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Automate Your Environmental, Health & Safety Processes

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Automate Your EHS Processes

Technology can help you reduce risks and be in compliance.

By Denise L. Rondini, Executive Editor, Successful Dealer Magazine 

You want your dealership to be a safe place to work and you want to make sure you are in compliance with all environmental, safety and health regulations. But with so many regulations, policies that have to be written and shared, employees that have to be informed and trained and procedures that have to be followed in the event of an accident, how do you keep track of it all?

Historically, dealers have used manual methods to track these important areas. Walk into most dealerships and you will see binders filled with policies and procedures, as well as binders containing minutes for safety meetings and others with accident reports. While dealers have automated many areas of their businesses, according to Lon Leneve, president and CEO of Compli, they have lagged behind when it comes to EHS compliance.

However, this is an area that can benefit greatly from automation. It can position your dealership to have a good faith compliance process in place, which can serve you well in the event of an audit or litigation.

Compli has identified 10 items that fall under the EHS umbrella: accident reporting, emergency action plan, ergonomics, green dealerships, hazard communication, hazardous energy control, hazardous materials, hazardous waste, safety committee, storm water pollution prevention, underground and aboveground storage tanks and ventilation and indoor air quality.

Any good process starts with having the proper information. Compli suggests adopting policies for each of the 10 areas, writing them down and posting them on line. Once the policies are set they need to be distributed to all employees who are impacted by them.

Using an automated system, these policies can be sent directly to the employee’s e-mail inbox, and as policies are reviewed and updated, the new versions will automatically be sent to employees.

In addition, the system can be designed so when a new employee is hired all the appropriate policies and procedures can be sent as part of the new-employee orientation packet.

An automated process makes it easy to keep track of who needs training on various subjects and if they have completed the training. Following the training, a short assessment can be sent out. “It is one thing to train, which is important,” Leneve says, “but you also want to understand what people have learned or not learned. The best way to prove that you are training your people is to test them and demonstrate that they know something about the subject.”

Automation also can help with investigating incidents like workplace accidents or hazardous materials spills. An automated system will walk you through the steps you need to follow to determine what went wrong and will ensure that each incident is investigated in a consistent manner.

Max Arbow, product manager at Compli, says, “The automated system facilitates perfect documentation, standardization and consistency and really helps with risk management. It can help eliminate the number of workers’ comp claims and safety related issues.”

An automated EHS process also helps ensure consistent enforcement of the rules and regulations across all of your locations because everyone has the same information.

An electronic system also allows for electronic signatures that can be used to have employees sign off on documents indicating they have read and understood your policies.

“Defensibility is an important point with workers’ comp or other employment related issues,” Arbow says. “If you have perfect documentation that you trained and really addressed those [EHS] policies and procedures, they can’t come back and say, ‘I never learned that or no one taught me.’”

In an automated system, all reports and evaluation forms can be time and date stamped. This includes employees signing off on policies, training or a workflow they have been involved in. Doing this allows dealers to then pull exception reports of things that aren’t being done properly or aren’t being completed.

“If 95 percent of it is working, you want to focus on the five percent that is not working. It allows you to evaluate what is going on in your organization and attack that area.”

He adds, “The real point of all of this is to educate your employees to try to get any ignorance factored out of your organization. Most employees want to do a great job, but a lot of problems result out of ignorance, carelessness or forgetfulness. If you can instill that educational environment and at the same time build up a track record of documentation and compliance you are killing two birds with that.”