Don’t Skimp on New-Hire Orientation

Statistics reveal that workers are the most susceptible to injuries during their first month on the job. That’s why you need to provide basic safety training to new hires as soon as they come under your supervision.

Before assigning tasks to your new employees, take the time to welcome them into your organization. Walk them around the facility and introduce them to their co-workers.

Encourage veteran employees to help newer workers feel at ease. Your efforts will make both new and veteran workers feel they are contributing to the success of your company.

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Whatever safety meeting you need, chances are you’ll find it prewritten and ready to use in BLR’s Safety Meetings Library.  Try it at no cost or risk. Here’s how.

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Your new hires need to be made aware of how serious safety training is right from the start. In your first meetings with your new employees, reinforce the need for caution and appropriate protective equipment for each task. Emphasize that all unsafe conditions, accidents, and “near misses” must be reported immediately. Show them what equipment they can and cannot operate without your authorization.

Covering the Basics

Make sure to cover these basics:

• The proper safety practices to use and hazards to be aware of within your department
• What to do if there is an accident or injury
• How to report emergencies
• How to report accidents and near-misses
• How to report a workers’ comp injury and file a claim
• The location of material safety data sheets (MSDS)
• How to care for and use personal protective equipment (PPE)
• How to use tools, machinery, or hazardous processes
• What housekeeping and personal cleanup rules must be followed
• The location of emergency equipment, first-aid supplies, and designated smoking areas

Other practices to teach new employees, recommended by BLR’s Safety Meetings Library, include:

• Inspect tools and protective equipment before use.
• Report any defective, malfunctioning, or “just not right” tool, machine, or protective equipment item immediately.
• Wear personal protective equipment.
• Follow instructions on using tools and machines safely.
• Walk, don’t run.
• Don’t fool around or ignore safety rules.
• Keep the work area neat and the aisles clear.
• Ask questions about anything you don’t understand.
• Always be alert to possible risks or anything that just “doesn’t seem right.”

Don’t Skimp!

The value of a strong new-hire training program cannot be stressed enough. Research conducted jointly by Silk Road Technologies and the Aberdeen Group showed that employers rated as best-in-class typically had onboarding processes that lasted 6 months. That doesn’t mean 6 months of constant new-hire training, but rather ongoing strategies that keep management in touch with new people.

With other data showing that most employees decide within the first 6 months whether they will stay with an employer, that only strengthens the argument for reaching out early and often.

Safety Meetings Library provides the perfect fodder for conducting frequent and engaging new-hire training. This cost-effective resource provides four separate safety meetings on the topic of New-Hire Orientation, as well as supporting handouts and quizzes—including some in Spanish!

All told, the CD provides you with more than 400 ready-to-train meetings on more than 100 key safety topics—a shrewd investment in this time of tight safety budgets. The in-depth meeting outlines are supplemented with quizzes and handouts, as well as with regulations (OSHA’s CFR 29), a listing of the most common safety violations cited by OSHA, and case studies of actual OSHA cases and their outcomes.

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We challenge you NOT to find a safety meeting you need, already prewritten, in BLR’s Safety Meetings Library. Take up our challenge at no cost or risk. Get the details.

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Safety Meetings Library lets you choose from a variety of training approaches, including:

• Mandatory—Sessions that are OSHA-required
• Comprehensive—Sessions with the broadest coverage of a topic
• 7-Minute—Short, simple, targeted sessions to fit tight schedules
• Initial—Sessions used as introductory training on a topic
• Refresher—Sessions that follow up on or reinforce previous training
• Toolbox Talks—More informal reinforcement of a topic
• PowerPoint®— Graphic presentations for comprehensive initial or refresher training
• Hands-On—Sessions in which there are training activities
• Spanish—Including Spanish language handouts and quizzes coordinated with English sessions

You can get a preview of the program by using the links below. But for the best look, we suggest a no-cost, no-obligation trial. Just let us know and we’ll arrange it for you.

Download document type list
Download product sample
Download table of contents

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