Safety Olympics

After thinking more about what the plant manager said at the safety conference, about keeping her employees involved and having fun activities to spark the development of new ideas about safety, I began to think about how that could be applied to the plant I'm working at. I asked my manager, Colleene, about her opinion on fun activities for the employees in the theme of safety. She told me that in the past they have done a "safety race" mirroring the Daytona 500. She said, disappointed, that currently the managers are so busy with data entries and desk work, trying to improve production numbers, that the fun activities for employees are falling to the wayside. After Colleene left my office I continued to think about possible fun safety motivators, which brought me to thinking about the Safety Olympics. My idea is that the Safety Olympics will mirror the 2010 Winter Olympics, and will have activities like Cross Country Skiing Race for Safety, Dare to Be Safe Ski Jump, and Individual & Pairs Figure Skating Safe Poster Design Competition. Employees will be able to contribute ideas for safety in the workplace, evaluate their own safety behaviors, and develop a new poster campaign for safety. I understand the importance of mirroring a current media event because when employees are not at work, they will see the Olympics on their TV's and in the news, which will get them thinking about the Safety Olympics at work. I decided to take my idea to Colleene and ask if it would be plausible to accomplish. I mentioned that I value fun in the workplace and incorporating the ideas of everyone, I also explained that I understand that the managers are busy with tedious desk work, but I do not have that problem because my job isn't exactly defined in stone, so I can organize and lead this new project. She was impressed with my forwardness in coming to her with a new idea, and informed me that not only was the idea fabulous, but that I should be ready to present to the employees at the monthly meeting this coming week information about the Safety Olymipcs. I was thrilled to hear her response! So now I'm getting more materials together and preparing to tell the employees our exciting new adventure!