Take Care of Your New Employees

Take care of your newest employees—and you will save mightily on your work-related injuries and health problems.

For every ten new employees hired this year, four will end up with a work-related injury by the end of the year.

The main reason your newest employees have the greatest risk of work-related injuries is that they are not familiar with tools or procedures at your business.

Complicating matters, many new employees try too hard to do everything right the first time and are reluctant to ask for help. Result: a high rate of injuries by workers who
have been on the job less than a year. Temporary workers have an equally high rate of work-related injuries.

Here are some steps you can take to smooth the path for your new employees as they begin working for your business:

1. Monitor your safety training programs during employee orientationto be sure that the new workers are paying close attention.
2. Vary your job training with free materials (without advertising) tomotivate your new workers to put safety first. For example, “New Employee Orientation” by LiftTruck.com, is an attractive slide show with narration describing what should be included in a safety program for new employees.
3. Allow extra time for more experienced workers to track with the new hires in difficult or high-risk tasks. Take time to listen to new workers express their frustration in mastering physical challenges unique to your workplace and take steps to recommend action based on their observations.

For supervisors who are responsible month after month for safety training, the information you are required to deliver to new employees can become boring even to the presenter. Don’t let that happen. Bolster your talk with examples (disguised to protect privacy). Involve employees in demonstrating safety measures. Inject a touch of humor as circumstances allow.

Safety training doesn’t end at the conclusion of your safety orientation program. Your new employees need time to absorb the principles and apply them to their work. You need time to observe how the new workers are adjusting to the job and to listen to their comments related to their personal safety at work. It also takes time to evaluate your own effectiveness in motivating new workers to prevent work-related injuries.

Time is the biggest culprit in new employee injuries. Give your newest workers the time they need to master their tasks so they won’t cut themselves, fall, twist their backs, or otherwise suffer from an injury on the job.

A marked improvement in your safety record for new employees will be your reward for your investment in time and caring.