July 2010 Blog Posts (26)

Safety doesn't just happen, it's a sustained culture that is learned and, like any learned behavior, it starts with listening.

Listening, however, doesn't stop once you've learned what you need to learn (not that learning ever stops).

Listening is key when it comes to safety on the worksite. Most warning signals are auditory in nature and workers need to consistently be listening for any and all warning cries, back-up alarms, etc…

In order to listen attractively, you…

Most people realize that for every dollar that your employer pays you, he is having to spend another dollar in additional costs (insurance, equipment for you to do your job, benefits, etc…). Most people, however, don't stop to think how much it actually costs your employer when you are injured on the job.

Here's a quick breakdown:

Monetary Costs

• To you
  • If you get overtime pay, you will lose…

This falls a little outside of my usual post as it doesn't directly refer to workplace safety but I came across this information this past weekend and figured it was just to important not to past along on a safety related blog.

I just became a grandpa for the first time 6 months ago. My daughter has lots of friends and relations that love to spoil their new daughter so she got a couple of new car seats (one for her car and one for her husbands' car). If, however,…

I Got an email this week from Tenacious Holdings, the manufacturer that we distribute for. They are the ones who make the Ergodyne product line that we've been talking about. The title of the email was: "TENACIOUS HOLDINGS, INC. NAMED 2010 BEST PLACE TO WORK". The email went on to explain that they had been voted on of the top places to work for 2010 by…

President Obama signed the Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act (to be aptly named the “Dodd-Frank Act for short) into law on Wednesday July 21, 2010. The complete act covers every bit of 2,300 pages and has bearing on almost every single financial services company and industry in the country.

The goals and basis of the Act include restoring “public confidence” in the United States financial system, preventing future crisis and predicting and…

Okay, this post is a little out of the ordinary because rather than talk about a specific safety issue, I want to talk about file sharing as it relates to getting information relating to safety.

Rather than try to explain it all in detail let's just jump right in and start playing.

Go to www.scribd.com. This is one of the many file sharing sites out there. It's also one of my favorites because of the breadth of products you can find…

No, I'm not having a 60s flashback (You know what they say about the 60s, if you can remember them you weren't there!). This POWER is actually the name of President Obama's new four-year initiative for workplace safety. POWER stands for "Protecting Our Workers and Ensuring Reemployment".

The presidents' memo addresses seven different areas of workplace safety:

1. Reducing total injury and illness case…

Remember when you first discovered those nylon ties? They were great! I've got a whole tub of them at home.

The problem is that once they are "zipped" you can't "unzip" them. You've got to cut them off. They aren't reusable which means that they are pretty much limited to items that you aren't going to be using very often. They also aren't very useful for hanging stuff up.

Ergodyne has changed all that with the…

If you're an employer who isn't paying a whole lot of attention to the safety of your employees, there's a new website that you aren't going to be very excited about.

www.whistleblowers.gov, hosted by the United States Department of Labor is designed especially for those who are trying to "blow the whistle" without getting fired or having negative repercussions at work.

Especially if you are thinking of blowing the whistle, this site…

Quiz: What's the deadliest natural catastrophe? Seeing the title of today's blog, you've probably already guessed… it's heat-related fatalities. Hot weather kills more people each year than tornadoes, floods, lighting or hurricanes. Because these deaths are isolated rather than collective as in the case of one of the other natural disasters we just mentioned, they don't tend to get the same amount of attention.

As the summer reaches its zenith, however, it's time for employers to take…

We use them every day. I can think of at least 3 times that I used one this weekend as well as at least 2 instances where I am using improperly. What do I mean by improperly?

One of the things that most of us don't pay enough attention to is the fact that extension cords are for temporary use only.

Other things to remember about extension cords:

• Make sure that they are in good working order. No fraying, cuts, etc…
• Makes sure that they…

Yesterday was Ergodyne day for me. Had breakfast with the Ergodyne people, met with them in the morning to go over new products, had lunch with them and met with them most of the afternoon. Why do I tell you this? Because after spending that much time and having that much dialog with them, I came away extremely impressed with what they are doing and what they are bringing to the table.

In an economy that is just striving to survive, Ergodyne stands out as being a company that isn't…

OSHA’s new site www.whistleblowers.gov…

My daughter just quit her job after many years of working there. She quit because of an abusive boss. She got another job that pays a lot less but it turns out, she did the right thing according to a new study by the British Medical Journal. The article entitled "Rudeness at Work" (you can read the whole study here) polled some 800 employees in North America and came to some startling…

I read recently of a person who asked a friend to save them money by having them put up some shelves rather than hiring a professional. The friend, without realizing it, screwed into the PVC pipe from the toilet upstairs that was hidden in the wall that the shelf was been mounted to. They soon discovered that every time someone flushed the toilet, there was a puddle of water under the shelf. Turned out to cost them a whole lot more than it would have to have hired a professional to start…

Back in February, I ran a post on table saw safety (you can read the post here).

One of the comments that I got referred to a new technology that detects flesh and stops the blade of the saw. Having failed to follow through on the comment at the time, I was reminded about it in an email from one of my woodworking magazines and decided to follow through and give you a glimpse of this new…