We are all familiar with the process where skilled trades and workers are shuffled into a site shed for four to six hours, while they listen to safety managers run through powerpoints about compliance, safety, PPE, community, quality, environment, and site maps. Each offers a similar message on a different colour slide, written by a different division in the business.
Workers being paid to sit still while a compliance box is ticked for four (or more) hours is an opportunity which is proving too good to miss.
Onboarding 800 workers x four hours at $90 per hour is a $280K investment. What sort of return would you accept for this type of investment? All too often, a piece of paper with a name and indecipherable signature is the only tangible outcome.
Principal contractors are realising that there is an untapped opportunity to leverage the worker onboarding process to upskill the workforce and share critical messaging and learnings with the workforce. So many trades and professional workers in the infrastructure industry are tactile learners. When they listen, interact and think, the learning outcomes are much more effective than listening to a lecture about the project rules, and answering a series of multiple-choice questions as a group.
Transitioning to a digital format with rich, interactive content is a shift in the thinking of some of the leading operators in the industry. As an example, simply replacing a motherhood statement about safety with video messages from the leadership team, with thought provoking exercises which check a learner’s understanding and help to reinforce messages, delivers great outcomes and reinforces messaging.
By transitioning to digital e-learning onboarding, workers are not only highly engaged and tested on their knowledge; the process can be carried out prior to arrival to site. This leads to large savings for the project and ensures workers get onto the job quickly.
As one major infrastructure project reported: over 25,000 workers using the 3D Safety onboarding platform saved the project millions, with an ROI of 860 per cent.
In a survey of these workers using this new approach, more than two thirds of workers said they found the experience a positive one, and over 80 per cent said they would recommend the approach to other projects.
Additionally, many workers commented that they had sat through this messaging on other projects and never actually understood the way that safety, quality, environment and behaviour align to deliver successful projects.
The workers are embracing this change. It only takes a slightly different approach to transform the outcome and deliver stunning returns – for far less than the current questionable investment outlay.
This sponsored editorial is brought to you by 3D Safety. For further information, please visit www.3dsafety.com.au.
