Eight steps to reduce the risk of injury in hospitality

People are drawn to working in hospitality because it’s an exciting and fast-paced industry but, along within this environment, they often experience stress, fatigue and injury. Long hours and physically demanding work, usually combined with shifts, can also play havoc with an employee’s body clock and work-life balance, which can make them even more vulnerable to mishap. 
 
As an employer, you have a duty to make sure your employees have adequate information, instruction and training to keep them safe. So, here are eight key steps to reducing the risk of injury in the workplace. 

Don’t assume your new recruits will have the required knowledge to understand and implement workplace safety measures. Working around commercial kitchen equipment comes with a level of risk, so it’s essential your team knows how to properly and safely operate everything from your coffee machine to a brat pan, without hurting themselves.

As a minimum, your people should be inducted in safe food handling, manual lifting and emergency procedures. Following induction, make sure regular refreshers are scheduled for the whole team, to avoid complacency and ensure that everyone is keeping themselves and their colleagues safe.  Well-trained employees who are regularly reminded of procedure are your best defense against injuries like burns, cuts, or falls.  

According to Safe Work Australia, falls, slips and trips are among the leading causes of workplace injury. In hospitality, where people are working at speed, under pressure and operating commercial kitchen equipment, slips and trips can lead to serious injury. Hazards include spilled liquids, greasy surfaces, and condensation, causing slippery surfaces and floors.

Installing non-slip flooring and/or matting is a must. Your employees, including front of house staff, but especially employees in the kitchen, should wear non-slip shoes. Keep all areas clean and ensure any spills are immediately cleaned up. Mark any slippery floors or tripping hazards with a cone or tape them off while you’re fixing the situation.

According to WorkSafe statistics, eight per cent of all workplace injuries occur when employees collide with stationary objects such as trolleys, equipment, fittings, and fixtures. Overcrowding is often a contributing factor, increasing the risk of spills, slips, and falls—especially in busy kitchen environments. 

To minimise these risks, keep walkways clear and encourage staff to move carefully rather than rushing, as running can significantly increase both the likelihood and severity of injuries. Additionally, ensure the kitchen has adequate workspace for chefs and kitchen hands, and where possible, limit the need for serving staff to enter the kitchen to reduce congestion. 

Did you know that almost one third of all injuries sustained by 15 – 24-year-olds are cuts from working with knives?1  As you have an obligation to ensure the workplace is safe, it’s critical that all chefs and kitchen staff are trained to avoid knife injuries. Your team should follow workplace knife safety and sharpening procedures, ensuring they never work with blunt knives, wear personal protective equipment such as cut-resistant gloves when they’re using knives, and store knives safely when not in use.

Of course, commercial kitchens have a lot of other equipment with sharp cutting edges that can cause injury. These can include commercial slicers, blenders, juicers and mixers. Ensure that your team is trained in how to use these items safely and conduct regular spot checks to make sure procedures are being followed correctly every time.  

Commercial kitchens are chock full of equipment that can cause burn or scald injuries, including ovens, hot grills, frying pans and more. On top of that, a commercial kitchen during service will have large amounts of searing hot oil, boiling liquids, pans spattering hot grease – as well as kitchen hands, servers and chefs moving around in a confined area. Without careful risk management, injuries are almost inevitable. Perhaps it’s not surprising that food service workers experience the highest number of burns of any employees.

It's easy to get complacent when you’re completing the same task day after day, and especially when you’re in a rush to get food out to hungry diners. Keeping up-to-date records of any near misses or injuries and reviewing them regularly can help you spot where the most dangerous areas are, and where more training might be needed. If accidents like spillage of hot fluids happen often in the same spots, you should spend some time with your kitchen team rethinking traffic flow around the kitchen.

One easy way to reduce the risk of burn and scald injuries is to provide your team with the PPE (personal protective equipment) to help prevent them. Non-slip shoes or boots can prevent accidents while carrying hot liquids and protect feet from burns if something hot is dropped. Invest in good quality oven gloves and gauntlets for hand protection and insist on long sleeved shirts and long pants.  

Handling stock and deliveries, lifting and moving crates of food, and moving washing trays are all routine tasks in the food service industry. Many workplace injuries result from improper lifting of heavy items - according to the Australian Bureau of Statistics, 24 per cent of all workplace injuries are caused by lifting, pushing, pulling, or bending.

You should carry out a risk assessment for hazardous manual tasks in your business, consulting your workers to help identify what those tasks are. Safe Work Australia provides a useful guide on how to do this.

Make sure your team is trained regularly in correct lifting techniques, such as bending at the knees and keeping their back straight. Provide trolleys for moving heavy pallets, kegs, sacks or crates. Keep an eye out for team members doing the wrong thing and remind them of the correct ergonomic procedure.

With so many bottles and drinking glasses around people working at speed, there will inevitably be broken glass hazards in your workplace. Make sure all employees know how to dispose of broken glass safely. This includes securing and isolating the area so that other people don’t step on the shards. Never use bare hands to pick up glass – always use a dustpan and brush, or broom, and wear protective gloves and shoes. A vacuum should be used to ensure all the smaller shards are collected. Once the glass is cleaned up, ensure careful disposal using a sturdy container such as a cardboard or plastic box that’s tightly sealed or taped. Label the container ‘caution – broken glass’ to ensure anyone handling the rubbish doesn’t open it and injure themselves.    

Fatigue is more than just feeling tired—it includes physical and mental effects such as slower reaction times, difficulty concentrating, irritability, and reduced alertness. While lack of sleep is a common cause, fatigue can also be triggered by long hours, shift work and repetitive or high-stress tasks, as well as noisy workplaces with changes of temperature. Sounds very much like a busy restaurant, café or bar, doesn’t it? While your employees are responsible for showing up to work fit for duty (which includes being adequately rested), you are responsible for making sure their work conditions are safe. Pay careful attention to rostering to make sure your team has adequate time between shifts. Encourage regular breaks, proper meals and adequate hydration to help prevent exhaustion-related injuries and accidents.  

According to Safe Work Australia, while you need to have an emergency plan for your workplace, it doesn’t have to be complicated. Your emergency plan should have clear instructions on what to do in an emergency, including evacuation procedures, how to provide first aid, how to communicate in an emergency, and who is responsible for what. Teams may feel that drills and tests are a waste of time, but in a real emergency, knowing what to do can save lives.

To make sure your team is clear on emergency procedures, as well as conducting regular drills, make sure there is visible signage around the workplace showing first aid procedures and what to do in case of an accident, fire or medical emergency. Have your first aid kits regularly checked and restocked and ensure you have a trained first aid officer on each shift. Make sure fire exits are clearly visible, and all employees are aware of evacuation plans and procedures.  

After an accident or injury