Safety is always at the forefront of what we do; and all who work at Chorus. We believe in a safe culture where all Chorus people are mindful, speak up, are heard and take responsibility when it comes to keeping themselves and others safe and well. In our 2019/20 Roadmap, we committed to making safety one of the four overall commitments of Chorus, including reducing the Lost Time Injury Frequency Rate. This year we introduced significant changes in the way we report and manage incidents. A new reporting system made it easier for Chorus people to communicate and solve safety issues, thereby continuing to build a culture where people felt safe to speak up. The success of the Safety Roadmap was observed by the increased team engagement through reporting of lead indicators such as hazards and near misses.
The implementation of SolvSafety, an online management system, enabled us to transition from an existing paper-based incident report form to a new real-time, more reliable system with consolidated reporting. SOLV’s portal link can be accessed on either a mobile phone or desktop computer so team members can submit reports without having to attend a Chorus office to use a desktop computer.
Team members have said that the system is easy to access and use. As a result, proactive reporting has doubled enabling us to mitigate risks before it turned into incidents.
We encouraged staff and volunteers to be brave and to “Put Their Hand Up”, knowing they will be heard and supported. For significant incidents, we were able to quickly consult and engage with teams to develop preventative strategies and share lessons learned throughout the organisation.
As part of our commitment to keeping people safe and healthy at work, Chorus joins and supports the National Safe Work Month theme every October.
At this year’s roadshow, we encouraged everyone to “Be a Safety Champion”.
There was a fantastic uptake amongst all staff and volunteers who expressed passion about actively caring for one another. They felt empowered to become safety leaders by taking an active role in improving safety at work.
When COVID-19 hit, we quickly set up a Critical Incident Management Team to oversee the safety of all Chorus people. The team worked through a series of scenarios designed to test our ability to keep Chorus people safe and continue to meet community needs.
This included:
The team worked extremely hard to prepare us for a worst case scenario and the external facilitator observed we were more prepared than many other organisations.
One of the key responses was the application of Microsoft Teams which enabled us to maintain safety communications, consultations and engagements.
COVID-19 created a high demand and low stock availability for Personal Protective Equipment (PPE) so the Chorus Gardening Home Maintenance and Work Health and Safety teams devised a mobile PPE unit.
Chorus Gardening Home Maintenance Support Worker Kevin looked after the unit, reaching staff who needed it most while making sure our supplies were in check.
Throughout the year we held a number safety workshops with the goal of highlighting issues, increasing transparency and promoting collaboration and positive involvement from all areas of the Chorus workforce. The workshops provide an opportunity for everyone to discuss best safety practice and learn from each other.
One of the events included an online workshop organised with our workers compensation partners. We learnt more about the workers compensation processes and how each of us can help with early intervention strategies.
Several Safe and Well sessions were also facilitated online to engage all staff in a safety discussion. Staff were able to freely discuss safety concerns and contribute to solutions.
Teams across Chorus adapted to a new way of working during COVID-19. Most office staff began working from home and were asked to send assessments and photos of their workstations to be evaluated by a working from home team member.
This interaction also acted as a cue for the team to check in on each person. The check-in was as much about psychological safety, as ergonomics and physical safety. We also embraced video conferencing using Microsoft Teams and Zoom.
To further help ensure staff were minimising their risk of at home injuries, we partnered with Curtin Ergo Link who ran a webinar covering strategies on how to set up and get the most out of our workspaces. They discussed how injuries can occur over time even when the smallest aspect of our desk or chair is not right.
They also offered one-on-one video assessments to provide guidance on what is a safe home office environment, including what a good workstation set up looks like, why we shouldn’t be sitting at the desk all day and tips for good work habits.
