Ensure that every employee understands the importance of workplace fire safety.
Keeping your workplace safe from fire is an important task that you have to always bear in mind whether you’re a business owner, manager or safety officer, but this responsibility is more than just clearing hazards or doing fire safety audits: Part of your responsibility is to promote fire safety itself.
Why is it Important to Promote Fire Safety?
Fire safety in the workplace is indispensable no matter where you are in the world, but especially in Australia, where the weather conditions are conducive to fires. It isn’t enough to merely have workplace measures in place to prevent fires; these measures are useless if they are not understood and followed by everyone on site.
Promoting fire safety is as important as having the safety measures themselves. Everyone in the workplace needs to be involved in order to make it a safer place for all.
9 Ways to Promote Fire Safety in the Workplace
Promoting fire safety can be easier said than done. If you’re having difficulties and in need of tips, we have compiled a list of nine ways to promote fire safety in the workplace.
1. Conduct fire safety training
Buying safety equipment or creating safety guidelines isn’t enough. Fire safety training – which includes knowing how to reduce risks and how to respond in case of fire – is one of the most important ways of keeping your workplace safe and one of the best ways to do this is to bring in a professional team to conduct fire safety training instead of doing it yourself. Someone well-versed in fire safety training, a professional firefighter, or a fire auditor can give great advice and proper demonstration.
2. Make sure the training sticks
It’s easy to forget what we’ve trained for once the training sessions are over. Anyone who has done a technical training course before would know. Try to prevent this from happening and make sure that what your employees learn during training sticks with them.
One way is to give periodic fire safety quizzes to your employees, once a quarter will do. If regular quizzes aren’t to your liking, arrange for a simple refresher class once or twice annually.
3. Remind everyone of fire safety measures
Don’t wait for the refresher class to remind everyone on fire safety measures, however. A few gentle reminders once in a while can greatly help. Perhaps a feature in the company newsletter or a monthly email blast on fire safety could work. Of course, don’t make the reminders too long-winded. Make them short, catchy, and helpful – you don’t want your employees skipping on the reminders.
4. Create signs for everyone to see
Fire safety signs are a great way of reminding your employees of important guidelines. Make sure that these signs are well-made, informative, easily understandable and posted in highly visible areas. Remember, your fire safety signs must be specific to your workplace and having a fire safety audit beforehand can help identify essential points to remind everyone about.
5. Regularly stock your workplace with safety equipment
The workplace must always have fire safety equipment. Safety signs and measures alone won’t detect or extinguish a fire. Some standard equipment to have is:
- Fire extinguishers
- Sprinklers
- Smoke alarms
- First-aid kits
Please note: Only operate fire extinguishing equipment if you feel confident to do so and you are safe to do so. If in doubt, just get out.
A fire safety audit can further help you identify the proper equipment for the type of workplace you have. Fire auditors can advise on how to make your workplace even safer.
Finally, always ensure that the equipment is in good condition and that nothing is expired or malfunctioning. These items are useless if they don’t work properly.
6. Designate fire safety officers in the workplace
You don’t need to completely rely on a fire auditor when making your workplace safer. A fire safety officer in the workplace can help oversee fire safety, among others. Of course, a fire officer cannot completely replace the work of a fire auditor. Some of the fire officer’s tasks can include:
- Sending out fire safety reminders
- Doing routine safety checks
- Inspecting safety equipment
- Checking evacuation routes and emergency exits
7. Get everyone involved
Just because there’s a fire safety officer doesn’t mean that other employees can ignore fire safety all together. Do make it a point to keep everyone involved when fire safety is concerned.
8. Give incentives for the top contributors toward fire safety
No matter how hard you try, it’s sometimes difficult to get employees involved with things that aren’t directly work-related. If this is the case, why not incentivise fire safety in the workplace?
Giving an early mark to the best-performing employees when it comes to fire safety would go down really well, or a little prize to help encourage everyone can also be beneficial.
Of course, this doesn’t mean that fire safety is now optional since it’s incentivised, you’re merely giving incentives on top of the standard safety training and the regular checks that you carry out.
9. Reiterate the team’s fire safety responsibilities
Finally, make it a habit to remind everyone of the important responsibilities each person has toward fire safety. They shouldn’t have to rely purely on a fire safety audit for their safety. They should take responsibility for fire safety on their own.
A Workplace Fire Safety Audit Can Help Point You in the Right Direction
Fire safety should never be taken lightly and everyone in the workplace should be on the same page when it comes to fire protection. To ensure this, we recommend getting an experienced fire auditor to help ensure your workplace is safe and compliant with fire safety standards now and in the future.
Adair Fire Audits & Certification is one of the best fire safety auditors you can find. Visit us at fireaudits.com.au, call us on (02) 8004 5142 or you can leave us a message for further enquiries.
Sources:
https://www.redcross.org/get-help/how-to-prepare-for-emergencies/types-of-emergencies/fire.html