What Does
Safety Trainer Mean?
A safety trainer is a person who conducts safety training for an organization. Safety trainers are recognized qualified persons who possess a knowledge of workplace hazards and their associated controls, as well as an understanding of how to demonstrate that knowledge to others.
Training may or may not address site-specific hazards, depending on whether the goal of the training is to provide a workplace safety induction or to certify a specific safety competency. Safety trainers working in fields that require workers to meet recognized safety standards possess formal qualifications for how to examine and evaluate a worker’s ability to perform the safety practices and principles that comprised their training.
Safeopedia Explains Safety Trainer
Safety trainers are integral to modern occupational health and safety practices. In all advanced countries, as well as in many developing countries, the use of safety training is legally required for workplaces in which there are more than minor safety risks. Many OSHA standards explicitly require employers to provide employees with safety training. The amount and nature of the training that employees must receive, as well as the expertise and qualifications their safety trainer must possess in order for their training to meet legal requirements, depend on the specific safety risks to which the employees will be exposed.
Depending on the amount of training required, a safety trainer may be a designated responsible person who holds a different full-time job, a full-time safety trainer or safety officer who works within the company, or an external contractor who specializes in providing safety training.
Within an office environment, safety training policies may only require that a non-expert employee be appointed to provide basic training related to work safety, such as instructions related to how to evacuate the office in the event of a fire. In more hazardous environments such as petrochemical plants, the hiring company may outsource training to a third-party company that has industry-specific infrastructure and expertise in conducting safety training. The use of third parties allows the employer to avoid the expenses and practical difficulties that would be associated with maintaining the infrastructure, human resources, and trainer certifications necessary to address the full range of projects the employer may potentially engage in.
In addition to site-specific safety trainers, there are also task-specific trainers who certify that an employee has the qualifications necessary to perform a specific task safely. This type of training generally requires the use of a third-party trainer who is qualified to provide a specific internal safety certification. Employees may be expected to engage with this type of trainer independently if the required safety certification is viewed as a necessary qualification to be hired onto a particular project.