Creating and maintaining effective lockout tagout procedures is only the first half of the lockout tagout battle. After you have created your procedures and put a serious plan in place to monitor these procedures, you need to ensure your procedures are efficiently distributed to all required employees and that adequate training is in place. If this training and distribution is not done, then the procedures will not be properly followed and accidents will still be a real threat.

When dealing with training for lockout tagout, it is first important to be certain that your procedures meet all requirements. To do that, you can review OSHA Standard 1910.38. If you have any questions about the technicalities of the procedures, you can also always contact a qualified safety consulting firm to have a third party audit performed on your procedures. After determining that you do, in fact, have appropriate procedures in place, you will also want to be sure your mechanism for maintenance is appropriate, as well. Now, you can do this in house, with a third party, by hand, or with a computer program. The choice is yours.

Once you have these foundational pieces in place, it might be a good idea to bring somebody on board to help with training, at least in the beginning. This can be an experience lockout tagout professional who you hire full time or a third party. Either way, it will make the training more useful and help you to know that your employees truly understand their role in lockout tagout safety.

If you have any questions about establishing lockout tagout procedures or establishing a lockout tagout training program, please contact us. If you have anything to add about the importance of lockout tagout training, please leave a comment.