Corporate Trainers near you

Ontario Regulation 297/13 under the Occupational Health and Safety Act requires employers to ensure that workers and supervisors complete a basic occupational health and safety awareness training program, and the requirements have been enforceable since July 1, 2014. They apply across sectors, from a construction project to a retail store, factory, hospital, long-term care home, mine or farm. Workers must complete the program as soon as practicable. Supervisors must complete the supervisor program within one week of beginning work as a supervisor, and because supervisors are also workers under the Act they may need both programs unless an exemption applies.

The content is prescribed, not left to taste. Ontario's guide lists what each program must cover: the duties and rights of workers, the duties of employers and supervisors, the roles of joint health and safety committees and health and safety representatives, the roles of the ministry and the Workplace Safety and Insurance Board, common workplace hazards and, for supervisors, how to recognise, assess and control hazards and evaluate those controls. The employer must keep records of the training and of anyone exempt from it. Self-employed persons are not required to participate. Before you buy a program, compare its outline against that content list, and ask the trainer to say in writing which requirement it satisfies.

If your organisation is federally regulated, a different regime applies. The Work Place Harassment and Violence Prevention Regulations came into force on January 1, 2021 under Part II of the Canada Labour Code. The employer and the applicable partner, meaning the policy committee, workplace committee or health and safety representative depending on the size of the organisation, must jointly develop a prevention policy, jointly carry out a workplace assessment that identifies risk factors and implements preventive measures, and jointly develop or identify the training.

The timing is specified. Employees must be trained within three months after their employment begins and at least once every three years after that; the designated recipient must be trained before assuming those duties and at least once every three years; and the employer must be trained on the same three-year cycle. Employers report occurrences annually to the Labour Program by March 1 for the preceding calendar year, even where there were none, and records are kept for ten years. Provincially regulated employers are covered by their own province's rules instead, so establishing which jurisdiction you are in is the first question, not a detail.

Off-the-shelf and e-learning courses are consistent, easy to schedule across locations and simple to track, which makes them a sensible default for required awareness training where the content is prescribed anyway. They are weak where the subject is your own process, your own customers or your own equipment, because generic examples give people nothing to transfer.

Custom programs cost more in preparation time and depend heavily on the individual trainer, but they are the only realistic way to change how a specific team does a specific job. Building in-house capability sits between the two: an external specialist develops the program and trains your people to deliver it, which pays off when you hire steadily and would otherwise buy the same workshop every quarter. Many organisations end up with all three, and the mistake is using the cheapest format for the training that matters most.

Required training is not a one-time project. New hires need it on the timeline the rule sets, which is as soon as practicable for Ontario worker awareness training and within three months for employees under the federal harassment and violence regulations. Refresh cycles matter too: the federal regulations require training at least once every three years, and require the policy and the workplace assessment to be reviewed on the same three-year rhythm.

Build a simple register that lists who has been trained, on what, when, and when it is next due, and keep it with the underlying records for as long as the applicable rule requires, which for federal harassment and violence records is ten years. Review the program whenever the law changes, the work changes or an incident suggests the training missed something. On LokalMatch you describe the training your organisation needs, including the jurisdiction you operate under, and trainers who work in that area contact you directly; LokalMatch does not certify trainers or confirm that a program satisfies a legal requirement, so verify that against the regulation yourself.