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Focus on Key Points

19 一月, 2015 - 17:10

As a different example, let’s imagine that you are the office manager for a pet boarding facility that cares for dogs and cats while their owners are away. The general manager has asked you to draft a memo to remind employees about safety practices. Your general purpose is twofold: to inform employees about safety concerns and to motivate them to engage in safe work practices. Your specific purpose is also twofold: to prevent employees from being injured or infected with diseases on the job, and to reduce the risk of the animal patients being injured or becoming sick while in your care.

You are an office manager, not a veterinary or medical professional, and clearly there are volumes written about animal injuries and illnesses, not to mention entire schools devoted to teaching medicine to doctors who care for human patients. In a short memo you cannot hope to cover all possible examples of injury or illness. Instead, focus on the following behaviors and situations you observe:

  • Do employees wash their hands thoroughly before and after contact with each animal?
  • Are hand-washing facilities kept clean and supplied with soap and paper towels?
  • When cleaning the animals’ cages, do employees wear appropriate protection such as gloves?
  • What is the procedure for disposing of animal waste, and do all employees know and follow the procedure?
  • When an animal is being transferred from one cage to another, are there enough staff members present to provide backup assistance in case the animal becomes unruly?
  • What should an employee do if he or she is bitten or scratched?
  • What if an animal exhibits signs of being ill?
  • Have there been any recent incidents that raised concerns about safety?

Once you have posed and answered questions like these, it should be easier to narrow down the information so that the result is a reasonably brief, easy to read memo that will get employees’ attention and persuade them to adopt safe work practices.