We are excited to announce our partnership with Acuite, a construction-specific reporting and analytics platform, to help small and medium-sized building companies to get on top of their health and safety.
This strategic partnership will deliver powerful new Dashboards, powered by Acuite to HazardCo members, giving them the tools to track health and safety activity and improve safety outcomes.
With so much to keep track of on-site, Dashboards are a practical way for HazardCo members to understand what health and safety activity is taking place across their business and at each project site. Often the business owner or admin staff are based in an office or moving between multiple sites. They want to be able to see at a glance what health and safety activity is taking place, view trends over time, and discover how to improve.
David Speight, Co-Founder, and CEO of Acuite Construction Intelligence says, “the Acuite founders are builders and we know it’s not easy. Through combining forces with HazardCo, we feel we can make a real difference by not only making sites safer but also improving the lives of builders through arming them with the knowledge to put them on the front foot of their projects”
Following the integration, HazardCo members can get real-time insights into key health and safety activities happening on their sites through Dashboards. These Dashboards help users to understand the areas that are performing well, and those in need of improvement in a simple and easy-to-understand way.
Iain Dixon, Chief Executive Officer at HazardCo says “We are excited to be working with Acuite because they are the best in the business for reporting, analytics, and insights. Like HazardCo, they specialise in construction, they come from the industry and keep things simple. We’ve had a great response from our members already with feedback that they are loving the quick snapshot they can get from viewing their Dashboards, and being able to see at a glance what health and safety activity is happening or not happening”.
Acuite is a reporting and analytics platform. As builders themselves, their mission is to improve the lives of those in construction by creating holistic data-driven insights as well as arming them with the knowledge, time, and transparency to make better decisions.
Mental and Physical health can often be overlooked in the construction industry, but it’s a big contributor to time off work. With 78% of workers having suffered a mental or physical injury at work and an average 32 days off work for ACC claim injuries.
Injuries in your industry may seem like they are just part of the job, but they can significantly impact your output if not taken seriously.
Strains and Sprains
The construction industry has become the number one industry for ACC claims with strains and sprains, (also known as Musculoskeletal Disorders or MSDs), making up a whopping 57% of the problem.
Common injuries for construction workers can range from sprains, strains, and contusions (bruising) which can be caused by heavy lifting, repetitive movement, poor body posture, forcefulness or muscle effort, or the vibrations from continuous use of hand tools. Symptoms of a workplace injury can range from any kind of pain and discomfort located in and around the neck, shoulders, wrists, back, and knees.
It is well known that there are a range of factors that contribute to MSDs. It’s not just one single factor, such as the lifting technique (although for industries such as scaffolding and roofing handling techniques are an important factor).
The research firmly points to four groups of factors we need to tackle when addressing MSDs in construction:
Physical factors, such as:
Individual factors such as:
Psychosocial factors such as:
Work Organisation factors such as:
It may not surprise you that physical factors often take most of the blame and focus as their connection is easy to understand, measure and observe. There are also proven strategies to overcome physical factors such as machinery, equipment, and task modifications. Combining the other factors into your approach is where the construction industry will get the most benefit. Understanding how these factors can combine and influence each other to cause problems will be crucial.
The most common solutions to dealing with MSD are:
Data shows that sprains and strains often become more problematic later in a construction worker’s career, with the largest claims in the housing construction sector. Between 2015 and 2019, 57% of ACC claims were MSD injuries, with the average cost being $3700, and a total of 1.9 million compensation days paid out, costing a total of $325m!
There is a large range of costs that surface when someone has an injury on the job, especially when they can’t return to work the next day or sometimes for weeks or months. This has a huge impact on deadlines, bottom line, skills on-site, and team dynamics.
Have you thought about other ways you could be working to alleviate the stress on your body? It could be as simple as:
It’s common practice when you work out, that you warm up and cool down, so why is working any different? Accepting the reality of MSDs helps us formulate an effective approach to combat MSDs in our industry.
Prevention and early intervention are key to maintaining a healthy musculoskeletal system so you can carry out your day-to-day duties on-site and personal activities you love to do in your own time. Ensure you keep fit and healthy; regular exercise, a good diet, and sleep can assist in keeping your body ready to take on work and recover faster.
Did you know businesses are legally required to monitor the health of their workers?
On construction sites, workers can be exposed to many hazards that can cause them harm over time.
Some common hazards are:
Continuous exposure to these hazards can cause progressively worse health issues for your workers. This is why it is important to monitor your worker’s health. Specifically their lung function, hearing, vision, and work-related musculoskeletal conditions.
If your worksite exposes your workers to environments that will cause them harm, we recommend beginning the process of monitoring your worker’s health immediately.
To further assist your health monitoring efforts, HazardCo has partnered with Habit Health, who provides nationwide medical checks. They’re experienced in health monitoring for the construction industry, and their efficient, cost-effective service is discounted for HazardCo members.
They can offer:
Did you know that nearly 1 in 4 Kiwi adults report experiencing poor mental wellbeing? This makes up a significant percentage of our workforce in New Zealand. This means that there is a good chance that you or someone you work with is struggling with or at some stage has struggled with their mental wellbeing.
We all know that work can affect your physical health. There are risks and hazards on-site that can cause you harm like slips, trips, falls, hazardous substances, dust and so many more. Working can also impact your mental health in more ways than one.
Some common workplace hazards that can affect a worker’s mental health are:
Businesses should try to prevent mental health harm at its source. Identifying risks and controlling them should be done by communicating with workers about what workplace conditions are harming their mental health. Things like low job control, low support, poor environmental conditions, and exposure to injury or harassment can increase the likelihood of mental harm.
Businesses should look to create workplaces that remove exposure to stressors, such as:
Start managing mental health at work today. Have a toolbox meeting to discuss the common issues that impact your worker’s mental health. Discuss ways to eliminate or minimise these risks. It’s good practice to keep records of your meetings, this can be done in the HazardCo App.
Get in touch with the HazardCo team if you have any questions
It’s important to have the right kind of insurance in place to manage risks and keep your business moving if anything goes wrong, especially if you work in construction and trades and you’re footing the bill if it all goes belly up. Contract works insurance will ensure your construction project is protected from start to completion.
Contract works insurance covers your project during the construction stage and protects you from accidental loss or damage due to fire, flood, storm, vandalism, or theft during the build.
What is contract works insurance?
Contract Works insurance is designed to cover accidental and sudden physical loss or damage to the project that is insured during the construction stage.
When you work in the trade industry, your tools are your lifeline. If anything goes missing, you need it replaced. Depending on your policy, this could also include the cost of the labour, materials and tools required in order to get the job back on track.
What could a Contracts Works policy cover?
Who is responsible for arranging cover?
For new builds, contract works is required and the builder or construction company usually arranges this cover. However, If renovations or alterations are being done to an existing structure, the responsibility will fall on the owner.
There are two main types of Contract Works policies. Depending on your situation, you may want a one-off contract and look at this project by project, or an annual policy for someone who regularly builds new homes.
Who needs this?
As a business owner, the key to success is minimising any potential risks for your company.
Why do you need contract works insurance?
If any one of the below happened to you, it’s important you have Contract Works in place to keep you covered.
To protect from vandalism and theft
A construction company was vandalised by a digger that was on-site and was facing a total rebuild of over $200,000 after someone demolished a house during the night. Check out the article here.
To protect from natural disasters
If there is a natural disaster such as a fire, earthquake, flood and water damage, subsidence and landslip, storm, tsunami or wind. Contract Works insurance puts your mind at ease by keeping you covered.
To protect building materials and tools being sent to your building site
If any equipment that’s being sent to your site gets damaged, lost or delayed then contract works insurance can help.
To protect from accidental damage while work is being carried out
This could cover an accidental nail through a water pipe, causing internal flooding or roof trusses collapsing after a load-bearing wall was removed.
We want to help you protect your crew and your business. That’s why we’ve partnered with Cactus Insurance to make it super easy to protect your site from start to finish.
Cactus are just like us, created by tradies for tradies to make insurance simple. They offer straightforward policies with everything you need and nothing you don’t.
Noise is a very common risk across many different types of worksites. One of the most common sources of loud noise is machinery and equipment.
Machinery and equipment operate at high speeds and generate a great force that can generate significant noise. In certain worksites, this noise can be at increased volumes for long periods of time. Noise poses a risk to workers as it can cause long-term and irreversible damage to their hearing. Once the risk to workers hearing is identified it should be managed by either removing or minimising the risk.
It is recommended to control noise at the source. Some examples of how you can control and reduce noise are:
Hearing protection should only be used when extra protection is needed after using the above noise controls. If hearing protection is required:
Workers should be aware of the risk that exposure to excessive noise has to their hearing. Talk about managing noise during your safety meetings and keep a record of it in the HazardCo App. Make sure workers are provided with the appropriate training in the correct use, maintenance and storage of hearing protection. A Training Register template is available on the HazardCo Hub which can be downloaded and filled out.
You can view these resources below:
Is your work too noisy?
WorkSafe NZ’s Hierarchy of controls for noise video
If you have any questions about noise in the workplace, give HazardCo a call on 0800 555 339.
Using machinery and equipment for work on-site puts workers in close contact with powerful and fast moving tools. This makes getting the job done easier and more efficient but it does also present some risks to workers health and safety. If a worker comes into contact with machinery or equipment in an unsafe way, it can cause significant harm or injury. It is common practice to use guarding on machinery and equipment to create a barrier between the workers and the moving parts that can cause harm or injury.
Machinery and equipment guarding is designed to eliminate or minimise the risk of workers being harmed while completing their work. It is important to assess the hazards and risks involved with all the machinery and equipment used in the workplace. If machinery and equipment is not guarded properly, workers can sustain significant injuries due to coming in contact with moving parts.
Some common injuries are:
Because there is potential for serious harm when using machinery and equipment, it is necessary to plan a safe approach when conducting a job. This will help identify the hazards of working with machinery and equipment.
The hazard management process includes:
There are many different types of guards that can be used to protect workers from being harmed when using machinery and equipment. Here are some common types of guarding and examples of when they are used:
When choosing a guard, It is important to make sure the guard can actually prevent an operator from reaching into the dangerous parts of machinery and equipment. To make sure the operators are protected from the dangerous parts, the safest guarding must take into account an operator’s ability to reach into or come in contact with moving parts.
There are many different types of guards to choose from. It is important to choose guards that eliminate the potential for harm. If this is not possible, then guards should be chosen that isolate or minimise the risk to workers. It is very important that guarding is not removed or tampered with as this will increase the risk of harm to workers.
Control hierarchy:
Workers should be trained to competently complete the work they are required to do. Workers should be trained and educated on the purpose and function of the different types of guarding in the workplace. Make sure that workers have the appropriate training, supervision, and qualification (if required) to safely use the necessary machinery and equipment. Keep an up-to-date register of what machinery and equipment workers are trained on and competent in using. A Training Register template is available on the HazardCo Hub which can be downloaded and filled out.
If you have any questions about guarding machinery and equipment, give HazardCo a call on 0800 555 339.
Machinery and equipment are used everyday on the worksite. Machinery and equipment are designed to make work easier, more efficient, and can generate great amounts of power and speed. This is really handy when there is a job to be done, but this also means there is a greater potential for harm and injury. When there is a potential for harm, especially in the workplace, it needs to be managed to prevent incidents or injuries. A great place to start is by identifying the hazards and risks involved with the machinery and equipment being used so that you can put controls in place to effectively manage them.
Many pieces of machinery and equipment use force and motion to cut, bend, join or shape materials. This force and motion can harm workers in many different ways such as crushing, cutting, puncturing and burning.
It is good practice to identify the risks to workers’ safety. When machinery and equipment is identified as a hazard in the workplace, the next required step is to manage the hazard. Begin by assessing the risks that these hazards pose to workers. A risk assessment in relation to the machinery and equipment can be completed in the HazardCo app to record hazards and the controls put in place to manage these risks. Keep a list of the common hazards in the workplace and how they are controlled in a hazard register. A Hazard Register template available in the HazardCo Hub.
It is also good practice to complete Standard Operating Procedures (SOP) for your machinery and equipment. The SOP should document instructions on the safe operation and maintenance of and training for any machinery or equipment. Ensure that the SOP is created using the manufacturer’s instructions so that it is specific to the machinery and equipment used. A few example SOP’s and a template are available in the HazardCo Hub that can be used to create SOPs for all the machinery and equipment in the workplace.
Machinery and equipment are often used in harsh working environments, and on a daily basis. These two factors mean that eventually machinery and equipment can become faulty, damaged or break down over-time. If and when this happens, it can pose a risk to the workers who are using or working closely to the machinery or equipment. It is good practice to manage these risks by doing daily pre-start checks before beginning work. This ensures that the machinery and equipment are inspected and are in good working order before beginning the works. These pre-start checks should be recorded and the records should be kept. There are Pre-start Checklist templates available on the HazardCo Hub.
Workers should be trained to competently complete the work they are required to do. This is especially important when using machinery and equipment as there is an increased potential for harm when it is not used correctly. Make sure that workers have the appropriate training, supervision and qualification (if required) to safely use the necessary machinery and equipment. Keep an up-to-date register of what machinery and equipment workers are trained on and competent in using. A Training Register template is available on the HazardCo Hub which can be downloaded and filled out.
If you need a hand with managing the hazards and risks involved with using machinery and equipment, give HazardCo a call on 0800 555 339.
A Task Analysis is a hazard management tool that helps you identify hazards and the appropriate controls before you carry out a specific task or job. Completing a Task Analysis will help reduce the risks on-site by walking you through assessing the work before you start and putting the correct processes in place to make sure you do it safely.
The HazardCo App makes it simple for you to understand what you need to fill in. With an easy-to-use guide that gives you options to choose from.
All workers involved in the work should discuss the Task Analysis so they understand exactly what work is being done, how it will be completed, and the controls that will be used to keep everyone safe. It’s fundamental and should be done before any high-risk work gets underway.
Task Analysis in the app are faster, simpler and repeatable.
The Task Analysis template on the App guides you through a step-by-step set up process. It gives you the confidence that the potential hazards have been thought through, and that you are putting the right controls in place to make sure everyone is safe.
All you need to do is choose the controls relevant to the work you are doing and hit SAVE, easy as that! A HazardCo Task Analysis is created, emailed to you and saved securely in your App and Hub so you can easily share it with the main contractors who need it.
If you have any questions reach out to the HazardCo team today
Taking care of your mental health is a difficult task. Sometimes you don’t even know you’re struggling until you are in the thick of it. Struggling with mental health can look different for everyone and the cause of it can be different for everyone. In the same way, dealing with or managing mental health looks different for us all. Even though we all respond to mental health differently, there are some common signs to look out for that we are struggling. There are also some commonly recommended things we can do to improve or manage our mental health.
These feelings and behaviours can be onset by a variety of life events or stressors. There can be many life events that can impact our mental health such as; work-related stress, relationship troubles, finances, loss of a loved one, and many more. If we have been through a tough time or are aware that we aren’t feeling quite right there are some tools we can use that can improve our mental health. Using these tools to proactively manage our mental health is a great idea but it is also useful if you are currently struggling with your mental health.
These tools and many more can all help you take care of your mental health. If you notice a friend is struggling or going through some tough life events, reach out to them and see how they are going. They could benefit from some of these tools or at very least a friend. Remember that taking care of yourself mentally is hard and you don’t need to do it on your own. Reach out to your family and friends or a doctor to talk about your mental health. If you are struggling there is help out there, below is a list of some places you can call if you need support.
Is work affecting your mental health? Is work affecting your worker’s mental health?
Have you thought about how to manage it? Did you know you have a duty to manage the risks that work poses to mental health?
We all know that work can affect your physical health. There are risks and hazards on-site that can cause you harm like slips, trips, and falls, hazardous substances, dust and so many more. Working can also impact your mental health in more ways than one. Here is a list of some common workplace hazards that can affect a worker’s mental health:
There are many things at work that can impact mental health. Sustained exposure to workplace stressors increases the likelihood of poor mental and physical health. Businesses have a duty to manage the risks that work has to mental health. If the risks can’t be eliminated they should be minimised.
Businesses should try to prevent mental health harm at its source. Identifying risks and controlling them should be done by communicating with workers about what workplace conditions are harming their mental health. Things like low job control, low support, poor environmental conditions, exposure to injury or harassment can increase the likelihood of mental harm. Businesses should look to create workplaces that remove exposure to stressors, such as:
Start managing mental health at work today. Have a toolbox meeting to discuss the common issues that impact your workers mental health. Discuss ways to eliminate or minimise these risks. It’s good practice to keep records of your meetings, this can be done in the HazardCo App.
If you have any questions get in touch with the HazardCo Team today
Disclaimer: This article discusses suicide and mental health
Last Thursday was World Suicide Prevention Day, and next week from the 21st-27th September is New Zealand Mental Health Awareness Week, so we thought we would share some insights into this important issue.
In 2019, New Zealand reported our highest number of suicide deaths to date, with a confronting figure of 685 cases. According to the Suicide Mortality Review Committee, construction has the highest suicide rate of all industries in New Zealand, at 6.9%. It is time that we recognised this issue, and understand the small, yet powerful steps that we can take to make sure our mates are ok, which can prevent the tragic effect on the lives of so many Kiwi families.
MATES in Construction is a community-based programme that promotes the building and strengthening of communities in the workplace and across the construction industry – helping Kiwi’s to provide an environment that encourages positive wellbeing.
MATES in Construction has three key focus areas to work towards their vision of significantly improving mental wellness and reducing suicide in the construction industry:
The key message is about taking time out of your day to remind each other to notice when our mates may be struggling, and that it’s not only OK to have these conversations, but it’s essential.
Due to the current COVID19 climate, individuals may be struggling with financial stress, anxiety levels, and a lack of social interaction – factors that hugely affect our mental health and overall wellbeing. Therefore, it is so important that we support our friends and coworkers by taking 10 seconds out of our day to start these conversations.
It can be as simple as asking “Are you ok?”, “What’s happening in your world?” or “You don’t seem yourself, is anything up?”. You don’t need to be a counsellor, but taking the time to check-in is a clear indicator to everyone that you care, and that they matter – and this can make a big difference.
For more information, you can check out these resources below:
Boss Burnout – Spot the warning signs in yourself
Mates in Construction has a 24/7 helpline which you can call on 0800 111 315. Alternatively, you can seek additional assistance from an Employee Assistance Programme (EAP), your local GP or your whanau and friends.
