Safety reporting is essential in the transportation industry. It allows employers to put systems in place to prevent any future accidents and incidents from occurring.
To make sure that your drivers write safety reports, you need to keep them engaged and make sure they understand the importance of the process. If your drivers aren’t engaged, you risk safety reports either being rushed or not done at all.
6 Ways To Engage Drivers For Safety Reporting
Here are some of the best ways to engage drivers for safety reporting so that you can ensure sufficient data and drive for a safer work environment.
1. Incentivise safety reporting
Make use of a mixture of strategies and tools that can be used to motivate and encourage your drivers. You can try using a points-based system to reward exceptional and meticulous safety reporting.
Drivers can collect points after every well-written safety report. After collecting a certain amount of points, they can redeem a larger reward - perhaps a day off or their favourite take-out meal.
It also wouldn’t hurt if you made a digital suggestion box to ask your employees how they would like to be rewarded.
2. Give detailed feedback for every report
Giving detailed feedback is essential for your drivers to stay engaged in safety reporting. This is because it shows that you actually read the reports, take their safety seriously and put effort into creating a safer environment together with the drivers.
The feedback that you give should be specific, prompt, relevant and honest. You don't want your employees to think that the channel you are using to collect the reports is just a bottomless pit.
3. Make vehicle walkarounds mandatory
Vehicle walkarounds or inspections allow for an advisor to evaluate a vehicle’s condition and what maintenance it needs. Having timely and meticulous vehicle walkarounds can decrease the risk of vehicular incidents and accidents.
By making this mandatory, you show your drivers that you care about their safety. It shows them that you will take extra measures to prevent any incidents that could risk their safety and well-being. This, in turn, makes them more likely to report any issues as they know you will see to them.
4. Never blame individuals for systemic mistakes
Person-centred practices that place the burden of causality on human actions are quite prevalent - especially in the transport industry.
You should lean more towards system-centred safety theories as many mistakes and errors are systemic rather than caused by individuals.
By not assigning blame, your drivers will feel more comfortable reporting any problems or errors as they won’t fear retribution. Simply put, stop the blame game.
5. Share best practices
Sharing best practices cultivate a work environment that allows employees to share their creative ideas and opinions. This increases engagement and thus boosts productivity and performance.
With regards to safety reporting, best practices are essential so that your employees know exactly how they need to file safety reports and when. This makes safety reporting more efficient and effective for everyone - especially with the help of an intuitive incident reporting platform.
6. Train frequently
If you train your drivers frequently, they will be able to keep up to date with the best safety practices. You can ensure that each and every one of your drivers knows what they should report and how to do so.
This will lead to more thorough reporting, which increases overall safety in your organisation.
Final Thoughts
Safety reporting is essential in the transportation industry. This is because drivers are often faced with conditions and situation where they need to be mindful of their own personal safety, and the safety of the freight they are transporting.
By engaging and training the drivers why safety reporting is important and useful, not only for themselves, but for the company as a whole you will be able to increase the number of reports from the road and as a result create a better safety culture in the company.
If you're looking for an incident reporting platform that is easy-to-use, boosts two-way communication, has customisable workflows, vast integration possibilities and more, have a look at our Falcony | Observe module and contact us for more information.
We are also offering a 30-day trial of incy.io so you can take your time testing it out for FREE. If you are interested, click the button below and fill in the required information to get started:
We are building the world's first operational involvement platform. Our mission is to make the process of finding, sharing, fixing and learning from issues and observations as easy as thinking about them and as rewarding as being remembered for them.
By doing this, we are making work more meaningful for all parties involved.
More information at falcony.io.
