badworkplace

Posts Tagged ‘WORK – Safety’

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Health and Safety at Work: Finding a Safe Job

In 1 on 12/17/2009 at 6:27 pm
  • “[There are] … four people named Everybody, Somebody, Anybody, and Nobody. There was an important job to be done and Everybody was asked to do it. Everybody was sure Somebody would do it. Anybody could have done it, but Nobody did it. Somebody got angry about that because it was Everybody’s job. Everybody thought Anybody could do it, but Nobody realized that Everybody would not do it. It ended up that Everybody blamed Somebody when Nobody did what Anybody could have done.” (Michaud, PA. (1995). Accident Prevention and OSHA Compliance.  Boca Raton, FL: CRC Press, Inc., p.3)

Assuring safe jobs is everybody’s business — including the unemployed who are seeking work. Not that we have a lot of  choices in this terrible job market.

Numerous individuals tell us they are exhausted, working every hour of overtime that they can get during the big holiday sales.  They’re not complaining –they seek the overtime because they know or suspect that they will be unemployed after the big holiday sales are over.  Then comes the job of seeking new employment.

It’s tempting to take any job that is offered, but we hope you can find one for which you would expect a very low level of accidents.   As you plan your job hunt and as you interview for various jobs,  seek information about accidents and safety.  Or, as the workload slows at the beginning of the year, look at the job that you currently have to see whether it could be made safer.

Here are some questions for which you may wish to seek answers:

  • Has this organization ever received an OSHA citation? If so, how was it handled?
  • What is this organization’s safety philosophy? Its safety program?
  • What is the accident record for this organization, and how does that compare to others in the field?
  • What is the accident record for this particular job, and how does that compare to similar jobs in other organizations?
  • What are the normal working conditions for this job?
  • What kinds of unsafe conditions might I encounter in this job?
  • What is the role of my potential supervisor in accident prevention?
  • What kind of insurance and/or worker’s compensation applies in case I do have an accident on this job?
  • Based on what you hear or can observe, is this not a hostile environment that is likely to experience violent incidents in the future?

We sincerely hope that the employment situation improves in the coming year.  Meanwhile, have a blessed holiday, and good luck on finding or keeping a safe job.

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Violence and Political Correctness

In 1 on 11/19/2009 at 1:34 am

In view of the recent shootings at Fort Hood, we are reminded of a relevant case used in our “Bad Bosses, Bad Workers” book. Does the following story sound familiar? Why does management place “Political Correctness” above the safety of our citizens?

CASE:  “In a highly secure government installation, there was an employee who was a recent immigrant from _____. He took a loyalty oath to get security clearance to work in our company. Yet he held a deep commitment to helping that country, even to the point that he seemed willing to talk about our work with his friends ‘back home.’ This posed a high security risk for the U.S. He had been told to hold his tongue, but when he was with those he regarded as his countrymen (as opposed to regarding U.S. citizens as his countrymen), he still just talked and talked.

“Soon he reached the point where he would also talk about our country. He criticized the President on down to the Governor. Sometimes he would be so critical that we would feel like shooting him. He seemed so angry that he was not in his country, yet he wanted to stay here. His loyalties most surely lay outside the U.S. The fact that he could not be trusted had an immeasurable effect on the work that could be done at this installation.

“As you can imagine, all his coworkers hated him. No one wanted to be assigned to a project with him. No matter if you were just starting a project or deep into working on it, you could count on him going on a tirade about the terrible United States and how they had mistreated his country. Not only that, we were afraid this guy would someday reach his boiling point and do major damage to the installation where we worked, or worse. As workers, we don’t know the story behind why he was hired or why he was not let go.”

Which comes first: loyalty or political correctness? Protect yourself by letting your views be known to your company and your legislators.

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Health and Safety at Work: Stress on the Job

In 1, WORK - Bad Workplaces, WORK - Safety, WORK - Workplace Violence on 11/16/2009 at 3:19 pm

Just as you should seek information about accidents and safety for any job for which you are interested, you should also seek information about stressors and the level of stress on those jobs.

Stress is not a simple phenomenon. It refers to individual responses to strong stimuli, which are called stressors. While some stress can be positive— it can motivate you to work to your top level of performance— other stress or too much stress clearly is negative. Positive stress is beneficial whereas negative stress can be harmful if it is not recognized and dealt with at an early stage.

Stress can be caused by “good” as well as “bad” things. Excessive pressure, unreasonable demands on your time, and bad news can all cause stress. But receiving a promotion with a raise can be stressful, too: like the stress of wondering if you can handle the new job, or the disappointment of receiving a smaller raise than you had expected and thus not being able to afford something you had planned on being able to afford.

Positive stress is experienced by meeting deadlines, becoming more innovative, being more productive, and accepting challenges. Negative stress occurs when the pressures of life, including work, increase to a level where the individual can no longer cope. In other words, pressure is healthy until it exceeds the person’s ability to cope and then it can cause illness. Negative stress is the form you want to avoid.

Negative stress can be seriously debilitating and the effects can be long-lasting. Management and organizations suffer because of absenteeism, reduced productivity, increased compensation premiums — medical insurance based on stress are higher than other claims.  Thus, finding answers to questions such as the following will tell you indirectly if too much stress is associated with a particular company or job:

  • What is the level of turnover on this job?
  • What are the major sources of stress on this job?
  • What are the normal working conditions for this job?
  • Does this job involve ever having to handle or be exposed to chemicals, biological agents, or the like?
  • Does this job involve having to come into contact with people who are known to be sick?
  • Does the company have a wellness program?
  • Does the company have an Employee Assistance Program?

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Workplace Violence Not New But Growing

In 1 on 11/04/2009 at 5:57 pm

Why are we shocked that people are murdered at Yale, Virginia Tech, Columbine, or other institutions? Or federal buildings, USPS facilities, and Planned Parenthood offices?

Violence in society at large is not new, but it is growing.  Incidents of violence are mentioned in The Bible and in ancient hieroglyphics and literature. For centuries sailors who traveled far from their employers on the high seas faced piracy by groups of bandits. Various religious and political groups have frequently resorted to violence—and still do.

A larger and more organized group, the Mafia, has been around since its origination in Sicily during the 9th century.  Street gangs have been fighting for at least 400 years, and in the last century there were numerous instances of violence committed by “The Mob” or other criminal elements in places where people work.  We also saw American businessmen in other countries kidnapped and held for ransom from their employers or for political purposes.

However, virtually all of these violent attacks were tabulated as criminal acts, not workplace violence; and they had little direct impact on most citizens in the USA.  Public and managerial indifference began to change when violence struck closer home in the 1980s and 1990s, with repeated homicides at U.S. Postal facilities and the bombing of the Federal Building in Oklahoma City.

During the last 3 decades workplace violence also spread to a totally different group of workers in a worksite that had always been considered safe:  the nation’s schools–elementary, secondary, and more recently, higher education. From 1997 to 2007, for example, the most recent year for which data are readily available, more than 7,000 occupational homicides occurred nationwide (U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics) by individuals inside or outside the organization.

How safe is YOUR workplace?