Running a company means that there’s likely to be a number of people that you are responsible for. Those people, when working in your organization, will need your support in a number of ways, and it’s up to you as the employer to help them and to also protect them. However, there should be an equal amount of protection when it comes to your business. Protecting your company and staff at the same time can sometimes have its challenges, but it is possible. So here are some tips to help you balance the two and to keep everyone happy.
Provide A Safe Working Environment
A working environment needs to be functional, and it needs to work well for your staff members. If you’ve got a messy or office that isn’t clean and a staff member falls ill because of it, you may have a problem. So first and foremost, a safe working environment is essential. You can make sure this is happening in a number of ways. Firstly, you want to ensure that the cleaners within your building or work site are cleaning up efficiently after staff. All the work surfaces should be cleaned daily, and all sanitary parts of the building are equipped and working properly. Next, make sure that all your staff is keeping their own workplaces tidy and organized. It might be beneficial to have rules put in place in regards to everyone’s personal space within the workplace. Making sure everyone follows these rules is important, and there should be disciplines put in place if staff members are persistent in their mess. Make sure that there’s enough storage because anything that’s left lying around on the floor has the potential to become a tripping hazard, and any accidents in the workplace can be problematic.
Take Out Various Insurances Needed
Having insurance, whether that’s in your personal life or work life, is essential because it protects you financially and legally should anything happen that’s not your fault or is out of your control. It protects the monetary values of certain objects, and in the workplace, that could amount to tens and thousands of dollars. Each business is going to be slightly different in what it needs when it comes to insurance. Everyone needs employee liability and buildings insurance to protect the company when staff gets injured in the workplace and for any eventuality of a robbery taking place or damage occurring to the business property. There may be additional insurances for machinery and in some cases, for when you need premium insurance.
The best insurance coverage is what you need to aim for when you are buying all of your insurances. The more you can cover yourself, the less likely that there will be a significant fall out financially or personally as a business. Take your time to research the different types of insurances that are available and which ones you’re going to need. You may not be able to get all of them, but you can certainly get a good chunk of them or the ones that are the most important.
Give Proper Inductions For The Workplace
With safety, the company has the responsibility to ensure that any new staff member has been trained in detail to know about anything that may affect their safety, how the building operates and any additional training, should it be needed for machinery, etc. So with that in mind, a proper induction is certainly needed for any staff members who may not currently have had an induction or for those existing staff who need a refresh. The operations or buildings manager should be readily available to talk through everything that is needed to cover the building. From fire drill meeting points to opening up and closing down to the end of the day. Of course, they don’t need to be able to do this, but it’s important they know what they’re duties are in terms of protecting the company. Doing this is going to help avoid anyone leaving a window open by accident or doing something that compromises or causes danger to the rest of the building. At this point, you want to protect both yourself and your staff.
Employ A Health And Safety Officer
For health and safety concerns, it might be worth hiring a health and safety officer or at least have someone who comes in a few times a week to keep track of the procedures within the workplace. This isn’t always necessary for small businesses, but maybe as the company grows bigger.
If the things your staff do within the office or work site have particular dangers to them either in a safety aspect or a health one, they need to be informed of that by the officer and the officer needs to be able to relay the correct information in order to keep everyone safe. If this communication or procedure doesn’t happen, then should something terrible happen, your company may have a battle on its hands in order to come out of it unscathed. If you don’t have the funds to employ someone part-time or full-time, then you can always seek professional advice on how to proceed with getting the relevant body in to help.
Train Your Staff In First Aid And Fire Training
Training your staff should be up there as a priority when it comes to protecting your staff. All of your staff serve a purpose to the company, and without them, the company would be missing an important cog in the machine. Therefore, training courses like first aid and fire training are essential not only to help your staff protect each other but for you to help protect your staff from anything that should happen by mistake, a sheer accident or a consequence that’s out of your control. First Aid is handy for anyone to learn and they can use this skill in the outside world should they ever come into contact with someone who needs their help. The person you want to do First Aid will need to agree to the training as you can’t force someone to do it if they don’t want to. Ideally, you want to have a handful of staff trained, but it’s also dependant on the size of your company. Fire training is equally important, and not a lot of companies have enough fire drill tests in order to time how quickly it would take its staff to get out of a building that’s potentially on fire. Again, it’s good to have fire wardens on every floor on the workplace or on-site. This is because you’ll need these individuals to be the last ones who check everyone who has come out before leaving with the rest of the staff.
Keep On Top Of The Budgets
Being financially in control of the company is essential because a lot of livelihoods rely on their work. If companies take too many financial risks or don’t keep on top of the accounts, that could spell trouble. Make sure that your accounts team is reviewing the process of checking budgets and that each department is spending correctly and not overspending or spending on certain things that might not be needed. A review of the budget should be done on an annual basis and more regularly if the company’s profits are a little up and down. Be prepared to make cuts to the budgets in the times where it’s needed. There are always savings that can be made, but that doesn’t jeopardize the growth and development of the business.
Have An Emergency Fund Just In Case
Talking of finances, an emergency fund is good for any business or individual to have. If anything were to happen to the company tomorrow and that impacted the finances of the company significantly, an emergency fund should be there to at least pay your staff so that they don’t suddenly get made redundant and without a paycheck. An emergency fund is a great peace of mind and something that the company can contribute to every month. There’s never going to be enough in that fund to protect you fully, but having at least some money available for emergencies is going to be helpful. Start this fund from day one and continue it until the business decides to close down or perhaps get sold to someone else. At least it would be a nice bonus for everyone to receive.
Being able to balance both the company and staff members can be difficult, but it’s good to realize that both have an equal level of importance to them, and without one another, neither would survive. Continue to provide a safe working atmosphere and one that’s positive. Take out the insurances that are needed to protect both parties and dish out all the training needed. Keep on top of the budgets and ensure that a review happens regularly to be in the loop. Finally, always have that emergency fund available and ready should the company need it.
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