Updates from the Leading Association for the Cleaning Industry Worldwide

Create An Injury-Free Workplace
By Deb Potter

Every day in the United States, on average, 15 workers lose their lives due to work-related injuries or illnesses. The single most common cause for these occurrences is complacency — an attitude that “it won’t happen to me.”

The Complacency Trap
Oftentimes, in-house service providers are complacent about safety. Managers are satisfied with mediocre safety performance and do not strive to raise safety awareness to eliminate the potential for injury. Employees respond to this lack of concern for safety by not being attentive to their work environment.

Over time, this attitude becomes an organizational norm. The result is employees begin to take shortcuts because they are more focused on production rather than getting the job done safely.

When managers don’t make safety a top priority within a facility, it is easy for employees to disregard personal safety. When this happens, incidents and injuries occur with increasing frequency. There are two things that must happen to avoid this potentially deadly situation:

1. Managers must renew their commitment to the safety process.

2. Employees must get involved in meaningful safety activities.

Managers Need Commitment
Managers can demonstrate their commitment to safety by following the company’s rules and by regularly attending safety meetings. Managers would be well advised to also consider implementing the following ideas:

• Take time to walk around and talk to employees. Visit employees in their work environment. Take personal action to correct unsafe situations and update employees on the outcome.
• Review all reports of near misses and injuries. Follow up on the reports to ensure that appropriate action is take to eliminate future incidents. Make sure your follow-up is positive and not a punitive action.
• Integrate safety improvement into management planning. Include safety goals and objectives in your budget.Communicate safety performance to upper management and employees.
• Enable employees to get involved in the safety process. Ask employees with specific skills or interests to participate in safety improvement projects. Then recognize their involvement and efforts.

Encourage Employee Involvement
Employees whose ideas and involvement are valued will increase safety performance. Create opportunities for employees to contribute ideas and information that will lead to safety improvement, such as:

• Report all unsafe conditions
• Attend safety meetings
• Serve on employee safety committees
• Plan and lead a safety meeting
• Participate in all incident investigations and facility walk-throughs
• Engage in conversations with managers to share improvement ideas

Avoid Distractions
Research shows that many incidents occur because employees are distracted and don’t pay attention to their environment or what is happening around them. Managers often stop paying attention to the importance of safety because they get distracted with issues such as the need to increase productivity, improve quality, and raise profits.

Deb and Carl Potter help organizations target a zero-injury workplace, which raises safety performance and reduces workers compensation insurance. For more information, visit: www.SimplySeamlessSafety.com.

ISSA/INTERCLEAN® USA Posts Strongest Start Ever
Proving to be the ONE SHOW for the cleaning industry, ISSA/INTERCLEAN® USA — held October 4-7, 2006 at Chicago’s McCormick Place — attracted 16,637 participants and achieved its highest-ever first day attendance with almost 10,000 unique visitors on the tradeshow’s opening day.

Attendance
While registration data indicates that distributors attending the show continue to represent more than 70 percent of the distributor purchases made within the United States, it also shows that consolidation has affected the number of companies in attendance. In addition, data collected from in-house service providers (ISPs) and building service contractors (BSCs) show that 89 percent of these attendees manage purchasing budgets of $25,000 or more, with 33 percent posting budgets of $500,000 or higher.

Facility service providers, including both ISPs and BSCs, reached 2,824 participants this year.

Keynote and Educational Sessions
Keynote speaker, former New York Mayor Rudolph Giuliani, kept the attention of more than 4,200 people right to the very end of his presentation on October 5. Breaking attendance records for room capacity at the convention center, Giuliani spoke about the key tenets of strong leadership and shared real-world experiences, including that of leading New York City through the September 11 terrorist attacks. He also engaged in a lively question-and-answer session with attendees.

The two-day educational conference also played to packed audiences — despite being in larger rooms than in past years. For the third consecutive year, the All-Industry Networking Lunch was sold out when more than 500 participants gathered to share ideas. Participants principally represented ISPs and BSCs from around the world.

APPA Seeks Data for Annual Survey
APPA, the association serving educational facilities professionals, is currently collecting data from fiscal year 2005-06 for its Facilities Core Data Survey. This survey is an annual collection and reporting of data related to educational facilities and an integrated research information database.

Developed and produced by APPA’s Information and Research Committee, the 12-module survey takes a comprehensive look at facilities’ operating costs, staffing levels and expenses, building and space costs and usage, strategic financial measures and other key data points.

The annual survey results in a set of Facilities Performance Indicators reports published on APPA’s Web site are available for purchase online at www.appa.org/Research/fcds.cfm. Pricing and level of accessibility to confidential information are based on membership in APPA and participation in the survey. Institutions that participate in the survey also receive a discounted price on the reports.

Questions about the survey and the resulting reports may be directed to Steve Glazner, APPA director of knowledge management, at 703-684-1446; e-mail, steve@appa.org.

Did You Know?
The ISSA special edition of Green Cleaning for Dummies shows you how to implement a green cleaning program for your facility. The book guides you on how to choose the best types of green cleaning products and equipment, and explains the positive impact on human health and the environment that you create by going green.

To find out more about this book, please visit www.issa.com (click on educational resources/bookstore), call ISSA’s Customer Service Department at 800-225-4772, or e-mail education@issa.com.