The year’s end has snuck up on us once again, bringing the added pressure of work deadlines, projects, social events, and family commitments.
With these additional pressures occupying our headspace over the festive season, injury rates and incidents tend to increase. The team at HazardCo have a few tips on ways to manage your stress, energy levels, and overall wellbeing at this busy time.
Deadlines – short deadlines for projects and pressure to reach end-of-year-goals can add additional stress to the holidays and cause health and wellness to fall by the wayside. As always, communicate early on, and involve everyone in the project timeline and any dependencies… that way time pressures become a shared problem. And if you do have a looming deadline you don’t think you can make, now’s the time to start talking about it and looking at options with your wider team and client.
Temporary Workers – great for covering annual leave and busy periods, these staff members are often at a higher risk as they don’t have the experience or knowledge of processes specific to your workplace. If you engage temporary workers to cover annual leave or busy periods, it is important that they are inducted correctly, and receive full and correct safety instructions and supervision for any work with machinery or unfamiliar tasks they may be doing.
Social Events – whether it’s purely a social catch-up, or an end of year work party, remember to drink responsibly; monitor and manage alcohol provided to staff, and never drink and drive. This way everyone can have a safe and enjoyable time celebrating their achievements throughout the year.
So, whether you are actively working, or in the midst of the holiday season, try to stay focused on the job at hand, and pay close attention to the task you are performing.
The HazardCo team wishes you all the best for a safe and happy holiday season and look forward to catching up in 2022!
Things can get pretty hectic on a construction site so it can be hard to find time to keep on top of everyone and everything. With HazardCo’s Quick Share, the latest innovation in health and safety, subbies can now share their on-site activity with the main builder – all online and at the touch of a button. It keeps builders and their subbies on the same page when it comes to health and safety, and gives them both one less thing to remember to do later.
HazardCo created Quick Share to let subbies easily share their on-site health and safety activity with the main builder. Subbies no longer have to find, download, and print or email reports since Quick Share does the sharing for them. It works on the HazardCo App so it’s all online and shared instantly, meaning less paperwork, and since there are no delays there is also less chance of being chased by the site supervisor for health and safety activity.
When subbies use Quick Share, the main builder has a better view of what’s happening on-site and more peace of mind that everything is being completed as it needs to be. It also saves the main builder time since they don’t need to chase their subbies for that paperwork.
The online HazardCo Hub retains all activity created by the main builder for a site, as well as any activity shared by their subbies for that project. With all health and safety activity saved in one place, on-site health and safety becomes more streamlined.
Quick Share saves both builders and their subbies time and makes sure they’re on the same page when it comes to health and safety. True to HazardCo’s purpose, Quick Share is yet another feature that helps HazardCo members create a safer site and have more time to focus on the job at hand.
New project? No problem. With so much to organise upfront, getting your health and safety sorted before you even turn up onsite means you’re covered right from the start, and can focus on getting everything else ready to go.
It’s really straightforward with HazardCo Projects – before you start your build take a few minutes to order and set up your new project. You’ll receive your site specific safety plan via email (it’s saved in the Hub too), and a physical scan-in board will be delivered for you to put up on-site. That’s it – you’re ready to start your build with all corners covered.
Tell all your team members and subbies to download the free HazardCo App before they turn up to site. Once your build starts, everyone digitally inducts themselves on-site, using the QR code that comes with the project scan-in board, and the QR scanner in the App.
Start your project the right way. HazardCo Projects help you nail health and safety before you start the build – giving you one less thing to worry about and helping you get your team and subbies home safe at the and of every day.
Managing your project on-site is all about multi-tasking. Your team, your client, as well as all the subbies and tradies, so it’s no surprise things can get pretty hectic on-site with a lot to juggle. Now there’s a way you can get your health and safety sorted even faster, while still doing the right thing to protect everyone on site.
HazardCo was built to make health and safety a breeze for everyone on-site – the app and online hub use smart templates and drop-down options, which make it super quick for anyone to complete a SWMS, site review, incident report, toolbox meeting, or induction.
The time saved on health and safety gives everyone more time on the tools, helping you get the job done quicker. And because the HazardCo App goes everywhere with you on your smartphone, health and safety activity can be completed there and then, with no need to find time to get it done later… helping you to have a safer site and manage your work-life balance.
Getting your team home safely at the end of the day is the most important thing you can do, and with HazardCo’s App and online Hub you get to save time without compromising on safety. Using the app every day keeps health and safety top of mind, which helps make the site safer for everyone.
Ready to have a little more time for other things in life? Whether you’re the lead builder, a subbie who’s won a site contract, or part of the crew, HazardCo is there to get your workplace health and safety sorted – super quick and straightforward.
While the mountain of paperwork seems to keep building every year, modern technology and smart solutions now give you, the main builder on-site, the option to cut back on health and safety paperwork in a way that gives you a safer site and more control of what’s going on.
Using your smartphone, HazardCo puts health and safety in the palm of your hand. The HazardCo App enables members to complete a SWMS, site review, incident report, or record a toolbox meeting – these are all done in record time and are available straight away on the Hub. All online, in real-time, and all without touching a single piece of paper.
The free version of the HazardCo App means everyone can complete inductions and scan on/off-site, so there are no excuses from the team. And because everyone on site scans on/off-site on their phone, you can see who’s on-site and when, without having to be there yourself.
If everyone on-site is a hazardCo member it’s even better! Site inductions can be done on the App and your team members and subbies, do these on their own phone without having to tie up additional meeting time. All up, it means you have a complete record of everything – completed inductions, site reviews, incident reports, toolbox meeting minutes, on-site time for all crew members etc., all saved online and available 24-7.
A big bonus when you go paperless, is that all of your employees have a total view of on-site health and safety. Because you’re using the app every day to scan in/out of site, you’re all seeing health and safety details more often – a key part of creating a safer site.
The HazardCo App is designed specifically for builders and tradies just like you. The smart App and online Hub put site health and safety in the palm of your hand wherever, and whenever you need. For a safer site, more visibility of health and safety, and less paperwork, make sure your team is using HazardCo.
It’s the latest App feature you’ve been waiting for! HazardCo SWMS has now landed!
A simple and easy to repeat approach, where you can:
- Simply complete SWMS from any mobile device
- Complete them on-site, in real-time in the touch of a button
- Keep the team informed by emailing your SWMS to everyone involved
Manage subbies? You can even digitally collect SWMS from subcontractors without the fuss!
What is a SWMS?
SWMS (Safe Work Method Statement) is a document that sets out the order of work activities to be carried out on-site, the hazards arising from these and the measures to be put in place to control the risks.
How does it work?
The HazardCo App makes it simple for you to understand what you need to fill in. With an easy-to-use interface that gives you options to choose from.
- An identification of the work on-site
- Specific hazards relating to the work
- A description of the measures to be implemented to control the risks
- The order of work (method statement) showing the tasks that will be carried out in a step by step process.
All employees involved in the work should discuss the SWMS so they understand exactly what work is to be done, how it will be completed and the controls that will be used to keep everyone safe. It’s fundamental and should be done before any work gets underway.
Empowering workers to save lives – check out our short explainer video to see how simple we’ve made it!
Risks change, all day, everyday. That’s the reality of life on site.
Methods change because of different training and experience, people on the job change, there are differences in machinery and materials used, as well as environmental changes from hour to hour.
It’s a lot.
Risk is a product of the work processes being carried out. So, if the work doesn’t happen, the risk isn’t present.
But, if a work process is defined then risk can be recognised and taken into account.
The key question tradies and supervisors need to be asking themselves is:
How do I adapt my task when a change occurs?
It’s not about mountains of paperwork. It’s about 4 simple steps:
- Plan: Identify and assess the risk
- Do: Eliminate or minimise the risk
- Check: Monitor the control measures
- Act: Review for continuous improvement
A change occurs. Repeat.
Plan. Do. Check. Act.
Repeat.
(You get the picture)
We should all be working towards a heightened sense of awareness on site. And of course, treating risks as priority should be a collective mindset. Reinforced by supervisors who should be adapting plans and guiding teams to take account of the constantly evolving risk environment.
The power of change in risk can kill, the power of change in process can save a life.
Be the change you want to see.
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