Why OSHA matters (even if you are just a 2 man operation)

There seems to be a mentality, among many small businesses, that OSHA and LNI regulations really only apply to the medium or large size business. After all, as a 2-man operation doing residential window washing or roofing, the odds of an inspector even seeing you, much less citing you seem to be about the same as the odds of winning the lottery. These business owners tend to abide by the mentality that if they can get away without getting caught, they don't have to worry about abiding by the regs. It's more or less the way a lot of us function with respect to speeding; as long as we don't get caught we feel we ought to be able to go as fast as we like.

The problem with that mentality is that it's the ugly step child of the thinking that says that others may get injured if they don't do it the right way but that isn't true of me because I'm more agile, smarter (how twisted is that?), faster, more aware or whatever other lie we try to tell ourselves to justify not taking the time to do it safely. It's the same thinking that allows teens (and a lot of adults too) to understand that it's completely unsafe to text while driving while texting while driving themselves.

The other problem with this thinking is the potential for catastrophic loss. In a large business, the loss of only employee because of injury, while costly and inconvenient, isn't necessarily going to affect the company as a whole all that much (for example, one employee out of 100 is only a 1% loss in personnel). For a two-man operation, however, the loss of one employee could make the difference between staying in business and having to declare bankruptcy (few companies can sustain a 50% loss in productivity and stay in business for long).

Small business owners need to understand that the cost of compliance is like the cost of an oil change; you can pay a little now or pay a whole lot more later when everything blows up. Small business owners need to retrain themselves to think of OSHA and LNI as expert who have found ways to help you stay in business rather than "the enforcer" that they try to keep away from.

It could, after all, make the difference between staying in business or folding shop.