Guide to Mitigating the Work Health and Safety Risk to Lone Workers

Introduction

Lone workers face real, often underestimated risk. The first step to managing it is knowing who actually counts as one. Our updated guide breaks down how to identify your lone worker population, assess the specific risks they face, and put the right controls in place, from training and communication protocols to the technology that makes real-time check-ins and location sharing possible.

Identifying the lone workers in your organization

"Lone worker" is a broad term. But unless organizations have a detailed understanding of who's included in the category, they might be unwittingly misidentifying their lone worker populations. The consequence: companies incur higher-than-necessary levels of work health and safety risk.

So, who are the lone workers in your organization? It might be difficult to tell. A lone worker doesn't always work alone. Most jurisdictions, including Australia, define lone work as professional work undertaken in a remote or isolated fashion, carried out either in a fixed facility or away from a worker's typical base.

Traditional representatives of the lone-worker class include social workers, security officers, truck drivers, delivery agents, realtors, in-home health aides, and traveling sales people. The industries that have historically employed the bulk of the lone-worker population include manufacturing, construction, property maintenance and real estate, retail, healthcare, utilities, operational security, logistics, energy, and the creative industries.

The rise of mobile work in advanced economies complicates that picture, as does the growth of contracting and subcontracting, which is actively swelling the ranks of lone workers. In most jurisdictions, "lone worker" is now a catch-all term for any employee ( direct or contracted) who works in a location where regular communications and steady supervision aren't always available, as the New Zealand Ministry of Business, Innovation and Employment explains.

Why do organizations need to take stock of their lone worker populations? Organizations usually undertake lone work to gain a market advantage. In failing to manage their lone-worker populations, they run several risks that work against those same business interests. Lone-worker anxiety, left mismanaged or neglected, tends to erode employee productivity, engagement, and morale, leading to increased turnover and a weaker corporate reputation.

Without effective internal policies, lone workers (already a higher-risk occupational group) might also put themselves in harm's way. Accidents stemming from insufficient or ineffective lone-worker risk management can create serious liability for an organization.

Negative effects of unregulated lone work

• A drop in productivity
• More employee absences
• Worse on-the-job morale
• Greater likelihood of occupational mistakes and mishaps
• Increased turnover
• A weaker corporate reputation
• Financial and legal penalties

By the book: Defining "lone work"

The definition of lone work varies by jurisdiction, and so does the terminology. Australia's work health and safety regulator, Safe Work Australia, uses the category of "remote and isolated work." This means work that is isolated from the assistance of other people, whether because of location, time, or the nature of the work itself.

According to Safe Work Australia, remote and isolated work doesn't necessarily mean a worker is alone, or even isolated in the geographic sense. A city building cleaner working without help qualifies as a remote or isolated worker just as much as a truck driver far from an urban center.

Safe Work Australia gives the following examples of remote or isolated workers:

• All-night convenience store and service station attendants
• Mobile sales representatives, including real estate agents
• Long-distance freight transport drivers
• Scientists, park rangers, and others carrying out fieldwork alone or in remote locations
• Health and community workers working in isolation with members of the public

How organizations can ensure proper care for their lone workers

Hiring employees to perform remote and isolated work isn't illegal. But managing the work health and safety risks to your lone worker population is part of your duty of care as a PCBU (Person Conducting a Business or Undertaking).

To recap: duty of care is the employer's obligation, within reasonable limits, to ensure the health and safety of all workers while they're on the job. In most jurisdictions, the general duty is to eliminate risks to worker health and safety altogether. Where that's not possible – often the case with remote and isolated work — those risks must instead be minimized to the extent reasonably practical.

PCBUs owe this duty of care to third-party contractors, who often carry out remote and isolated work, as well as to direct employees. It's an obligation that can't be transferred to any other party — including the lone workers themselves. The PCBU alone is responsible for managing the risks associated with lone work.

Risk assessment and control: Two steps to manage the work health and safety risk to lone workers

So how should you effectively manage the work health and safety risk to your lone workers? For starters, your lone-worker risk mitigation strategy should be part of (not separate from) your organization's larger work health and safety strategy. Here are the two crucial steps to take:

Step 1. Assess the lone-worker risk

Context matters. That's the fundamental precept of any work health and safety strategy, and it should be the cornerstone of your lone-worker risk mitigation protocols.

Remote and isolated work often carries more inherent risk than other forms of work, whether that's greater exposure to violence from customers, or poorer access to emergency services should an incident occur.

One objective of the risk assessment, then, is to fully consider the factors specific to the kind of lone work carried out at your organization. To do that, ask the following questions:

What kind of lone work is being done?

It's not enough to know that lone work is taking place. You need to know its precise nature. Cleaning an office at night carries far different risks than work with heavy machinery, at heights, with hazardous substances, or in a hazardous plant.

Knowing whether high-risk activity is involved isn't enough either. Risk is always dynamic. Driving might not seem like a high-risk activity at first glance, but factor in long hours and the potential for road violence and aggression, and the risk increases. The same goes for extreme environmental conditions.

Where is the lone work taking place?

Remote and isolated work sometimes takes place at a significant geographical distance from emergency response and rescue services.

When is the lone work being done?

Statistically, remote and isolated work at night increases the risk of exposure to violence.

How long will the lone work take?

The risk to a lone worker can grow as time on the job increases.

Who are your lone workers?

Remote and isolated work is often specialized, calling for a specific skill set. Both the business unit assigning the work and the team managing work-related risk should know the lone worker's level of experience and training. HR should also be looped in if a pre-existing medical condition could increase risk.

What types of communication do you have with your lone workers?

Finally, risk teams must determine what kind of communication the lone worker will have with base operations while on the job. Will a fixed-location team stay in regular contact with the lone worker? And is the remote or isolated work taking place somewhere available communications might be impaired?

Lone-worker risk mitigation: Key factors to consider

Security and safety

Lone workers are often at higher risk of attack from customers or strangers. Lone work also carries a higher risk of on-the-job accidents that organizations will find more logistically difficult to respond to.

Isolation

• Social: Many lone workers experience social isolation, which over time can dampen employee engagement, morale, and productivity. Where possible, organizations should create regular opportunities to bring lone workers into contact with the rest of the team.
• Organizational: Lone workers should receive the same information, training, and development opportunities as employees in a fixed setting, even though they're working remotely or in isolation.
• Technological: The same applies to access to digital tools. Lone workers should be able to access the same platforms as their office-based colleagues.

Step 2: Control the lone-worker risk

Once you've identified and assessed an acceptable level of lone-worker risk, it's time to implement controls, actual strategies, and tools, to mitigate or eliminate that risk. This isn't a theoretical exercise: PCBUs have a legal obligation to control the work health and safety risks to their lone workers.

Controlling measures vary by jurisdiction, but they usually include:

• Worker consultation and involvement in identifying risks and developing measures to control them
• Taking affirmative steps to remove risks where possible, or implementing control measures where they can't be removed
• Specialized instruction, training and supervision
• Periodic review of the risk assessment, and additional reviews after significant changes in working practice

These control measures are a floor, not a ceiling. To capture the full benefit of remote and isolated work without succumbing to its risks, PCBUs need to go further with their own best-practice controls. Effective controls reduce or eliminate at least one of the following risk components:

• Probability of occurring
• Severity
• Exposure of people and equipment

For remote and isolated work, best-practice controls start with suitable training for lone workers, i.e., training focused on concrete, practical strategies for staying safe in specific lone-work settings. Remote or isolated environments also need to be made as safe as possible for lone workers. This means business and risk teams must perform due diligence on the setting a worker is entering, and relay those findings before they arrive.

Senior leadership at a PCBU can also ease some of the organizational and social isolation that comes with lone work, i.e., isolation that can dampen engagement and lower productivity, by clearly communicating the employer's commitment to the lone worker's health and safety.

Business teams should also only recruit capable employees for remote and isolated work. Professionals already experienced in lone work bring valuable expertise to the risk mitigation consultation, development and engagement process — expertise that, in turn, improves the process for future lone workers.

Conclusion

Finally, PCBUs must provision their lone workers with the tools and services needed to work remotely and safely, including workplace layouts, a buddy system, personal protective equipment, first aid supplies, communications technologies, and more. On the PCBU's end, keeping movement records of lone workers, whether through satellite-powered tracking or lower-fi call-in systems, also helps mitigate the risk.

A dedicated mobile safety app can streamline much of this, enabling real-time location sharing, automated check-ins and instant alerts, so organizations always know a lone worker's status without relying on manual call-ins. Explore safety management software