18 Oct Managing workplace noise
Does high definition sound and the “boom boom” of heavy sound or rock speakers at a concert make your chest feel uncomfortable, give you a headache and assault your eardrums?
The same effect can apply in employment, and sustained noise level in a workplace can increase stress to employees, leading to a significant drop in productivity. In the past, there has been a lot of comments about the benefits of applying good health and safety practices to increase productivity in the workplace, but how do can you quantify it?
Is it measured by the lack of absenteeism, sick leave or the lack of hearing aids being issued to older employees?
When it comes to the physical protection of employees from industrial and other workplace noise, the trend has been to take the easy way out instead of looking at the root cause and investigating ways to ether eliminate, isolate or to engineer the problem for a better solution. If you take into account the 1992 Health and Safety in Employment Act’s definition of “significant risk/hazard”, this provides you with a good insight into considering the level of risk to employees but more importantly the consequences of long term effect after exposure. Compared to an employee having to spend $6-$10,000 dollars on hearing aids in the future, as an employer you have the responsibility to assess all hazards and risks associated with your business that has the actual or potential risk of affecting the hearing of your employees.
Click here to read a WorkSafe NZ article – an example of good risk management.