Mobile skills refresher delivery

Inexperienced workers contribute to a rise in workplace incidents

Having an inexperienced workforce increases the potential for workplace incidents to occur. Particularly in high-risk industries or sectors where businesses employ multiple, diverse and remote workgroups. Barriers to the effective communication of processes and procedures between the office and the field, such as language and literacy issues, significantly impact productivity and safety outcomes.

ee-Fit, a division of Fletcher Building improved its diligence around training and supervision with the creation and distribution of visual resources to upskill its workforce and dramatically reduce workplace incidents.

Upskill workers on how to avoid potential hazards at work

ee-Fit supplies and installs all types of insulation and energy efficiency products for residential, commercial builders and homeowners across Australia. Following a Royal Commission in 2013 into the Home Insulation Program, insulation companies nationwide recognised the need to upskill workforces to avoid potentially harmful hazards in their work environments.

It’s important that less experienced workers understand the risks involved in installing insulation and follow critical instructional procedures to prevent incidents that require medical treatment or may lead to fatalities.

Easy access to worker knowledge reduces risk on worksites

ee-Fit turned to CodeSafe for a customised solution that would support their compliance efforts and provide consistent training information to its remote workforce.

Communication of important instruction and reporting had to be via a preferred method for the company’s diverse workforce. This would encourage workers to not only engage with the material but comprehend it and apply the knowledge when completing a job or project. ee-Fit wanted the critical content to help installers understand potentially harmful hazards and avoid situations that put them at risk of injury in an effort to get the job done.

Visual resources improve worker engagement and provide consistent training

We utilised our award-winning Experiential Learning Program (ELP) to provide a framework for ee-Fit to produce a series of instructional videos that could be easily accessed via a mobile device. In collaboration with ee-Fit, we identified what the significant risks were and created a series of visual resources and supporting portals, ensuring its multiple workgroups received standardised training.

During the implementation of the ELP framework, ee-Fit recognised that in certain procedures there was conflict between work as documented and practical application in the field. Realising its workforce were more likely to engage with and understand the content of visual procedures than written communication, ee-Fit addressed the gap with videos and tracked engagement levels.

Since implementing the CodeSafe solution, ee-Fit significantly reduced the number of lost time injuries (LTI) and fast-tracked compliance. In the 12 months following the solution implementation, ee-Fit had no LTIs or medically treated injuries (MTIs) as a result of accidents onsite. Incidence and compliance reports went down from 31 percent to 10 percent of total activities, which meant that contractors not following processes properly dropped by 66 percent in that same period.

Testimonial:

?CodeSafe helped us break down the ‘us and them’ (being field and office) in our business. They (the workers) appreciate us taking into account that their learning preference is visual and we’re not encumbering them with more documentation.”

Rae Grech – former ee-Fit National Safety?Advisor