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Don't mind if I do...

Eric & Bob
Post 2, Oct 14 2010

Health and safety signs and posters are a practical way of meeting your legal requirements, and assisting in the process of improving workplace safety. Signage is not only important for informing people about risks and possible dangers, but in many cases it is a statutory requirement.

Not to mention, signs make everything clearer and more professional-looking, right? Here's how NOT to use health and safety signs - courtesy of, who else, Eric Erickson.

 

Click here to see the full-size image
 

 
Eric: You know what this place needs, Bob?
Bob: Well...
(Bob reminisces the past week at ACME Heating & Plumbing...)
 
(Pandemonium on the factory floor!)
Eric: REG!! HIT THE STOP BUTTON!
 
Sally: Now, do you have an environmental policy?
Bob: Of course! Who wouldn't have these days, eh?
Reg: Yeah, when it gets that high we burn it...
 
Eric: WHO'S THAT!?
(Stan lays sprawled on the floor under a ladder.)
Bob: That's Stan, I'm just, erm, collecting him for his training.
Eric: That'll affect his bonus...
 
(After a great deal of puzzling, Bob doesn't have a clue what one thing 'this place needs', except possibly a closure order.)
Bob: ...no idea, enlighten me.
Eric: A touch of professionalism. REG!!
(Eric produces a huge pile of signs as Reg appears.)
Eric: Put up some signs!
Reg: Okay...
 
Signage is very important around the workplace, contributing to the continual improvement of safety and communicating good health and safety around the workplace. But it should not be a substitute for ensuring the welfare of your employees via worker involvement and an effective health and safety policy.
 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Employer of the week: Eric Erickson

 

The chain-smoking big bad boss at ACME Heating & Plumbing, much like his factory he is unstable, produces very little except in the way of noise and chemical pollution, and seems ready to blow at any given moment. It is rumoured however that Eric was once 'a very nice person', and the workers at ACME often gossip about what it might have been that tipped him over the edge.

Business Management

By the late 70s, the West had started to notice how successful Japanese industry had become. In industry after industry, including steel, watches, ship building, cameras, automobiles, and electronics, the Japanese were surpassing American and European companies. Westerners wanted to know why.

Numerous theories were put forward to explain the Japanese success including:

• Higher employee morale, dedication, and loyalty;
• Lower cost structure, including wages;
• Effective government industrial policy;
• Modernization after WWII leading to high capital intensity and productivity;
• Economies of scale associated with increased exporting;
• Relatively low value of the Yen leading to low interest rates and capital costs, low dividend expectations, and inexpensive exports;
• Superior quality control techniques such as Total Quality Management and other systems.

Although there was some truth to all these potential explanations, there was clearly something missing. In fact by 1980 the Japanese cost structure was higher than the American. And post WWII reconstruction was nearly 40 years in the past. The first management theorist to suggest an explanation was Richard Pascale.

In 1981, Richard Pascale and Anthony Athos claimed that the main reason for Japanese success was their superior management techniques. They divided management into 7 aspects:

• Strategy
• Structure
• Systems
• Skills
• Staff
• Style
• Shared values

The first three of the 7 S's were called hard factors and this is where Western companies excelled.

The remaining four factors were called soft factors and were not as well understood by European and American businesses of the time. Great value was not placed on corporate culture, shared values and beliefs, and social cohesion in the workplace. In Japan the task of management was seen as managing the whole complex of human needs, economic, social, psychological, and spiritual. Elsewhere, work was seen as something that was separate from the rest of one's life. It was quite common for Americans and Europeans to exhibit a very different personality at work compared to the rest of their lives.

What this means
Businesses that succeed do so by:

• Getting to know the customer, and therefore providing better value for the customer than competitors;
• Treating staff with respect and being rewarded with productivity;
• Sticking to what they know well, and keeping things simple.

Eric & Bob
Post 1, Sep 30 2010

Meet the team at ACME Heating & Plumbing - a flyer campaign from a couple of years back that has little-by-little transformed into a living, breathing entity of its own!

The mistakes and blunders that go on at the ACME factory are of the kind that other companies can fully appreciate and have a good laugh at, as every business has been there to some degree. Enjoy!

Click here to see the full-size image

Employee of the week: Bob Pearlman

A salesman who sees himself as suave and sophisticated, witty and whimsical; Bob is self-centred, spiritless, wishy-washy and wearisome. It can be said however that he is persistent, having worked all the way up to a managerial position at ACME Heating & Plumbing in ten years, and just as many failed relationships. Bob's personal motto, 'Just smile and say yes' works wonders with Eric, but not so much with friends and femmes, getting any free thought out of him is like trying to get blood out of a stone!

League Loyalty

Loyal fans that we were, we could dismiss the shameful final score of the week before as a fluke - 59-8. We got proudly into our rugby team colours and set off, ready for the turnaround of the season.

Light rain fell as the players trudged onto the pitch. And in the first ten minutes of the match, the opposition had scored and converted. This set the precedent for the rest of the half. There is normally some redemptive quality to a team even if they don't have a brilliant half however - at least their lineouts were good, or they were strong in their scrums or even, they showed plenty of effort. The highlight of the half for us was none of the above, but that a score commentator had managed to inadvertently leave his speaker on. The crowd jeered to such gems as 'Get-back-get-back-get-back-get-back!', 'Idiots!', and last but not least, 'Yes please Jen, I'd love a cup of tea.' 40 minutes in, the score was 35-3, and we needed the break.

In the second half, we didn't even have the comedic value of a commentator's blunder to fall back on, and towards the end (at 54-10) an away supporter turned to us with a 'Season ticket, boys?' Small mercies! The referee awarded a penalty try in the waning minutes of the match out of sympathy, which we converted, and the final score was 54-17. 'I'd forgotten why I stopped coming to these,' we heard someone muse.

Loyalty was unforgivingly flung through the window, and the next day, we threw three new team names into a hat. At the very last minute, somebody suggested that the home team deserved one last chance and wrote up a fourth name, REDEMPTION, which only just made it before the pick.
It is of course well-established fact that the pet picks the owner; the wand chooses the wizard; and now the Solutions boys can confirm it's the rugby team that chooses its followers. MACHEN was discarded. Followed by PENALLTA. BRIDGEND was a close runner-up. All that remained was the home team we had followed all along.

The two of us being revitalised steadfast supporters, the weather being off, and the match being away, we did not see our team play the following weekend. But! A friend of a colleague relayed the score off to the office on Monday: a 42-12 VICTORY. It just goes to show, a little bit of loyalty can go a long way!

---

Addendum (24th September 2010):

Good news and bad news. The bad news is a 47-17 loss villanously disguised as a 42-12 victory, and that therefore Carl has officially been struck off the Friends of Colleagues list for good.


The good news? That's our smallest point difference this season! (Roll on the weekend!)

Health & Safety and the Law

The aims of good health & safety systems, safety policies and the law are to reduce occupational ill health, reduce accidents and deaths, provide a good working environment, promote physical and mental wellbeing, protect the environment and be a continual reminder of the commitment of all within the organisation towards safety.

Management peace of mind is but a dream for far too many businesses, here are the key elements considered essential when evaluating your health & safety systems:

• An adequate health & safety policy (link to HSE site)
• Legal compliance
• Good welfare facilities
• A plan to reduce accidents and incidents
• A mechanism for improvement

Remember that as an employer you have a legal and moral duty to make your organisation as safe and healthy a working environment as is reasonably practicable.

'Reasonably practicable' indicates a balance between cost and risk; companies need to identify and evaluate hazards in order to ensure that the financial and time costs of dealing with them are balanced against the risk of harm to a person. In a prosecution for breaches of safety legislation, the company must prove its innocence by justifying that it had done all that was 'reasonably practicable'.

Having a safe and pleasant workplace will improve working relationships and make your business somewhere your employees will enjoy being. Visiting clients will feel comfortable and more prepared to do business.

Why should a company give back to the community?

Synergy.

Every long-term successful business respects the "give to the community" law. This is about taking a proactive rather than reactive stance, and participation in local activities or projects, adding to respect and reputation, brand recognition, sales, staff performance and retention. Being a responsible neighbour and giving a little back is very important, you should strive to continually improve any impact you have on society and your business surroundings by understanding the local environment and adapting to local needs.

When evaluating your effect on the community, the following should be considered:

• Clean surrounding environment
• Taking part in community projects and functions
• Development of a more proactive approach
• Consideration of the benefits to your local community

Thought should also be given to how to harness the positive contributions that individuals make. Show your community you're not just here for business, that you care about improving the locality; and you will both reap the benefits.