It seems like a simple concept, but it’s not always easy to implement a robust risk management strategy. We discussed the link between risk management and workers compensation in our first post of this series. In this post, we’ll provide actionable insight on how to implement risk management into your operations to further enhance your efforts to promote a safer overall workplace environment.
The Link Between Workers Compensation and Risk Management
How much does your company payout on workers compensation claims?
While every business strives for a zero-incident environment, the fact is, accidents are bound to happen sooner or later. But the good news is that the frequency and severity of these incidents can be greatly reduced over time by better understanding the nature of worker’s compensation claims, identifying key risk factors, and observing how risk management can play a role in a safer overall workplace environment.
It’s estimated that nearly 70 percent of executives are not confident in their risk management policies and practices and the ability to meet the needs of the future. Furthermore, nearly 60 percent of senior-level executives rank “risk and compliance” among the top risk categories they feel the least prepared to address. Make the investment now to improve your risk management and you’ll make an investment in your overall business.
The first step in implementing risk management within your business is to evaluate the risk trends within your business. Here are some tips on how to do so, and how this will have major payoff in reducing workers compensation costs:
Evaluating Risk Trends
What’s the best way to identify hazards and risks inherent within your business? It all starts with conducting a careful assessment in an effort to leave no stone unturned within your operations. In this section, we’ll take a closer look at how to properly identify the risks that are inherent to your business and then how to use the information that you’ve gleaned to put an effective risk management strategy into place.
Analyze Your Risks
Like we said earlier in this piece, a robust risk management strategy first starts with identifying and assessing your risks. This is easier said than done, and it may be helpful to rely on software that can help you collect and report out data trends over time. This is the crucial first step in ensuring your business is all-around safer – and you can’t move on until you know what your main risk factors are. It’s estimated that some 96 percent of all risks in the workplace are preventable – identifying these major risks before they become workplace accidents is huge.
Look at Leading Indicators
To identify these major risks, leverage leading indicators in your company, then you can remove these hazards or take steps to greatly reduce the likelihood of an injury stemming from them. Anvl’s solution provides supervisors with real-time data and a Leading Indicators Dashboard to assess risk trends over time in order to implement risk management within a business. This can pay big dividends, as taking actionable steps against these risks will decrease the costs of workers compensation claims.
Train Workers to Identify Risks
Part of eliminating risks includes properly training your workforce to know what to do when a hazard or threat is detected. While a software solution can be helpful for detecting hazards, if workers don’t know how to properly react when faced with one, then safety issues and injuries could still persist. This is why it is crucial to intentionally invest in software that not only detects hazards, but also educates and empowers your workers to respond in the safest way possible.
Meet Regularly to Discuss & Review Risks
It’s not enough to implement a program and train your workers properly – you should also be regularly engaging with them to see how safety can continue to be enhanced in the workplace. Hold brainstorming sessions, allow your workers to ask questions and provide feedback, and make sure that you’re receptive to it. Involving the workers can also increase buy-in, which can lead to a safer and more enjoyable all-around workplace environment.
Practice Responsive Management
When it comes to risk management, it’s important to be as proactive as possible. However, if incidents do still arise, and there’s a good chance they will on some scale, you need to carry out the appropriate response. It’s also crucial to adapt and adjust over time. Anvl’s software offers two-way communication between frontline workers and supervisors, and also tracks data and key metrics to help streamline improvement now and in the future.
Assess the Results
If you do all of the aforementioned, you should notice a significant improvement to your firm’s overall safety culture. And when safety improves, so too does the morale of your employees. However, be sure to not become complacent with the results. Continue to adapt and adjust to ensure that you’re setting yourself up to protect your workers now and into the future.
Anvl’s solution is here to assist your business with integrating and implementing risk management. Our experts will work with you to assess your safety needs and provide a solution that is tailored to provide your workers with the safety solution they need to educate and empower them to make the safest, actionable decisions on the floor. To learn more about Anvl’s solution, click here to see a demo and contact one of our experts today.
