WorkCover program helps small business focus on safety

WorkCover NSW has congratulated 32 businesses that offered support and assistance to 36 smaller businesses, as part of the 2010 ‘Safe Business is Good Business’ mentor program.

Under the program, 36 small businesses were mentored by larger businesses that gave their time to help them make their businesses safer and more productive, said WorkCover NSW CEO Lisa Hunt. This program has a strong influence on changing safety behaviour, with 95% of businesses in the 2010 program reporting they had made immediate safety improvements in their workplace, she said.

The program, now in its sixth year, allows small businesses to learn directly from large employers on how to make sustainable improvements to safety and improve their business outlook, said Hunt.

Business owner Owen Bladen, who works in the traffic management industry and participated in the initiative first as a mentee and later as a mentor, said there needs to be a genuine desire in a business for a positive change to develop a safety culture. “As a mentee in the 2009 Mentor program, I wanted to learn more about how to improve my business and the experience completely altered my perspective on workplace safety,” Bladen said. “The program highlighted areas that I had overlooked and as a result I implemented immediate improvements to my business, including updating safety policies, reviewing risk assessments and safe work method statements.

“I wanted to share what I had learnt with other businesses and my industry peers, so I became a business mentor to others in this year’s program. “I wanted to open people’s minds to what areas they can improve to make their business safer but also more economically viable,” he said. Hunt said the initiative involves a series of advisory worksite visits, workshops and planning to help businesses to improve their capability to develop safety systems.