Employees are increasingly nomadic nowadays, carrying out their duties far from the traditional brick-and-mortar office buildings to which they were once tethered. At the same time, many workers have no option but to leave the office, often alone, to carry out their duties at a remote work site.
As such, it’s never been more important that safety regimes and protocols adapt to take account of the risks and hazards that remote and lone working pose.
The trouble is that the risks lone workers face are often unique and difficult to mitigate. However, with the right mindset and the appropriate technology, all risks can be managed and mitigated. Let’s find out how.
Risk Management
In the UK, under the Management of Health and Safety at Work Regulations (1999), an employer has a duty to identify and manage the risks lone workers can be expected to encounter as they go about their jobs. The UK’s HSE suggests that a three-pronged approach to lone-worker risk identification works best.
The three steps are:
- Identify the hazards on a worksite, especially those that are liable to cause serious injury or illness to an employee.
- Assess the risk – that is, weigh up how likely it is that someone working on a site might be expected to run into the hazard you’ve identified and the severity of the risk it poses to the worker.
- Eliminate the risk or hazard, if possible. If that’s not feasible, take steps to control and manage the risk. Failing that, the task should not be performed alone..
Monitoring & Supervision
Performing a thorough risk assessment is just half the job when it comes to ensuring remote worker safety. Now, the hard work begins.
With the information gleaned from the risk assessment at hand, the work of adopting the appropriate monitoring and oversight safety regime should begin. Technology plays an increasingly important role here, especially in addressing the third aspect of safety management highlighted above: elimination.
For example, a lone worker app is a handy tool that allows safety bosses to stay in touch and monitor remote and lone workers while they are out on a job.
This tech often features essential safety mitigation and monitoring tools like GPS tracking, true man-down detection, real-time alerts and check-in data.
Feedback
It’s important to bear in mind that risk management is an ongoing process. Risk profiles change, and the nature of workplace hazards evolves, so a company with lone and remote workers needs to constantly solicit feedback from in-the-field workers.
This will allow a company to get a handle on the changing nature of risks faced by its workers and gauge the extent to which workers feel the safety equipment they have at their disposal is appropriate in mitigating those risks.
Again, technology has a role to play here. Lone worker apps feed companies with real-time metrics and feedback, allowing safety managers to stay ahead of the curve, understand where pain points are and spot hazardous aspects of their worksites.
The workforce has never been more mobile than it is today. While this is convenient for both bosses and employees alike, it means that the risk profile has changed in important ways.
However, as we’ve demonstrated, with a conscientious approach to risk assessment and by adopting the right technology, most risks can be managed and mitigated.