Long-term training effects on the implementation of a legislated safety system

This is a longitudinal study exploring the long-term impact of various training strategies on conformity to the new Workplace Hazardous Materials information System (WHMIS) introduced in Canada in the late eighties. Fifty six companies in the transportation equipment and machinery manufacturing sectors in Quebec participated in this study. Companies were divided into two main groups based on strategies chosen for employee training: (1) external safety association experts used for training of all employees, or (2) safety experts used to train selected employees, who would then train the remaining employees and serve as internal experts. A further fourteen companies who had not used the sectorial association for training at the lime of the sample selection were used;ls a comparison group. About six months after the initial implementation of WHMIS, a random sample of employees representing 14 job titles was selected to answer a short questionnaire on WHMIS and general workplace health and safety. Three years later, the companies were revisited and an equivalent questionnaire was applied to selected workers. Short term results showed WHMIS knowledge to be best in companies with all employees trained by an external expert. However, the long-term results showed that WHMIS knowledge in companies with internal trainers improved while WHMIS knowledge in companies with external experts declined.