Posted on: December 26, 2024

Year-End Review and EHS Resolutions

Year-End Review and EHS Resolutions

As the new year approaches, we all consider the coming year’s goals and develop strategies to achieve them. Most of the time, New Year safety goals don’t make the list, but they’re the prerequisites to any other professional or business goals like achieving productivity or advancement.

Below, we’ll talk about why workplace safety should be featured on your list and some examples of EHS resolutions you can carry in the New Year.

 

Why Set Workplace Safety Goals for the New Year?

Plain and simple: safety is good business.

A poor safety record is expensive – you may have the direct costs in mind, but there are a whole host of hidden costs as well. Safety accidents and incidents can result in:

  • Worker’s compensation claims
  • Medical expenses
  • Property damage/repairs
  • Increased administrative expenses (insurance, legal, etc)
  • Lost productivity from delays or stoppage
  • Investigation and reporting costs
  • OSHA fines
  • Corrective action costs
  • Training employees to replace injured workers
  • Lost productivity from worker replacement
  • Delivery delays
  • Increased employee turnover due to morale problems
  • Reputation problems

The National Safety Council (NSC) estimates that the total cost of work injuries in 2022 was $167 billion, and these numbers don’t account for property damage, decreased productivity, or other downstream costs.

 

Year-End Safety Review

Before we can set actionable workplace safety goals for the new year, we need to know where our record stands.

This means that year-end safety reviews are unskippable components of EHS resolutions.

The first thing you'll want to do is review all available records of safety accidents and incidents, like the OSHA 300 log, accident/incident reports, near-miss reports, worker safety concerns, and other paperwork.

Look for patterns – are there certain jobs or processes that experience a higher rate of incidents? Are there certain teams or shifts that have a poorer safety record?

If you find that you’re lacking in some of these written records, your goal for the new year can be to take steps to put these measures in place!

Next, try to find things that the current paperwork missed. Talk to department heads and managers. Ask what processes or equipment have changed over the past year and whether hazard assessments have been performed for the new world order. If not, that’s a great goal for the new year!

Throughout the process, don’t be afraid to dig deeper than what you see on the surface. Do a root cause analysis on incidents to locate the real problem.

 

New Year's Safety Resolutions

Once you’ve conducted your year-end review, some specific safety resolutions should jump out – areas of improvement where you’ve been falling short recently.

It’s important to make all New Year safety goals SMART: Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Relevant, and Time-Bound. Choose things that will make a concrete difference in your company or team’s safety record and set a specific period of time to achieve them.

Whatever goals you choose, create processes for tracking your progress and evaluating your success afterward. Don’t be afraid to adjust your goals as needed, and don’t forget to celebrate your successes!

If you’re in a position to set safety resolutions for the whole organization, that’s great. However, even managers and workers can set goals to improve their safety record. In fact, one of your organizational goals can be asking individuals to set their own.

Your EHS resolutions will be unique and tailored to your business and safety record, but here are a few examples of potential safety resolutions at each level to get you started.

 

Organization-Wide EHS Resolutions

Examples include:

 

Manager-Level Safety Resolutions

Examples include:

  • Checking that your team’s safety training is entirely up-to-date.
  • Adding timely and relevant toolbox talks to your weekly routine by the end of the first quarter.
  • Doing a daily walk-through to observe safety behavior and correct problems.
  • Publically recognize and reward safe behavior.
  • Increase compliance with personal protective equipment (PPE) use to 100%.
  • Investigate all near-miss incidents and take corrective measures.

 

Employee-Level Safety Resolutions

Examples include:

  • Inspecting your tools and equipment to verify they are in good working order before every use.
  • Completing the annual fit test of your PPE.
  • Notifying your supervisor immediately if you notice an unsafe condition or action.
  • Finishing your safety training before it’s due.

 

The Role of Training in Workplace Safety Goals

Regular safety training is a necessary component in reaching your New Year safety goals – not only is training a compliance item in its own right, but it’s also a crucial way to keep workplace safety principles at the forefront of workers’ minds.

OSHA 10 or 30 courses can be a great foundation for workplace safety training, as well as an excellent refresher. And these days, you don’t have to cram all your workers into a classroom for two or three days, sacrificing productive time.

Online OSHA Outreach courses are just as valid when you use a reputable OSHA-authorized provider like us. We’ve been issuing DOL cards for over 20 years with self-paced, mobile-friendly courses that workers can tackle whenever and wherever it’s most convenient to them.

For construction and demolition workers, we offer 10-hour Construction as well as a 30-hour supervisor-level course. For all other OSHA-regulated industries, including manufacturing, warehousing, and healthcare, we offer 10-hour General Industry courses and 30-hour supervisor-level versions.

Get started today!