One popular strategy to preserve worker safety is implementing a hotline that workers use to register complaints. But too often, hotlines go unused, not because employees don’t have grievances, but because employees don’t trust them — a lose-lose for employer and employee alike. Employees need mechanisms to keep themselves safe, and employers need a healthy and engaged workforce.
How to Create a Worker Safety Hotline That Really Works
Four research-backed recommendations.
December 19, 2022
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Summary.
A worker hotline that is well designed and utilized by employees not only helps managers find harm; it also can allow managers to move from a reactive to a proactive approach to workplace abuse. The authors’ research on dairy farms in Vermont offers four simple recommendations to help increase utilization:
- Hotlines need to be accessible, at the times, in the languages, and through the mediums that workers prefer.
- Hotlines need to institute serious protections against retaliation with immediate, biting penalties for non-compliance.
- Workers need to see fast responses to concerns, and quick resolutions when they make valid complaints.
- Informal complaint resolution can be more effective, faster, and better oriented to workers’ needs. Nevertheless, retaining the option of a formal process is essential to guarantee complaint process integrity.