Aaron’s tips for getting staff to do their Health and Safety Training

Posted 8 years ago

Aaron’s tips for getting staff to do their Health & Safety Training – Part 2

Even though we publish training for our clients and help them get their staff through it, all of us here at iHasco still need to complete our own Health and Safety training!

As well as being an Account Manager here at iHasco, I am the Health and Safety Manager, and there is nothing worse than trying to get people to complete online health and safety training, especially when they are experts and talk about it day in, day out.

I always sympathise with my clients when it comes to getting their staff trained as there are always a few employees that drag their feet – even though we all know that we have Legal, Financial and Moral obligations to complete the training!

It was DSE Training week here last week and all staff have completed their training … or should have! I will be going through the results in the LMS to double-check later this week, and for their sake, they better have done it!

It has not been a straightforward task, but I have a few tips that should hopefully help you get pesky staff through their training:

1. Communicate Information Clearly.

Always start with a pre-training email to let everyone know they will be receiving the link and that they need to get it done. In this email, put a short timeframe such as a week or two at max. If this is not done, they will forget about completing the training as other things will be “more important” or they’ll say they’ve been “busy”. It would then be wise to follow up with another email halfway through the time frame – you need to make sure no one forgets that the course needs to be done.

2. My second tip is to let your staff know what happens if they do or don’t do the training in this time frame.

Using incentives is a great way of getting your staff to complete their training. I have heard lots of different ways my clients incentivise their staff; from offering raffle tickets for staff that complete the course, to staff being named and shamed or even given warnings, it is totally down to how your company culture works.

3. Finally, Objection Handling.

Make sure your staff are aware that you are not asking them to undertake the training for your own amusement and that it is, in fact, a legal requirement; which they have shared liability for.

Over the coming year, for required training such as Fire Awareness or Manual Handling, I am going to get departments competing against each other. The winners will get a prize and the losers will get a forfeit! I will make sure I blog about the winners and certainly name and shame the losers!