Employee Trust Promotes a Safer Working Environment on a Feedyard

During a TCFA safety training at a feedyard, an employee motioned Gordon Moore to lean in so he could tell him about a frightening situation he experienced. The employee described an incident where his front-end loader bucket was caught in a powerline. He tapped his head signaling to Moore that he remembered the training when he and his crew learned about electrical safety from him a few years back prior to the incident. And how that training had kept him safe until he could call for help.

“That training was on electrical safety and what employees should do if they ever found themselves caught between a live wire and an electrical conductor. We specifically talked about equipment and powerlines,” Moore said. “Thankfully, it stuck.”
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Those stories are not uncommon, said Moore, who has more than 30 years of feedyard and safety training experience. But accidents happen less when feedyard employees are better trained, he said.

Gordon Moore, of Moore Ag Safety, has collaborated with TCFA for the past 8 years serving as the association’s lead feedyard employee safety consultant and trainer for the TCFA Safety Services Program. In that role Moore has conducted tens of thousands of onsite safety training courses on feedyards across Texas, Oklahoma and New Mexico.

“TCFA’s safety program is unlike any of its kind,” he said. “We have onsite tools that we use to train feedyard employees on safe working conditions right on the feedyard where they work.” 

Electrical Safety

Front End Loader Training

Lockout Tagout

TCFA’s feedyard employee safety program started in the 1980s with routine feedyard safety inspections and a comprehensive safety review and policy book for TCFA feedyard members.

However, in 2004, TCFA feedyard members came to the association needing a more robust program. That discussion led to the official development of the TCFA Safety Services Program. The new program included routine safety inspections and reviews as well as an enhanced safety policy book that was more adaptable and accessible. This allowed individual feedyards to create their own book of site-specific policies. The program also included something unlike any other feedyard employee safety program, onsite training.

“This was a game changer for feedyard safety,” said Shane Guest, manager of Wheeler Land & Livestock. “Employee safety is our number one priority, but it is near impossible to shut down a feedyard so your staff can travel to a safety training. Cattle must be fed and taken care of daily.”
“To have a program that will come to the yard and do a full day of hands-on training for all employees is simply invaluable,” he continued.

Later, as the program grew, TCFA created a portable training center — what is known around the feedyards as the TCFA Safety Trailer. The trailer meets all OSHA requirements for safety, but more importantly, Guest said, it gives employees a better hands-on learning experience and fosters trust across all levels of feedyard employees.

“What we’ve learned at Wheeler is that putting the safety of our employees first requires more than a standard set of policies and training videos,” Guest said. “We teach them how to do their job safely, and the safety trailer gives them the chance to practice what they’ve learned.”

“Our employees and their families appreciate that, and it gives them the confidence to do their jobs both safely and efficiently,” he said.

It’s not just safety skills that employees take away from trainings. They learn to trust each other and communicate safety practices to their fellow employees.

“Not only does the trailer provide an enhanced learning experience for each employee,” Moore said. “Employees build rapport with management, their colleagues and even me. This allows for constant communication about safety, why it’s important, and how to continuously improve upon it.”

Blind Spot Training

Confined Space Training

Boiler Safety