Safety in the Workplace - by George Redmond III

Whether you work at a business, manage it, or own it, every person needs to be aware of how to work safely in the workplace. The major goal of working safely is for employees to come home as whole as when they started their day.

For workers, workplace injuries or illnesses can cause the following:

• Loss of life,
• Pain and suffering,
• Loss of income and financial well-being,
• Stress on relationships,
• Loss of job or career,
• Health-care costs beyond what is covered by insurance.

For employers, one injury can mean financial disaster. Costs to a business include the following:

• Production losses,
• Wages for work not performed,
• Increased workers' compensation insurance costs,
• Damage to equipment or machinery,
• Hiring and/or training new employees,
• Decline in product quality and worker morale,
• Decline in worker morale,
• High turnover and lost work time.

Safe and healthy workplaces:

• Have more satisfied, productive workers who
• • Produce higher quality products and services,
  • Return to work more quickly after an injury or illness,
  • Feel loyal to the organization.
• Are better places to work,
• Retain employees,
• Establish positive community relations.

About the speaker

George Redmond, III, has been a Safety and Training Specialist for 14 years at Memphis Light, Gas and Water. He is accountable for employee safety inside substations, electric motor shops, steel riggers, transformer shops, oil circuit breakers, relay, and telecommunications. Mr. Redmond makes sure that electricians, plumbers, HVAC employees, welders, machinist maintenance employees, painters, carpenters, and roofers perform their jobs safely. Also, he is responsible for the safety of System Operations at MLGW, which includes dispatcher for gas, water, and electrical maintenance.