Duty of care has become quite complex. And when it comes to employee safety, it’s not just about fulfilling your legal and moral obligations.
Meeting your employees’ expectations is important too.
When you increase employee confidence, it’s easier to attract and retain top talent. That matters in today’s tight labor market: Even though the extremely high turnover rates of the Great Resignation have subsided, more than half (51 percent) of U.S. employees are watching or actively seeking a new job.
But how can you know if you’re living up to your employees’ expectations when it comes to their safety and well-being? We went straight to the source and surveyed more than 1,000 full-time in-office, fully remote, hybrid, and lone workers to uncover their experiences, expectations, and preferences around workplace safety. Take a look below at some of our top findings from the 2024 OnSolve by Crisis24 Employee Safety Survey. Then read the full Survey for insights into how you can fulfill your duty of care by providing the protection your employees expect.
Physical Threats Take an Emotional Toll
According to our Survey, more than half of full-time employees (52 percent) experienced a physical threat during working hours, while just under half (49 percent) experienced one outside of working hours. But no matter when it occurred, employees felt emotional/mental distress – the top impact reported. If the event happened during work, it resulted in loss of productivity and unplanned downtime. Outside of working hours, employees said loss of income and physical injury were the top impacts of a physical threat.
Tips: Be ready to deal with the most common impacts of physical threats on your employees – even if those threats occur outside of working hours. Emotional/mental distress and physical injury can have long-term effects on productivity and morale. Making appropriate resources available will help employees recover faster.
2024 Employee Safety Survey
Discover employee perceptions and expectations when it comes to communication and safety in the workplace. Read insights gathered from our survey of over 1,000 in-office, hybrid, fully-remote and lone workers to improve your safety initiatives and enhance employee satisfaction.
Employees on the Clock Have High Expectations
The large majority (93 percent) of full-time employees feel their employer is responsible for their safety during working hours. These numbers remain high when looking at different categories of workers. Ninety percent of in-office workers and 89 percent of hybrid employees feel their employer is responsible for their safety when they're on-site or in-office during working hours. Fifty-eight percent of fully remote employees and 63 percent of lone workers feel the same way.
Tips: Proactively identify potential threats to employee safety across all facilities and deliver targeted communications to workers in specific locations should a critical event occur. Train employees so they know how you’ll communicate with them during an emergency.
Employee Safety Should Never be off the Clock
More than half (56 percent) of full-time workers feel there are scenarios when their employer is responsible for their safety outside of working hours. For example, 35 percent of full-time workers feel their employer is responsible for their safety at work-sponsored functions like holiday parties, happy hours, and team building events.
Tips: Expectations around duty of care and employee safety don’t stop when employees clock out. Monitor the threat landscape and communicate with employees regardless of their location and time of day. Multi-modal communication makes it easier to reach workers outside of working hours, ensuring they’ll receive your alerts.
Travel Isn’t a Vacation From Duty of Care
When it comes to travel during working hours, 36 percent of all full-time workers surveyed feel their employer is responsible for their safety when traveling for work. Somewhat fewer respondents (29 percent) feel this way when they travel for work outside of office hours.
Lone workers have higher expectations: 63 percent say their employer is responsible for their safety when traveling for work during working hours.
Tips: Whether employees are on or off the clock, employers have a responsibility to keep workers safe and informed when they’re traveling. Meet your duty of care with a robust travel risk management program. Having this in place will reduce frequency of incidents and legal and financial exposure. It also helps attract and retain skilled personnel.
When it comes to employee safety, don’t just meet expectations. Exceed them. Download the full results of our employee safety survey to learn more.
