Beyond Penalties And Fees
It’s been said again and again that adults respond to reason, not fear. In the same way kids hide their infractions to avoid being scolded, adults can conceal errors to avoid fines. Both these cases push for the appearance of compliance since safety in the workplace is of utmost importance. And this can be risky because non-compliance costs money, property, or even lives. Pretending to follow the rules, therefore, leaves everyone at risk. So, how can you stress the importance of safety in the workplace using your trusty compliance training LMS?
5 Tips To Emphasize The Real-World Repercussions Of "Breaking The Rules" With A Compliance Training LMS
1. Cause And Effect
You don’t have to tell your employees how much they’ll have to pay if they break the rules. Or even threaten to deduct it from their salaries. Instead, a compliance training LMS allows you to use simulations and branching scenarios to show the real-time effects of non-compliance. You can yell about switching off the lights until your face becomes blue. You can craft and upload detailed spreadsheets on the cash cost of hiked electricity bills. Or you could make a demo video filmed "At 2.00 a.m. on a long weekend/banking holiday." In the video, someone left the lights on. A power surge made a bulb overheat, snap, and burst. The sparks fell onto someone’s messy desk, setting their papers alight. The smoke alarm detected the fire, but being a long weekend, nobody heard the alarm. The fire spread to the whole office and by the time the fire department arrived, the flames were roaring. Nobody got hurt, but servers and crucial documents were damaged. This beats using CCTV to see who left the lights on and deduct the entire month’s bill from their paycheque.
2. Realistic Responses
A compliance training LMS can also provide employees with branching scenarios grounded in real life. Talk to your insurance company and ask them to give you actual instances of safety risks that happened. You might know the fine for carrying unauthorized personnel in a staff car is $20,000. And you might think the looming figure will prevent anyone from offering lifts. But they’ll always sneak their niece in for a school run, or their date for a joy ride to impress them. So, walk them through a digital branching scenario. It can be visual, VR, or text-based. In step 1, they give someone a ride. Or they refuse, but 3 steps later, they drive someone else to a personal appointment. On the way, they get hit by another driver. A seemingly simple lapse in judgment leads to a legal mess with a possible lawsuit and mounting medical bills.
3. Feasible "What-Ifs" To Balance Engagement With Enlightenment
Certain safety requirements really just feel like a pain in the neck. Things like avoiding loose clothing or always wearing goggles. Safety training doesn’t always have to be doom and gloom. Just think of the "Dumb ways to die" campaign by the Australian metro. Its catchy jingle, hilarious drawings, and pop culture references hit the mark. You find yourself picturing those silly characters in your mind. Then you deliberately step a safe distance away from the railing. Employ this type of tactic in your compliance training. For example, a male employee might refuse to wear a hairnet for style reasons. You could use a multiple-choice pop quiz to express potential harm. (a) They could get hair stuck in the lift door. (b) Their gelled hair could shed into someone’s cigarette ash and cause a chain reaction. (c) A strand could slip into an important client’s tea just as they’re about to sign a big check. And it all could’ve been avoided by simply following the protocols that are there keeping everyone safe and secure.
4. Immersive Serious Games
Another way that a corporate training LMS helps you stress the importance of safety in the workplace is through serious games. Employees don’t just read about how violations lead to serious accidents. They live through them. For example, not cleaning up a spill or putting up the proper signage results in a customer falling. Or mishandling food items causes contamination, which makes a customer gravely ill. These games give them the chance to learn from mistakes without actually causing anyone harm. Thereby, preventing the same errors when they are on the job.
5. Targeted Troubleshooting Resources
Compliance training LMS solutions enable you to provide quick troubleshooting resources for your employees. Workplace safety training often involves split-second decisions. Employees must be able to think on their feet and rapidly respond to keep customers and employees safe. Targeted moment-of-need resources help them navigate tricky situations without having to sit through a half-hour course. This means they have 24/7 access to support tools they need to prevent costly—and dangerous—compliance violations.
The best way to offer safety training isn’t with cash penalties of exaggerated FUD (fear, uncertainty, doubt). It’s to use authentic, actual examples of what could happen when you don’t comply. Express the danger in human terms, not monetary ones. Use videos to show realistic expressions of cause and effect in safety matters. Show how real people would react to an infraction and the chain of events that could follow. Demonstrate that "silly rules" aren’t silly at all. Replace cash fines with humor so your employees will laugh, remember the dangers, and strive harder to keep workspaces safe.
Get our eBook Mitigating Risks In The Modern Corporate World: Your Guide To Investing In A Compliance Training LMS to mitigate risks with a compliance training LMS. We share tips on how to find the ideal system for your budget as well as how to implement your compliance online training program and set prime examples using demo videos. There’s even a must-have features list to help you choose a platform that suits your specific needs.
