Lesson 2.5
“But We Have a Cleaner”
Estimated time: 6 minutes
Hiring a cleaner does not mean every other employee can ignore the environment.
There is a difference between:
being responsible for formal cleaning duties
and
being responsible for your own behavior in a shared workplace.
Scenario
An employee walks past an empty bottle lying directly in the customer walkway.
There is a rubbish bin nearby.
The employee says:
“I’m not the cleaner.”
Is that reasonable?
Usually, no.
If the employee can safely pick it up and dispose of it, ignoring it simply because cleaning is not the employee’s job is poor workplace behavior.
But Know Your Limits
Now imagine the employee notices:
- an unknown chemical spill
- broken electrical equipment
- exposed wiring
- a dangerous sharp object
- another potentially hazardous material
The correct response may not be to clean or repair it personally.
Instead:
The Principle
Take reasonable ownership. Do not perform work you are not trained or authorized to perform.
Poor
“Not my department.”
Better
“I can’t safely resolve this myself, but I’ll report it to the person responsible.”
That is still ownership.
International Labour Organization (ILO) guidance for small enterprises similarly emphasizes good housekeeping, identifying unsafe conditions, carrying out inspections and correcting problems rather than simply allowing hazards to remain.
Remember
Responsible employees do not walk past every problem simply because somebody else has a job title connected to it.