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Evangelista, Rizamae - Case Study 1
Evangelista, Rizamae - Case Study 1
21-52094
I. Executive Summary
The workplace is one of the most important places for workers, which can also
become dangerous. Therefore, it is a must that employees should be trained properly
in order to prevent accidents at work. This is where Houghton Refrigerator Company
is lacking. Their safety training program and the hiring process were poorly organized
and no proper orientation and on-the-job training was provided for the new hires and
even on the old workers. For Houghton Refrigerator Company to overcome or
improved these problems, they should have workplace safety training, for the workers
to have a better understanding of how their work environment is set up and how they
should behave while at work. With this knowledge, workers will feel more responsible
in performing their duties and take any safety precautions that will help them avoid
accidents while at work. Companies like Houghton want to avoid being involved in
cases that fixate on negligence, so it is the obligation of the manager or supervisor to
have a safe workplace, which can be achieved with effective workplace safety training.
The Houghton Refrigerator Company has a great image to its partners in business.
Unfortunately, the company operates in a poorly manner. They don’t have a proper
hiring and training process for their employees. The company also has poor upper
management skills that resulted in different difficulties.
Houghton Refrigerator Company employs about 300 workers and needs to add
more when the demand increases significantly. They are employing high school and
college students even without the proper orientation on the work processes. The
training process was about five to ten minutes only, the supervisor usually shows the
employee how to do a job once and lets the employee do the rest. Though it is an
easy job, proper orientation and training are still required and the right people should
be employed. And it sometimes resulted in unexpected difficulties that the new hires
know nothing about because training is lacking in the company. There’s also an
instance that a line supervisor belittles those hired that have a ten-minute introduction
to the job processes and that could instill fear in the rest of the employees to commit
mistakes. The employees in the company already experienced minor injuries and
that’s the moment the upper management realized that there was a need for safety
training for all the workers and when they decided to do so, no one in the company is
capable or knowledgeable enough to conduct such pieces of training. Creating an
employee training and development program from scratch is a challenge. The
company must do it right, to give a foundation for success for years to come.
Currently, Houghton does not offer orientations. Houghton should offer newly hired
employees an orientation where they are given a brief history of the company and the
products it offers customers. Houghton Company does not have a well-established
and effective training program. It has not put in place the appropriate mechanisms
through which both the current and new employees are regularly trained. Houghton
should offer training sessions for about one week or two. In order to ensure an
effective training program, the company should develop a properly evaluated
systematic approach to training. This approach ensures regular identification of the
job-related skills that are necessary for successful training and meeting the general
objectives of the company.
Several changes need to be made in the safety training program. The program
needs to be formalized and structured. Management or the Board needs to document
and establish the structure of this program. The program should be outlined, and key
modules, relative to the job, should be developed and approved by management. The
company should contact their insurance company, as they likely already have similar
modules created. The safety training program should be focused on the following
items; Personal Protective Equipment (PPE), what is required and how it is properly
used to protect you, Danger and Risks of each job, development of a safety culture.
Finally, the most important step is management involvement. This includes creating
or approving any safety-related procedures that are to be implemented in the
company. There should also be a committee that focuses solely on keeping the
employees safe and sound inside the company premises.
Houghton needs to have a proper hiring process, wherein they should select the
most qualified person for the job, and orientation should then follow. Introducing the
new hires to your company culture, hierarchy, job responsibilities, co-workers,
workplace facilities, and more on the day of onboarding. Good employee orientation
plans allow new employees to get to know the very basics. It answers any questions
or concerns a new hire may have while also reducing anxiety under a new
environment as company policies and employer expectations can be daunting. The
orientation session will help them assimilate comfortably into their new roles. The
research found that new employees who have undergone a well-structured
onboarding orientation are 82% more likely to remain at a company for up to three
years. When both parties are able to express what’s required of the other, it reduces
misunderstandings and assumptions because all aspects of performances have been
covered.
The company can also be advised to continuously conduct a job hazard and risk
analysis. Utilizing the analysis will provide a process for analyzing the work activities
that will identify the tools, materials, and equipment needed to develop work methods
and procedures for accomplishing the task. The process will identify existing and
potential hazards and assess the risk and identify methods to eliminate or protect
against the hazard. Safety and health can add value to Houghton. This can help
prevent workplace injuries and illnesses by looking at workplace operations,
establishing proper job procedures, and ensuring that all employees are trained
properly.
VI. External Sourcing
Labor law has always indicated training programs on workplace safety as a way to
promote the adoption of safe behaviors by workers. It also requires all workers to
undergo the mandatory 8-hour safety and health seminar that must have a joint
employer-employee orientation. According to Arthur Jr. et al. (2003, p. 235), “there is
very little reason to believe that how trainees feel about or whether they like a training
program tells researchers much, if anything, about (a) how much they learned from
the program (learned criteria), (b) changes in their job-related behaviors or
performance (behavioral criteria), or (c) the utility of the program to the organization
(results criteria).” The four criteria these authors list (reaction, learning, behaviors, and
results) are the same included in the most popular evaluation model developed by
Kirkpatrick in 1959 and still in use. Kirkpatrick’s model, however, does not take into
consideration the psychosocial factors that explain why behaviors are adopted. From
a more process-oriented perspective, it would be expected that even the worker’s
effective and attitudinal reactions to the training program would inform its effects in
that they are indicators of the motivation to apply, or not, the knowledge acquired.