Ability Beyond > Resource Center > Closing Sheltered Workshops > Develop Risk Management Plan
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Develop Risk Management Plan

Ability Beyond created a Risk Management Health and Safety Assurance Plan to ensure that all areas of concern were thought of and addressed. As such, all stakeholders knew that the
agency was completing its due diligence to make the closing of its sheltered workshop successful.

Community Implementation Team

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Develop Buy-In Plan

A Buy-In plan is essential to the process of closing your sheltered workshop. This assures that all of your stakeholders are supportive and positive of the upcoming change by providing clear messaging and information about it.
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Risk Management Template

The Risk Management Plan details the categories of risk and then addresses through specific examples, what the potential impacts are, the strategy to handle the risk, implementation, resources needed, and the resolution. Following are the categories used by Ability Beyond in our Risk Management Plan:

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Community Acceptance

This is where you address any issues your organization believes the community may have about incidents that may occur. Some types of risks for Community Acceptance are:

  • Seizures
  • Injuries
  • Behavior
  • Incontinence
  • Damage to a vehicle or community site
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Accountability

This is where you address the new risk of accountability with staff that you never had to deal with when staff were in the workshop. Some examples of risk related to staff accountability are:

  • Tardiness to work
  • Saying they will be at X location in the community and going elsewhere
  • Ensuring staff can be reached at all times
  • Ensuring staff are doing what they should be doing while in the community
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Training

This is where you identify all risks that occur if you don’t give your employees the additional or enhanced training that they would need to work in the community rather than within the four walls of their workshops.

  • Ensuring all staff are trained on how to deal with public misconceptions
  • Injuries that occur due to lack of training
  • Behaviors that occur due to lack of training
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Transportation

This is where you identify any risks that could occur to your agency vehicles or to your staff by increasing your fleet and your fleet usage.

  • Agency van damage from an individual served
  • Agency van damages from vehicle accident
  • Insurance policies needing to be enhanced or increased
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Health and Safety

While the individuals you serve are in the parameters of the four walls of your workshop, any of their individual’s needs that could become a concern are addressed immediately. However, once you are in the community a lot of the services are not easily accessible and there are new risks that could occur.
Some of these are:

  • Speech, occupational therapy or physical therapy concerns
  • Equipment breakdown
  • PICA

Download risk management template

 

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Tip

It is important that the team go through the exercise and review each and every one of these areas to make sure they have a plan and to make sure their direct care staff are prepared for the transition from a home base to a community setting.

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