To keep his workplace safe, he needs staff 100% behind health and safety.
Rob organises regular meetings. He allows plenty of time for staff to discuss safety concerns, and is careful to ask apprentices and new recruits directly what they think – his more experienced team members are quite vocal, and can be intimidating.
Once everyone’s had their say, they come up with ideas to address the safety problems they’ve identified.
He then asks for volunteers to take responsibility for each aspect of their plan – updating the health and safety board, and keeping the risks whiteboard up to date.
Giving his team shared responsibility for health and safety means Rob can benefit from their ideas.
It also makes them much more likely to consider other people’s workplace safety, than if he’d dictated exactly what they could and couldn’t do.