You’ve got the certificate. Now comes the job.
By Ric Tohu, VerifyME — 31 October 2026
My recent exchanges with WorkSafe about its height-safety guidance have raised a fairly basic question: what are we actually trying to achieve with safety training?
The guidance allows “equivalent or higher” alternatives to recommended unit standards. Yet WorkSafe told me it does not assess particular alternatives for equivalence and did not hold the specific criteria I requested.
That’s a bit like being told to clear the bar, then discovering nobody can tell you where the bar is.
But there’s a bigger issue than comparing courses.
Get the certificate. Go to work.
I’ve been in this industry for over 40 years, and I’ve seen this approach far too often: the employer wants a certificate, the worker gets one, and everyone considers the job done.
Training sorted. Next item.
Except the job isn’t done. It never was.
When I taught and assessed height-safety unit standards at a polytechnic, we delivered three standards over roughly two days. Some material had little relevance to particular workers’ jobs. Meanwhile, their actual workplace could involve equipment, hazards and tasks the course couldn’t fully cover.
No initial course can teach every worker everything they will ever need to know. Expecting it to do so is setting everyone up for disappointment.
The forklift that grew on the way home
Take a worker who learns and passes an assessment on a small forklift at a training school.
Back at work, the forklift is two or three times larger. The loads are different. So are the attachments, visibility, operating area and tasks.
The certificate hasn’t changed. Quite a lot else has.
The foundation training is useful, but someone still needs to identify the gaps, provide instruction and supervised practice, and check the worker can do that particular job safely.
The same principle applies across powered mobile equipment, including elevating work platforms. Relevant equipment-type training, machine familiarisation and preparation for the actual work still matter.
Everyone behaves while Ric has the clipboard
On training day, I’m standing behind the operator, putting little ticks in boxes.
“Seatbelt on. Well done. Tick.”
“Checked behind before reversing. Excellent. Tick.”
At that moment, I’m probably watching the most conscientious forklift operator on the premises.
Of course they want the ticks. The ticks lead to the certificate, and the certificate gets them back to work.
A proper practical assessment matters. It gives us evidence of what someone can demonstrate under the assessment conditions. It cannot guarantee what they’ll do three weeks later, under pressure, with nobody watching.
I’ve got a clipboard, not a crystal ball.
Then they meet the workplace culture
What happens when the worker returns and the supervisor says, “Forget that. This is how we do it here”?
If managers ignore unsafe shortcuts, workers learn that those shortcuts are acceptable. If supervisors demonstrate them, the lesson is even clearer.
The instructor gets two days. The workplace gets every day after that.
If the safety culture is shit, another certificate won’t fix it. You can laminate it as many times as you like.
Employers need procedures that fit the work, supervisors who uphold them, and workers who can raise a problem without being treated as the problem.
Training needs reinforcement. Otherwise, the business is paying someone to teach one thing while its own management teaches another.
Where the law fits
The 2026 amendments to the Health and Safety at Work Act take effect on 1 April 2027, including a renewed emphasis on critical risks.
I welcome a focus on what can seriously hurt people. But job-specific training is already required: regulation 9 calls for suitable and adequate training and supervision, taking account of the work, its risks and its controls.
The amendments don’t suddenly make a certificate insufficient. A certificate alone was never the whole answer.
I see the reforms as an opportunity to close the gap in practice between formal training and what happens at work.
Keep the foundation. Finish the job.
There’s still a place for unit standards. I’d like to see their generic knowledge component connected more effectively with practical training and assessment relevant to the worker’s actual job.
That means putting practical learning where it does the most good, with enough supervised practice for the individual. Any course awarding unit-standard credits must still meet the standard’s requirements.
For initial training, I strongly favour a suitably qualified, experienced workplace coach who can demonstrate, question, observe and explain.
Online refreshers can then help maintain generic safety knowledge consistently. They’re useful tools, alongside practical observations and further instruction when needed.
Clicking the right answer on a screen is useful evidence of knowledge. It doesn’t tell me you can handle that load safely on Monday morning.
At VerifyME, our approach starts with the work people actually do. That’s also what I want clearer guidance to support: relevant training, defined limits and evidence of capability, regardless of provider.
If WorkSafe offers an “equivalent or higher” pathway, it needs to explain how businesses can use it.
And employers need to stop treating the certificate as the finish line.
It’s what happens after the certificate that counts.
Sources
WorkSafe, OIA 260892 response to Richard Tohu, 5 October 2026 — correspondence held by the author.
Regulation 9: information, supervision, training and instruction.
WorkSafe-hosted forklift training code, including its distinction between basic, specific job and familiarisation training. This is an older publication; its historical legislative references should be read accordingly.
Health and Safety at Work Amendment Act 2026, particularly sections 2, 4 and 38.
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