Delivering projects on time and within budget is no easy feat, requiring laser focus on a wide range of issues, from quality inspections to asset management, process execution to safety measures.
Unfortunately, safety is too often framed as a burden around which companies are tempted to cut corners to save time and money. While safety by itself isn’t a profit maker, this attitude fails to see the big picture – the lack of safety is a guaranteed profit dumpster fire.
On average, employers will spend $120,000 in direct and indirect costs on each workplace injury which requires companies operating at a 10% profit margin to make an additional $1.2 million in sales to simply cover the costs. And when you consider that employers reported over 2.6 million illness and injury cases in 2021, the overall costs are staggering – numbers which, of course, can’t account for the physical pain, long-term damage, or reduction in quality of life suffered by injured workers.
To the rescue, digital field safety management software keeps workers safe, ensures OSHA compliance, and prevents financial losses. Digital tools will consistently give you better data to drive more productive and safer on-the-ground performance while affording you visibility that can improve your safety program’s overall efficiency and cost-effectiveness.
In this post, we’ll look at how safety management software can make the difference between a company keeping its workers safe and prospering and struggling to just tread water – or filing for bankruptcy protection.
First, we’ll consider what every project needs to ensure a timely and safe project delivery.
What every project needs
Every successful delivery requires a delicate balance of the following:
Consistency — Quality and safety work requires that both new and experienced workers can perform a task the same way each time. Digital checklists make it easy for workers to follow best practices, while automatic forwarding of changes to SOPs ensures everyone is working from the same updated guidebook.
Safety — Failing to invest in safety is a much bigger issue than workplace injuries and can result in a tarnished reputation, increased delays, skilled staff turnover, potential fines, and lawsuits, increased regulatory scrutiny, higher insurance rates, and a deluge of worker’s comp claims. Easily accessed and always updated, digital checklists meticulously guide workers so they never miss a step, preventing unsafe conditions from causing injuries or fatalities.
Flexibility — Tools and processes need built-in flexibility to address ground conditions that change after work begins. Leveraging shared, connected data and workflows, digital field inspection management platforms allow you to quickly adapt to new and emerging circumstances, whether an equipment breakdown in the field or updated safety regulations.
Let’s drill down and look at how safety management software works to deliver on these needs.
Safety management software in action
Enhanced inspection and documentation
On the factory floor or in the field, safety management software uses checklist-based processes to guide workers through safety inspections. Time stamps, geotagged records, mandatory fields, as well as required photos and video captures, can help remotely track teams in real-time, freeing supervisors to monitor teams without having to be there in person.
Improved outcomes
Leading safety management software does more than enable your team to improve the safety of their immediate work environment – it empowers you to continuously improve their processes for safer and better-quality work. Real-time connectivity and shared data ensure your entire field team is always using the latest checklists, inspection processes, reports, and workflows. Easy-to-follow SOPs (standard operating procedures) and automated workflows integrate health and safety into everyone’s workday without significant job disruption, a low-friction way of achieving safe environments.
Proof of effectiveness
With instant access to secure, cloud-connected records, stakeholders can examine and assess their collected data to better understand and prove the efficacy of their field workforce and safety programs. Seamless data integration into business intelligence platforms also allows executives to directly connect your safety programs to wider business outcomes. And the more ways your data gets used, the more valuable it – and your team – becomes.
Can your safety management software do this?
Leading field safety inspection management platforms such as Fulcrum handily address the requirements outlined above, empowering your teams with consistency, safety, and flexibility, in real time and at scale. Look for a field inspection management platform that speaks to these needs with a robust set of features, including:
- Easy task creation and assignment: Plan your projects by creating tasks and assigning them to team members, with checklists that ensure no detail gets overlooked or flaw goes unnoticed.
- Automated workflows: Built-in workflows manage scheduled and assigned work, as well as any ad hoc issues discovered through issue reporting, keeps teams on task and accident-free.
- Real-time dashboarding: High-level dashboards provide in-depth visibility to track performance and safety inspections, assuring supervisors that all issues are addressed.
- Public and private issue reporting: Workplaces are made safer by expanding the ability to easily and anonymously report safety issues to everyone.
Driving profitable safety
Studies have shown that, on average, every dollar spent on improving workplace safety returns an average $4.41, an impressive ROI that dispels the myth that safety drains profit. It is also a clear indication that “profitable safety” – an idea once thought impossible – is well within your reach with the right safety tools.
Integrating new levels of consistency, safety, and flexibility into the work and worth of your field workforce, Fulcrum’s field safety management platform keeps both workplaces and bottom-lines safe and healthy.
Ready to make your workplace – and your profit margins – safer with less time and effort? Sign up for a Fulcrum free trial today!