most effective program is one in which employees are directly involved with creating, overseeing, and adjusting as needed. My recommendation for improvements would be for the president and vice presidents to re-evaluate the integrity of their initial safety program and consider an employee-developed program with final approval given by senior leadership. Mid-level supervisors should lead each diverse team of employees in: a) identifying role-specific hazards, b) recommending safety/prevention measures, c) suggesting appropriate monitoring and follow-up protocols, and d) periodically reviewing the safety program for any necessary updates. This team-led approach should help ensure more employees are “bought-in” to the safety program and the company should see a decrease in the number of incidents.

2. The supervisor’s response appears to be a little too passive considering the nature of the employee’s behavior and the concerns expressed by fellow co-workers. Although the employee does have rights, the company has a responsibility to act both delicately and quickly or it may find itself subject to negligence charges. It’s simply not enough for the supervisor to assume that an incident, should it occur, could be covered under Workers Compensation laws and therefore reduce the liability to the firm. The supervisor should follow all applicable rules or policies in trying to help Mr. Randall. This could include but is not limited to the following: a) respond to the potential threat, b) investigate if needed, c) take disciplinary action if necessary, d) provide support, counseling, or anger management, and e) return the workplace to its normal environment. My personal preference or style of conflict resolution would be to have a one-on-one conversation with Mr. Randall in a location of his choosing. I would probably invite a witness but ask Mr. Randall if it was fine before visiting with him. I would just try to get him to do most of the talking by asking questions and doing a lot of listening. In a simple case, if the talks led to a mutually agreeable modification at the workplace that could positively influence his behavior, we would probably try to implement the change. Sometimes, just giving an employee a periodic or recurring “ear” for him/her to vent may be enough to modify behavior over time.

References

Goetsch, David L. (2013). Construction Safety and Health, 2nd Edition. Upper Saddle River, New Jersey: Pearson Education, Inc.