Employees want to have music but is it a distraction

Hello, 

So a lot of the employees are always asking if they can have music. I say no not only for food safety reasons but also people safety reasons. It is a food processing facility and music is a distraction IMO but also you are in your workplace. Does anyone know if there are any regulations regarding this so I can take something concrete to them and the owners (owners are way too lenient sometimes  :thumbdown:) One of them says their priority is keeping the employees happy above everything else LOL which causes the employees to think they can do whatever they want sometimes. Which is great you know to want to keep employees happy, but not on top of food safety or other more important things.

Anyway, thanks for any help. 

Kat

Assuming you're after SQF standards as well as law since you're posing this in a SQF subsection:

11.3.3 Clothing and Personal Effects

11.3.3.8 Jewelry and other loose objects shall not be worn or taken into a food handling or processing operation or into any area where food is exposed. Wearing plain bands with no stones, prescribed medical alert bracelets, or jewelry accepted for religious or cultural reasons can be permitted, provided these items are properly covered and do not pose a food safety risk.

11.3.4.2 All visitors, including management staff, shall be required to remove jewelry and other loose objects in accordance with the facilities Good Manufacturing Practices and 11.3.3.8. All visitors shall wear suitable clothing and footwear when entering any food processing and handling area.

11.3.5.4 Provision shall be made for staff to store their street clothing and personal items separate from clean uniforms, food contact zones, food, and packaging storage areas.

From US Federal law:

(7) Storing clothing or other personal belongings in areas other than where food is exposed or where equipment or utensils are washed.

These selections don't even begin to address the OSHA safety concerns about employees in a manufacturing environment.  Not being able to hear equipment approaching or other employees in distress is a problem.  Not to mention liability of an employee who listens to music at ear damaging decibels coming back to sue your company for hearing loss ("I had to turn my earbuds all the way up to hear music because your plant has loud noise!").

If employee happiness is truly such a big concern that music must be played, the only good idea I can present is music over a PA system at an appropriate level.  Any speakers you add must be addressed in your sanitation program, glass and bp program, and sanitary installation guidelines.  Generally speaking, even a boombox is a personal item that cannot be allowed (because how often do your employees wash their boomboxes, then they want to touch it during the shift when they should be on the line working with sanitary hands, etc), so if you have to cave and provide some version of radio, that has to be a company product accounted for in all of your programs.

In short, tell 'em music is against code and against Federal law, and help find other ways to improve morale.  The beatings shall continue until morale improves!  :spoton: 

Don't "sell" the food safety and distraction thing to your employees - as in these are the reasons why you can't have music.

Instead have your employees sell you on having the music and have them tell you why it will not lead to issues.

Our employees did this, we agreed and told them we'd track any anomalies over and above prior times without music and re-convene on it after 30 days - we did, there were no issues and music continues.

No radios though - it is piped in on something similar to a Muzak system.

We also installed in the offices - nothing like listening to KC and the Sunshine band first thing in the morning!

Hello, 

 

So a lot of the employees are always asking if they can have music. I say no not only for food safety reasons but also people safety reasons. It is a food processing facility and music is a distraction IMO but also you are in your workplace. Does anyone know if there are any regulations regarding this so I can take something concrete to them and the owners (owners are way too lenient sometimes  :thumbdown:) One of them says their priority is keeping the employees happy above everything else LOL which causes the employees to think they can do whatever they want sometimes. Which is great you know to want to keep employees happy, but not on top of food safety or other more important things.

Anyway, thanks for any help. 

 

Kat

If you look through the forum, you should be able to find a similar topic. USDA/FDA plant. We allow music with rules applied. Also USDA inspectors have never had a problem with it. 

Don't "sell" the food safety and distraction thing to your employees - as in these are the reasons why you can't have music.

 

Instead have your employees sell you on having the music and have them tell you why it will not lead to issues.

Never considered it from this angle before...I like it. 

Similar to kfromNE, the employees in the meat cutting room had a boombox. USDA didn't care and we had them follow rules of who is allowed to touch it, clean hands after, volume level, etc. It wasn't allowed in the main production area since it was too loud there anyway or where forklifts drive through, so not a huge safety risk. For the sake of SQF audits, we removed it from the room those days just to not worry about fighting the auditor on it.

I think if they show they can be responsible with it (no increase in food safety or personnel safety incidents/near misses), you should consider it. You certainly don't have to cater to every whim of production employees, but they have a tough, monotonous job so if this is the worst they are asking for  ¯\_(ツ)_/¯. A happy employee will generally be a better behaved employee. 

Don't "sell" the food safety and distraction thing to your employees - as in these are the reasons why you can't have music.

 

Instead have your employees sell you on having the music and have them tell you why it will not lead to issues.

 

This is great! I will defiantly use this for any scenarios the staff bring up. I would count this towards Food Safety Culture.

We allow a mounted stationary handsfree radio in our facility. I added it to my plastic/glass inventory for monthly inspection. It is on the sanitation list as well. Never had a issue with WorkSafe or SQF auditors.

Maybe music isn't so bad, and employee moral defiantly counts for something. Use this as a learning tool under Food Safety Culture.