Day-To-Day Ways To Prevent Human Error In Workplace Environments

In technical, specialized industries, it’s easy to get caught up in highly advanced, particular topics that everyday practices take the backseat. Simply put, the more basic day-to-day monotonous habits that imbue every industry aside to make way for more cognitively challenging material.

Human error reduction training and regulatory compliance courses online and in-person are popular human error reduction tools that specifically look into how to prevent human error in workplace scenarios. But what about the simple things we think less of day-by-day? That process you’ve done hundreds, even thousands of times that you’ve memorized? You may have advanced specialized knowledge, but even the most simple slips can cause avalanches of errors. Here are simple ways on how to prevent human error in workplace scenarios.

Teach

There’s no better way to stay sharp than to teach a process to new, less experienced colleagues. In the last blog, we touched on cognitive load errors and how the teaching/learning processes influence human error. Teach a process you’re familiar with and really delve into the specifics of the process and pay attention to how you teach it to new learners. One must not only know a process to teach it, but they must also provide accessible information. The breakdown of complex information into manageable terms will further your understanding of it even as you’re teaching.

Learn and re-learn

On the other end of the spectrum, learn something new in application to your job. Go out of your way to learn from someone else. Learning new topics highlights the importance of foundational understanding and jostles those new-learner juices that may have been stagnant a while. When you’ve learned something new, apply the same foundational study to a process you feel you’ve mastered. You may be surprised at how fresh and new your understanding may be. Think of it like reading a series of books another time through or the second viewing of a film. There’s always more a second or third time around.

The foremost complaint employees have about their employers is a distinct lack of communication. Preventing human error in the workplace is derived especially from communication. From that communication must come an environment that fosters teaching, new learning, re-learning and the cognitive exercise that’s essential to keep the mind strong. While no workplace will ever be wholly error-free, cognitive workouts in processes complex and simple will drastically reduce those pesky mistakes.