If you own or manage a business, it’s imperative you do what you can to teach your staff about the best practices when it comes to fire safety. Doing so might just save your business one day or, more importantly, people’s lives.
Each year there are around 22,000 fires in workplaces around the UK, many of which could have been prevented if staff had a better understanding of fire safety. As an employer, what should you put in place? Here are 6 simple tips for educating your workforce on the best fire safety practices.
Lead by example
How can you expect your employees to take fire safety seriously, and to retain all of the necessary knowledge, if you’re not demonstrating that you also care significantly? Lead by example and your employees should follow. This includes regularly sharing helpful videos, updating staff on now protocols through email, and regularly having your fire alarm serviced. Seek fire alarm installers in Durham or elsewhere across the North East.
Discuss it with each new employee on their first day
The best way to enforce the severity of fire safety knowledge is to make yourself very clear on day one of your employee’s time with you. Discussing what to do in the event of a fire – and how to prevent one – should be treated just as importantly as the other bits you tend to discuss with new employees, like payroll and holidays.
Put up posters and leaflets around your workplace
Your employees should never have to struggle to remember what your business’s fire safety protocol is. A good way to ensure they never forget is to have posters and leaflets around your workplace. In fact, did you know that the Health and Safety Information for Employees Regulations 1989, requires employers to either display the HSE-approved law poster or to provide each of their workers with the equivalent leaflet?
Regularly practice fire drills
Fire drills should not be something you do once every three years and then forget all about. If you’re not regularly practicing fire drills, you’re suggesting to your staff that you do not take fire safety very seriously, neither do you truly care for the consequences that could arise from a fire in the workplace.
Look for training opportunities
The best way to educate your workforce on the best fire safety practices is to seek the help of a professional team to do most of it for you! Your knowledge and guidance is helpful, but it cannot beat the knowledge and guidance that fire safety professionals boast. Look for local courses that can give both your staff and you the confidence necessary when it comes to fire safety protocols.
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