As a health and safety manager, you are faced with uniquely different issues every day that are often difficult to predict. The responsibility for the health, safety and wellbeing of your team is a multi-layered responsibility, but one of the most powerful tools at your disposal may be in your pocket right now: the mobile phone.
A huge number of jobs from retail to construction, nursing to carpentry, don’t involve employees being at a desk with a computer. Yet mobile phone and tablet adoption in Australia is almost at saturation in the adult population, meaning every employee in your duty of care is likely to have one or both for personal, if not professional use.
In the event of an emergency evacuation imagine the peace of mind knowing you’ve got a guaranteed way to reach every single person in your duty of care in an instant – tracking and directing each of them to safety via a mobile app.
It was being caught up in a chaotic building evacuation that first inspired Darren Whitaker-Barnett to think there must be a smarter way to account for people in such a scenario. Darren became the Founder and CEO of MRI OnLocation which today supports organisations in 52 countries around the world as part of global technology leader, MRI Software.
So, how do you go about choosing the right mobile app to help manage HSE in your particular workplace environment?
The best workplace safety app is one that keeps track of who’s on-site automatically. It has the means for you to account for everyone on-site in an emergency with manual roll calls, self-verification, collaboration and insight, mustering and evacuation reports, for example.
Other things to look for when assessing mobile software like this is to ensure it can tell you where at-risk workers are at all times, with the ability to communicate important notices and hazards instantly. The OnLocation mobile app is highly regarded among high-risk industries or lone workers because of its proven ability to manage the predictable, and much more common in the HSE space, the unpredictable.
Here are some thoughts and features of the OnLocation Mobile app you may like to consider in helping you manage the challenges of not knowing what to expect from one day to the next in your workplace:
Run smoother evacuations
Have you ever tried to run an evacuation, only to find you actually have no idea who is on or off-site? With the massive uptake of hybrid work models in 2022 this is more of a challenge than ever. With a workplace safety app like OnLocation Mobile you can automatically sign employees and Service Providers in and out of your locations and work sites, using their smartphone’s geolocation. This feature gives you accurate people presence data so there is no need to rely on a quick but often inaccurate head count to know everyone is safe (“Anyone seen Stan?” “I think he went to the bathroom, not sure.”).
Communicate hazards quickly and easily
If your building or work site was suddenly deemed unsafe, how would you quickly and efficiently communicate with everyone who needs to know? If you went into lockdown, could you target your message to everyone off-site to tell them not to enter the premises?
Instant Messages can be used to communicate important notices and segment your communication by employees versus Service Providers, those on or off-site, those in a specific department or those with a specific role type. Whether it be an emergency, reminding employees of company policies or updating staff about on-site hazards…the key is mobile technology means the control is with you, and just depends how and what you want and need. Having mobile-enabled HSE tech like OnLocation means even those working in remote areas can have up to date information at hand.
Get notified when at-risk workers need immediate assistance
How would your team call for help if a machine started malfunctioning in the next factory, or someone injured themselves on-site? They can use the app’s SOS Alerts to quickly and easily raise an alarm in the event of an accident or high-stress situation. The alarm will notify your designated SOS Responders that there is a problem, automatically sending the location and contact details of the person needing assistance.
What can you do with all that data?
Reporting is one of the most important parts of safety and security as it enables you to pull data to gain insights needed to improve the future safety of your organisation. The mobile app allows you to report on the geolocation of workers during their working hours as to who has or hasn’t acknowledge an important notice, for example. This way you can confidently demonstrate to an auditor or management you have the required systems in place to keep everyone in your duty of care safe and secure.
Get in touch if you’d like to learn more about how the OnLocation Mobile app will help ease your HSE challenges or try a free 30 day trial.
