Hiring skilled contractors to address workforce gaps is becoming increasingly common. However, as temporary team members, contractors often bring varying levels of skills, qualifications and experience that may not align with your core workforce. These differences can create challenges in maintaining consistent health and safety standards across your organization. This is where effective contractor safety management becomes essential.
Contractor safety management is a system of procedures that organizations follow to ensure that contractors, like full-time employees, remain safe and healthy. These processes can include:
Contractors don’t always have the same detailed knowledge of safety practices as the rest of an organization. Because of these key discrepancies, both contractors and the full-time employees become more vulnerable to workplace hazards.
By improving the safety of contractors and employees alike, companies can take significant steps toward their EHS goals.
Managing contractor safety is a considerable task, and it can be hard to know where to begin. Including these six steps will put you on the right track:
If a contractor’s skills don’t measure up, they pose a significant risk to themselves and your greater team.
In addition to determining the required qualifications, firms should assess the particular hazards associated with the jobs they’re outsourcing and ensure that safety management systems are in place to manage those hazards. By performing a thorough assessment of the skills, training, qualifications and hazards connected to the job, companies can ensure they’ve done everything in their power to mitigate the additional risks involved in hiring a contractor.
Before hiring a contractor, make an agreement detailing the duties and responsibilities of the position being outsourced. This agreement should clearly establish expectations of the contractor throughout their time in the role.
While your contractors must meet the qualifications required to perform their duties, it’s also important to provide them with additional training to make sure they can do the job as effectively as possible. Even if they have received relevant training prior to securing the job, you can’t be sure that training will be specifically applicable to your jobsite and the contractor’s exact role. Of course, this additional training doesn’t just apply to their ability to perform their job well; contractors need to understand the safety risks associated with their duties and how the company expects hazards, near misses and incidents to be effectively reported.
Employers should regularly monitor their contractors’ performance and ensure that safety requirements are met. They should also engage in regular dialogue with contractors to ensure that they’re engaged in their work and provide any necessary feedback that could help them improve their performance. If there are any areas in which contractors are not meeting these requirements, your company can then provide additional safety training.
The most effective way to safety manage contractors is to identify, establish and implement a set of complex controls that reduce the risk of a contractor experiencing a work-related injury. Job Hazard Analyses (JHAs), risk assessments, inspections and audits should be performed to identify hazards involved in contractors’ tasks.
Leading companies across industries use software solutions to manage their contractor safety. These systems enable companies to maintain high health and safety standards for both contractors and full-time employees by automating and centralizing safety management procedures, boosting engagement with health and safety, enhancing communication and making it easier to manage and analyze incident and hazard reports.
Today, a growing number of organizations use software solutions to streamline the various processes involved in support of contractor safety management. Some solutions run on mobile applications, making vital information like procedures, regulations and warnings accessible to contractors. These same solutions also provide an easy-to-use platform for effective training.
Implementing a software solution can also simplify the process of hiring and onboarding contractors and streamline their management once they’re in the door. If your company’s contractor management system doesn’t offer these capabilities, it may be time to consider implementing a software solution to maximize efficiency and keep your contractors safe.
For additional information on contractor safety management, check out our Contractor Safety Management Software module page.
For a sharable version of this information, download our Contractor Safety management eBook below.
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