Protecting or ensuring the health and safety of employees who are directly affected by the activities within the organization is an important part of risk management. The employees are the most important resource and the last one that determine the performance of the organization after other factors have been satisfied (Werner & DeSimone 10).
Therefore, strategies that should be implemented to protect their health and safety should not only cover the context, but must be effective. Whoever conceives the initiative is not more important than the one it affects. I suppose that the debate about health and safety should be on how the intended strategy is appreciated among the subjects rather than on its perceived outcomes. Thereason is that, the effectiveness solely depends on the willingness of the subjects to contribute to the initiative.
The strategies should therefore be those that initiate motivations and establish positive relationship between the deliverer and the subject. The realization here is that the human resource management is as important as the employees in protecting the health and safety of the employees, and the best recommendations are those that affect bothcontexts.
Exhibit commitment
Hawkins (2) suggests that the provision of health and safety of the workers is the responsibility ofparties bound by organizational policies, goals and mission. The sources of unsafe environment should not be seen as to originate from the system that caused it or the failed responsibility of an employee, but right from external factors that could have been considered in preventing it.
For instance, a new faulty machine that causes an accident could be the fault of the operator or the manager as well as the failure of the legislative bodies to commit them in seeing that the developers of such machines adhere to quality specifications. Commitment for all including the society which can protest if a facility is observed to risk the health of the people is a strong recommendation in ensuring health and safety for all.
When narrowed down, corporate commitment is most important in providing health and safety of the workers. It can never be argued that the accomplishment can occur without involving the stakeholders. Health and security is a matter that requires knowledge and skill support, moral support, and financial support.
At this juncture, the role of human resource department is to link the employees with the higher hierarchies of governance. While the employees are in the best position to protect them, the means to do that usually comes from above. The commitment of the management and the board will make them to value the employees and eventually be willing to enhance their working environment.
The effects of corporate commitment on health and safety of employees is seen in the case of North Staffordshire Combines Healthcare NHS Trust (HSE, 3). After facing improvement targets, the board set out a whole system approach to manage risks giving one of the directors responsibilityfor overseeing the health and safety in the organization.
This led to a better and much improved health and safety system that enables in identifying and managing corporate risks, a transparent culture, and improvements in reporting and monitoring. In such an environment there remains only the contribution of the employees to ensure their health and safety.
Employee commitment is also important as it gives the last take in the process of ensuring health and safety of the workplace (Karmis 181). No matter how the management is committed, the employees must be ready to appreciate what is afforded. Their commitment means even their efforts to assist the management understand the ground issues in terms of health and security.
This is a basis of the argument that the employees have the sole responsibility to protect themselves. As noted earlier however, the means and motivation must come from somewhere else. Workers humble themselves in order to deliver their duties so as to make a living and might never be aware of the risks associated with their working environment.
Develop training program
We all do what we know and improve our performance through learning new things as well as revisiting the old ones. Similarly, the employees will do what they know about health and safety and improve in that context through leaning new things. Furthermore, working environment and the equipments associated keep on changing and thus require new knowledge in order to adapt well.
Therefore training is important in protecting the health and safety of the employees. The more the employees learn new ways to protect themselves, the better they shape their work places. It is not morally upright for the management to assume that the employees are safe at their workplaces when there is no effort to show them what should be done.
The major role of HR is ensuring that the employees are comfortable enough to perform to the expectations of the organization. In terms of health and safety, this comfort means to arm the employees with the necessary skills and knowledge through systematic training.
It is true that the managers might not understand the situation at the ground level or might not be feeling the actual weight of the matter, but they have the central role to connect the employees with the necessary resources. The business context is quite different as the mentoring process originates from the HR department. Most employees will innocently seek for an advice from the HR fraternity and thus imposing a moral obligation on HR to support their independence in terms of health and security through training.
Most of the management members within an organization know about the basic health and security implications, and indeed have the resources to learn about them. Hence, it beats logic to argue that the members should delegateall the health and security responsibilities to their employees.
According to the work ethics, leaders are accountable to the wellbeing of their employees and should never come a time when they leave this responsibility. They would instead initiate programs for training to make the employees more independent and easy to manage, and the best programs will be designed when there sufficient knowledge about the workplace.
Inspect the workplace
Regular inspection of the workplace and the associated systems forms the platform for the management to make effective decisions concerning health and safety.
This is because recommendations such as training originate from the findings of an inspection exercise. The human resource has the role of collecting as much information as possible about the experience and perceptions of the employees on their places of work.
Although, the employees might require the organization to provide a healthy and safe environment, it is not true that most of them know the ideal working environment. Certainly, they are not much aware of the health and security issue surrounding their working environment. This is because, as any other person who becomes used to the same place, the employees tend to assume the many signs of risks.
Regular inspections may also awaken the realization in the employees that the organization in concerned and become more responsible when working. In fact many accidents and errors leading to health hazards resulting from the carelessness of the employees can be reduced through regular inspection. Aware that the management has played its role in ensuring health and securities, the employees are challenged to contribute to the dilemma.
As human beings, the employees cannot sit down and watch everything being done for the sake of their wellbeing. They will indeed be motivated to rise up and take their respective roles and for the conditions beyond their control, they will be able to press their needs forward in faith that they will be dealt with. Their moral authority will move others and the entire organization towards protecting their health and safety.
Conclusion
Protecting the safety and health of the employees is an effort that calls for corporation from all the parties involved. Their commitment and especially that of the human resource management ensures that the employees have accessibility to the appropriate means. These means which are facilitated by the organization at large must meet a workforce which is prepared to exploit them.
Therefore, training becomes important in preparing the employees to work independently towards a healthy and safe environment. In addition, the regular inspection of the working environment enables the management to make better decisions while at the same time encouraging the employees to take responsibilities. Despite their understanding of the situation, there is no way that the employees can ensure healthy and safe environment on their own.
Works Cited
Hawkins, Leslie. Tolley’s Guide to Managing Employee Health. London, UK: Taylor & Francis, 2003.
Health and Safety Executive. “Leading health and safety at work”. 2011. Web.
Karmis, Michael. Mine health and safety management. SME, 2001.
Werner, Jon and DeSimone Randy. Human Resource Development. Florence: Cengage Learning, 2008.