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How Improving Literacy Skills Can Improve Food Safety HygieneAll aspects of the food preparation business require accuracy and the highest standards of hygiene. Food manufacturers function in an environment of stringent controls and compliance. Documentation requirements with regard to overseas markets are increasingly complex and companies can’t afford to make errors. If the staff can’t understand instructions or calculate quantities accurately, it gets difficult to maintain high hygiene standards. If an employee can read the newspaper, it doesn’t mean that he can read a hazard notice also. Many employees on being asked to read and record numerical data relating to temperature or size or dates, don’t understand the measurement scales they are using. They need to clearly communicate with colleagues, but they struggle to make themselves understood. Around 260,000 (12%) of employed New Zealanders have considerable difficulties with workplace documents. Another 610,000 (28%) have problems with complex or unfamiliar information, especially when faced with changing demands. Migrants who have strong technical skills and qualifications and those who have English as a second language are included in these figures. It is tough to have a ‘flexible’ or innovative workplace and implement transformation, when the literacy and communication skill of your employees are inadequate. Workbase is a not for profit organisation which has, since 1991, specialised in developing workforce solutions for adults with low literacy, language, and numeracy skills. (More information can be found on our website: www.workbase.org.nz) We have worked with many businesses in the food industry – with companies that realise to improve productivity or health and safety, they have to improve the literacy skills of their workforce. A complex mix of literacy and numeracy skills is needed today for Effective performance. They are obligatory for implementing production and job schedules; ensuring health and safety requirements are met; estimating quantity and weight, and measuring accurately; solving problems and contributing in team meetings. Workbase offers government supported training for companies who believe they may have literacy issues. Workbase works with those companies to identify the gap between the literacy demands of the job and the literacy skills of the employees in that job. Workbase then develops training programmes to improve the literacy, language and numeracy skills of the employees using authentic workplace examples. Because the training is based on the tasks and procedures the employees use daily, the improved skills benefit both the company and employee. Katherine Percy, CEO of Workbase, emphasises why literacy is important. “You can’t expect people to be able to understand how to operate systems or software if they can’t read the technical documentation, if they don’t understand the instructions they are given, or if they can’t make themselves understood with their colleagues. The skills needed in workplaces are changing, and employees more and more need to be able to learn new skills and adapt to new work environments. Literacy and numeracy are part of the basic tool set all employees need to ensure they can meet their work demands.” For more information on how Workbase can help, contact Nick Miles on (09) 361 3800 or nmiles@workbase.org.nz “We see the literacy programme bringing many positive outcomes for the company and for employees. Most importantly, it has helped to usher in a new learning culture at Sanford which is indispensable for our success in a highly competitive and carefully-regulated industry.” Sanford Case Study (www.workbase.org.nz). About The Author: Workbase is New Zealand's most experienced service provider of adult literacy, numeracy and communication support. Find out more at www.workbase.org.nz