The human capacity to retain knowledge, a major risk?

Technical training for all parties involved in fall prevention is one of the most important elements in ensuring worker safety when working at heights.

It develops better reflexes, a common language, recognizes hazards and helps develop a fall protection program. However, any training effort can be compromised by its biggest obstacle: the ability of participants to retain knowledge.

The 7 essential elements of a fall protection system are:

• Training (user, competent person and qualified person)
• The structure
• The anchorage system
• The fall arrest connecting device
• The harnesses
• The rescue plan
• The inspection program

Without training, these 7 items are more or less improvised and can compromise worker safety.

What is the retention curve ?

The retention curve is a measure of the mastery over time of concepts covered in a training course. In fall protection, this curve can be negatively affected by several elements, such as the dissipation of information over time, pre-concieved notions or industry myths, and the lack of ongoing training. These barriers to learning retention are real hazards and can lead to serious injuries and even death. Fortunately, there are strategies to improve the retention of information and reinforce learning through technical training.

How do you maximize retention of information ?

At Barry, we believe it is imperative to stay in touch with the training content on an ongoing basis and to schedule periodic refresher courses after the training. A person who applies the concepts learned in a technical course on a daily basis, greatly increases their chances of understanding and applying the concepts learned. Therefore, we have developed a 4-step review method to increase the value of training taken by managers, health and safety advisors, team leaders, engineers and their technicians.

It consists of :

• Step 1: All training information and materials should be reviewed within 24 hours of the training session.  
• Step 2: Ensure that each person spends +/- 10 minutes per day reviewing key concepts for 30 days following the training.
• Step 3: Hold monthly meetings to review key safety procedures.
• Step 4: Review all concepts in detail on an annual basis.

What you do after the session is as important as the training itself, and greatly improves retention. See the diagram below.

Think about all the training hours you've taken over the years, and try to quantify the percentage of learning retained. Is that percentage around 80% retention or more like 50%? Perhaps it is less than 50%? If you are concerned about the results of this exercise and feel the need to update your fall protection knowledge, contact us today or register for one of our free webinars to better assess your training needs.