• Menu
  • Skip to main content
  • Skip to secondary navigation
  • Skip to primary sidebar
  • Skip to footer

Before Header

  • Search
  • About
  • Contact
  • Privacy
 
CHOOSE BROADSPIRE

Amaxx Workers Comp Blog

Reduce Workers Compensation Costs By 20-50%

Header Right

  • Home
    • Training Center
  • Get Started
    • Newcomers Class for WC Professionals
    • Subscribe to Free Newsletter
    • Free Training Center Account
    • Return to Work Resources
    • WC Claims Mgmt. Resources
    • Insurance Advisor Resources
  • Membership
    • Insider (free account)
    • WC Mastery
    • Teams & Managers Mastery
    • Training Partners
  • Products
    • On-Demand Courses
    • Specialty Courses
    • Certifications & Mastery Courses
    • Ultimate Guidebooks
  • Blog
    • Video Blogs
    • COVID-19 / Coronavirus Pandemic
  • Login

Mobile Menu

Choose Broadspire

CHOOSE BROADSPIREBroadspire Delivers Meaningful Results to Our Clients and Their Claimants
  • Home
    • Training Center
  • Get Started
    • Newcomers Class for WC Professionals
    • Subscribe to Free Newsletter
    • Free Training Center Account
    • Return to Work Resources
    • WC Claims Mgmt. Resources
    • Insurance Advisor Resources
  • Membership
    • Insider (free account)
    • WC Mastery
    • Teams & Managers Mastery
    • Training Partners
  • Products
    • On-Demand Courses
    • Specialty Courses
    • Certifications & Mastery Courses
    • Ultimate Guidebooks
  • Blog
    • Video Blogs
    • COVID-19 / Coronavirus Pandemic
  • Login
  • Search
  • About
  • Contact
  • Privacy
You are here: Home / Workers Comp Loss Prevention / Workplace Safety / Supervisor Is First Line Of Defense In Work Accident Prevention

Supervisor Is First Line Of Defense In Work Accident Prevention

July 29, 2016 By //  by Michael B. Stack Leave a Comment

The best workers comp claim is the claim that never happened.  An effective approach to accident prevention is having supervisors actively involved in the safety program.  The importance of safety training for field or floor supervisors cannot be overstated.  Having supervisors actively involved in safety programs gets them to “buy into” the program, making it more effective, and making safety an important daily job duty for supervisors makes safety a routine practice.

Safety Responsibilities of Supervisors

Supervisors’ safety responsibilities must be incorporated into their job descriptions as important performance measurements.

Safety objectives that should be a regular part of every supervisor’s job include:

  • Inspecting work areas to identify any safety issues
  • Initiating work orders for safety related repairs
  • Insuring all needed repairs are completed timely
  • Knowing and complying with all OSHA and state requirements
  • Enforcing employee compliance with all safety regulations
  • Training all new employees on the safety plan
  • Having monthly safety meetings with group employees
  • Safe completion of all work
  • Recording all safety incidents
  • Reporting all safety incidents to management
  • Investigating all accidents
  • Preventing the reoccurrence of similar accidents
  • Reviewing with management how to improve safety
    Click Link to Access Free PDF Download

    “4-Step Sequence For Effective Employee Screening, Hiring, & Placement”

Knowing and Implementing the Safety Plan

Management must ensure that supervisors know and implement the current safety plan.  Supervisors must be familiar with any updates to the safety plan and immediately communicate these changes to their group employees. Supervisors should review the changes and the overall safety plan with their group employees at the monthly safety meetings.

Review of Safety Work Orders

Management should regularly review a supervisor’s safety work orders for repairs or improvements and this information should also be included in a supervisor’s performance review.  Management must verify that the supervisor is identifying and correcting legitimate safety hazards. The accuracy and effectiveness of the safety work orders will impact the overall outcome of the safety program.

Accident Reporting

An important safety duty of a supervisor is to create a detailed accident report after each injury.  The accident report should always be reviewed by management immediately following an incident and the quality of all accident investigations completed by the supervisor should be a part of every performance review.

The supervisor’s manager should check each supervisor’s accident report to determine if the supervisor:

  • Interviewed the injured employee and the co-workers/witnesses
  • Included an investigation of the object/ machinery/ equipment involved
  • Determined if the accident was the employee’s fault or caused by an object/equipment/ machinery defect
  • Recommended how to prevent a similar accident from occurring in the future

Safety Reporting Is More Than Completing OSHA Forms. 

Safety reporting should entail a review of injury accidents by categories determined by management.  Sample categories include employee error, equipment/machinery malfunction and unforeseen circumstances.  The purpose is to identify areas where further safety improvements can be made.

Checking the OSHA Website

One good way to keep supervisors up to date on safety prevention is to have them or their managers regularly check the OSHA website at http://www.osha.gov/.  OSHA provides easily downloadable posters, flyers, educational materials and apps to help supervisors prevent accidents and injuries.

The Supervisor’s Performance Review

Performance reviews are one way to insure that supervisors meet their safety goals.  Management should not measure safety solely by the number of injury claims reported.  By emphasizing the prevention of injuries, management reduces a supervisor’s temptation to underreport the minor injuries that do occur.

FREE DOWNLOAD: “4-Step Sequence For Effective Employee Screening, Hiring, & Placement”

In performance reviews, management should assess a supervisor’s:

  • Completion of regular safety inspections
  • Timeliness of repair orders
  • Compliance with OSHA and other regulations
  • Safety training provided to employees
  • Recommendations on how to improve safety

Integrating safety into supervisors’ job performance will improve compliance with all safety requirements and reduce the number of workers’ compensation claims.

Author Michael Stack, Principal, COMPClub, Amaxx LLC. He is an expert in workers compensation cost containment systems and helps employers reduce their work comp costs by 20% to 50%.  He works as a consultant to large and mid-market clients, is co-author of Your Ultimate Guide To Mastering Workers Comp Costs, a comprehensive step-by-step manual of cost containment strategies based on hands-on field experience, and is founder of COMPClub, an exclusive member training program on workers compensation cost containment best practices. Through these platforms he is in the trenches on a working together with clients to implement and define best practices, which allows him to continuously be at the forefront of innovation and thought leadership in workers’ compensation cost containment. Contact: mstack@reduceyourworkerscomp.com.

©2016 Amaxx LLC. All rights reserved under International Copyright Law.

Do not use this information without independent verification. All state laws vary. You should consult with your insurance broker, attorney, or qualified professional.

FREE DOWNLOAD: “4-Step Sequence For Effective Employee Screening, Hiring, & Placement”

Filed Under: Workplace Safety

Related Articles

Sam Thinks He May Have COVID-19. Now What?

Sam Thinks He May Have COVID-19. Now What?

Injury Prevention With Ergonomics Creates Money

Injury Prevention With Ergonomics Creates Money

Plan for a Happy New Year with Safety First

Plan for a Happy New Year with Safety First

The A B C’s of Workplace Safety

The A B C’s of Workplace Safety

If You Are Not Preventing Work-Related Injuries, You Are Causing Them

If You Are Not Preventing Work-Related Injuries, You Are Causing Them

Important Safety Tips for Outdoor Workers In Hot Summer Months

Important Safety Tips for Outdoor Workers In Hot Summer Months

Address These 7 Most Common Workplace Safety Concerns

Address These 7 Most Common Workplace Safety Concerns

4 Tips To Ensure Safety Committee Success

4 Tips To Ensure Safety Committee Success

11 Tips To Keep Aging Workers Safe, Healthy and Productive

11 Tips To Keep Aging Workers Safe, Healthy and Productive

6 Techniques To Avoid Lifting Injuries

6 Techniques To Avoid Lifting Injuries

5 Tips To Prevent Winter Work Comp Claims

5 Tips To Prevent Winter Work Comp Claims

Risk Management at Industrial Work Zones

Risk Management at Industrial Work Zones

Free Download

4-Step Sequence For Effective Employee Screening, Hiring, & Placement - FREE Download Click Here Now!

Train to Succeed

BECOME CERTIFIED IN WORKERS’ COMPENSATION

Proven Course Catalog & WC Toolbox Give You The Power To Achieve Lower Costs and Better Injured Worker Outcomes

VISIT WORKERS' COMP TRAINING CENTER

Previous Post: « Nova Scotia Unveils New Workplace Safety Resource
Next Post: Texas’ DWC Presenting Workplace Safety Workshop »

Reader Interactions

Leave a Reply Cancel reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

Primary Sidebar

FREE DOWNLOAD

4-Step Sequence For Effective Employee Screening, Hiring, & Placement - FREE Download Click Here Now!

Our Sponsors

Broadspire

Workers’ Comp 3rd-Party Administrator
 

Catastrophic Care Management, Complex Care, and Specialty Networks
 

Ametros

Post-Settlement Administration
 

Medcor

Injury Triage, Onsite Clinics

Read Our Award-Winning Blog

Blog Categories

Search Our Archive

Subscribe to Our FREE Newsletter

Footer

Search Our Archive

Search our continually growing archive of over 2500 articles about Workers' Comp issues.

Quiclinks

  • Calculators
  • Terms & Abbreviations
  • Glossary of WC Premium Terms
  • WC Resources
  • Best Practices
  • Industries

RSS Recent Blog Posts

  • Timely Reporting Claims Is First Step In Work Comp Management
  • Using Defense Attorneys to Defend Work Comp Cases
  • Settle More Workers’ Comp Claims Faster With The Team Approach
SUBSCRIBE TO OUR FEE NEWSLETTER
Let Us Help You Stomp Down the High Cost of Workers' Comp!
Top of Page ↑
  • Home
  • Training Center
  • Get Started
  • Membership
  • Products
  • Blog
  • About
  • Contact
  • Subscribe
  • Login
Copyright © 2021 Amaxx, LLC. All Rights Reserved. · Privacy Policy / Legal Notice