Joe Reilly on Drug Testing in America
Curious about the drug screening industry? Looking to get your start in a rewarding career? Trying to navigate the changing landscape of federal and state laws and how they influence your companies drug testing policy? If you have leaned in for any of these questions then you have found the podcast you have been looking for. Join Joe Reilly on this informative and educational adventure in drug screening in America.
Joe Reilly on Drug Testing in America
Reasonable Suspicion Testing Keeps Your Workplace Safe
Safety in the workplace hinges on supervisors' ability to recognize potential impairment – but how exactly should they make these critical determinations? Joe Reilly and Tom Fulmer, incoming president of the Substance Abuse Program Administrators Association, tackle this question head-on with practical insights for employers navigating the complexities of reasonable suspicion testing.
The conversation reveals a crucial distinction many employers miss: the difference between immediate and non-immediate reasonable suspicion. While immediate situations require swift action based on specific, observable behaviors that suggest current impairment, non-immediate scenarios involve patterns of concerning behavior over time. Each requires a different approach, documentation method, and confrontation technique.
"Don't try and diagnose the problem. You're not a clinician," Reilly emphasizes, highlighting that reasonable suspicion isn't about catching employees or making accusations – it's fundamentally about workplace safety. The experts share valuable guidance on proper documentation (using objective criteria rather than subjective judgments), confrontation methods that keep discussions on track, and the importance of confidentiality throughout the process.
Perhaps most valuable is their practical advice for supervisors, including never allowing potentially impaired employees to drive, keeping emotions in check during confrontations, and understanding that many behaviors that mimic impairment could have alternative explanations like medical conditions or personal crises. The discussion underscores why supervisor training isn't just a compliance checkbox but an essential safety tool that can prevent accidents, reduce liability, and potentially save lives.
Whether you're developing a drug-free workplace program, training supervisors, or looking to strengthen your reasonable suspicion protocols, this episode delivers actionable insights that balance workplace safety with employee dignity. Subscribe to our channel and ring the bell to receive notifications when we upload new content about workplace drug testing and safety policies.
Joe Reilly on Drug Testing in America podcast, today's episode how do employers determine reasonable suspicion of impairment leading to a drug test? And your host today is Joe Reilly, with your sponsor, joe Reilly and Associates, and now your host, joe Reilly.
Speaker 2:Thank you, jesse, good to be back with you on our podcast on drug testing in America and I look forward to today's episode. I have a guest, tom Fulmer. Welcome Tom. And we are going to talk about, as Jesse mentioned, how do employers determine reasonable suspicion of impairment of a drug test, and this is a topic that's near and dear to my heart and Tom's heart. We both do a lot of training with employers all over the United States with reasonable suspicion, signs and symptoms that someone might be impaired at work, and that's a big safety issue, and having this training can help prevent accidents, workers' comp claims and bad things that could happen because somebody might be impaired at work. Jesse, a little bit about our sponsor before we move on.
Speaker 1:So Joe Riley and Associates is our current sponsor for today's episode. We want to remind you that they offer consulting for the drug testing industry. They offer expert witness services, marketing and sales consultation, as well as policy writing, and they also have a new startup comprehensive training and consultation program as well and, of course, their drug-free workplace trainings.
Speaker 2:So thank you, joe, riley and Associates, thank you, jesse. And in that last bullet point there, drug-free workplace trainings. Part of that is supervisor training for recognizing signs and symptoms that an employee could potentially be prepared it's not impaired at work, it's not definite, but they could be and that requires that the supervisor take some action. And that's kind of what we're going to talk about in this episode today. So, tom, you are the Vice President of Business Development at National Drug Screening, but you got a big year ahead of you coming in as the incoming president of the Substance Abuse Program Administrators Association. So before we get into questions and all that, sapa, what's SAPA all about?
Speaker 3:Yeah, sapa is a great industry association. It's the oldest current drug and alcohol testing industry association and it's all about education and about knowledge and about industry connections and about knowing what's going on out there and that's been our focus since the foundation of that. I've had the privilege of serving as the membership chair for the past several years, actually, and looking forward to taking over, as I'm the president-elect currently. I'll be taking over as the president this year at the annual conference out in Phoenix, arizona, coming up in October, so very much looking forward to that. But education is really the key thing about it.
Speaker 3:That's why I love being on podcasts like this, where it is actually educating people and not just for information but things they can take action on. That's actually going to make a difference in society and companies and for individuals, and you know I know you have a passion for this as well as I do for different. You know people that we've known in the past and in situations that have come up. Reasonable suspicion and recognizing signs and symptoms is something that all companies should be able to do and it has a variety of benefits. I know we're going to get into a lot of those today.
Speaker 2:Absolutely yeah, and I've been a member of SAPA oh probably 20 years now and there's a lot of members in SAPA that are professionals that conduct reasonable suspicion training all over the US and they do a great job. And SAPA is a good organization to be a part of to be able to network with other drug testing industry professionals. So I congratulate you on being the president-elect and having your term of office starting in October. You're going to have your hands filled because you don't get any slack working for National Drug Screening.
Speaker 3:Yeah, exactly right, it's my new, second job, but it's a job of passion and something I really enjoy doing and I really appreciate the opportunity you've given me, as from National Drug Screening, to be a part of this organization and the encouragement to go out and do that to be able to make a difference in people's lives. It's been tremendous.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and I think we'll have some fun too. But let's get into our topic for today, which is reasonable suspicion. And, tom, I had asked you to think about and write down some questions that we get from our clients and any questions that you may have or prospects have about reasonable suspicion and what it's all about.
Speaker 3:Yeah, I think the first thing that comes to mind. I think a lot of people don't understand that. So, in the context of workplace drug testing, what does reasonable suspicion really mean? I mean, you know, how does that apply in the workplace environment?
Speaker 2:Yeah, and putting it that way is important in the context of workplace drug testing. When we talk about reasonable suspicion, we're basically talking about having a person that's working and there is suspicion of some type of impairment, potentially from drugs or alcohol. But there's a lot more to it and we'll explain in a few minutes as we get into some more of these questions. But again, I'm a supervisor, I'm working and I'm supervising somebody and they look like there's something wrong.
Speaker 3:Yeah, and, and so you know, reasonable suspicion is recognizing those signs and symptoms and obviously impairment is a big issue and can cause, you know, lots of, lots of issues. Can you kind of give me a distinction, you know, because there are different test reasons out there and I think sometimes employers get those confused, so kind of the difference between reasonable suspicion and such as random or pre-employment testing and kind of how those, how those differ, so we can better understand what reasonable suspicion, how it works into the workplace.
Speaker 2:Yeah, absolutely, and starting with pre-employment. If there's reasonable suspicion, we might as well stop the interview.
Speaker 2:We don't need to do a reasonable suspicion drug test. But what happens a lot of times is I get a phone call You've probably gotten some of these same phone calls that says, hey Joe, we want to do a reasonable suspicion test on Johnny this afternoon. He's acting kind of funny. But they don't say reasonable suspicion. They say, hey Joe, we want to do a random test on Johnny this afternoon. He's acting kind of funny. Well, there's nothing random about that. That is, if appropriate, a reasonable suspicion drug and or alcohol test and it should be based on a trained supervisor observing behaviors or triggers, including possibly slurred speech, staggering lack of coordination, bloodshot or glassy eyes, erratic behavior or other signs and symptoms that we'll get into more. But basically we're seeing something that lends us to believe that this person may be impaired at work and this is a huge safety issue.
Speaker 3:Yeah, and there's legal implications too of calling it one thing when it's something else. So I'm glad you pointed that out. You know, if you call it a random test and it's really reasonable suspicion, you could run into some challenges down the road. And as far as making that reasonable suspicion determination, you mentioned, you know the supervisor. So do they need to have some type of specific training or can they just look at it and go, hey, I think you're stoned or I think you're drunk, and just get away with it that way?
Speaker 2:Yeah, great, great question, tom, and an important question. And it is supervisors at the workplace that should be the ones that make these reasonable suspicion determinations. But extremely important is that these supervisors have been trained in advance to learn about signs and symptoms, to learn about the drugs that are out there, to be trained and authorized to make reasonable suspicion determinations Now in the DOT drug and alcohol testing programs that are required of transportation regulated industries. Dot supervisor training signs and symptoms is actually required for non-regulated businesses.
Speaker 3:Required for non-regulated businesses. It is a best practice that really needs to occur, because you really can't determine that someone might be impaired unless you've been trained to do so and it's also going to prevent exposure to liability.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and you mentioned that it's required for DOT. I also know that you can get a discount on workers' comp insurance. Well, those comprehensive drug-free workplace programs, if you elect to participate, require supervisor training. There's also companies that get contracts from other companies and they may have a contractual obligation to implement a drug-free workplace program that includes supervisor training. So there may be situations where it is required, but again, as I mentioned, it's definitely a best practice and it can limit exposure to liability.
Speaker 3:Yeah, and I know, as part of that training you know, recognizing the signs and symptoms, the specific articulable observations you know appearance, behavior, speech, body odor, those have to be really trained. People aren't going to know, just to recognize that. So can you tell us about some of the training programs that are available to them or how they can go about getting or accessing supervisor, reasonable suspicion training that would meet all those different criteria that are out there?
Speaker 2:Yes, supervisor, reasonable suspicion training has been around a long time there, yes, supervisor, reasonable suspicion training has been around a long time. And there's federal organizations like the Federal Transit Administration which for years they put on conferences and put on actually train-the-trainer programs Great conference.
Speaker 3:By the way, I remember that's one of the first ones you sent me to. Yeah, absolutely.
Speaker 2:So the supervisor training is typically a minimum of two hours. It could be a live training. You know we can go train a group of people. I've done that many times, you have too. It could be a webinar training where we can offer it out to the general public, computer-based. It could be just a self-paced, computer-based remote training course and it covers the signs and symptoms of someone to be impaired. But even prior to that it covers, you know, what are the state laws in your area, what are the DOT regulations, if they apply. But what are the harmful effects of drugs or alcohol in the workplace and how do some of these drugs work and what do they look like?
Speaker 2:Because sometimes you're going to see these drugs in the workplace and maybe you never saw it before, so we show pictures of them and explain a little bit more in depth about the drug itself and the harmful effects of the drug.
Speaker 3:Excellent and I know you know you've been doing this, like I said, for a long time and now I have as well. One of the things I remember when, when you did several years ago was you actually wrote a book on supervisor reasonable suspicion training, making these determinations. I got the name here Reasonable suspicion testing for drugs and alcohol, a guide for workplace supervisors. Can you tell me a little bit about the about the book, what led you to write that and and kind of what's what's contained in that?
Speaker 2:about the book, what led you to write that and uh, and kind of, what's, what's contained in that? Yeah, so I got the idea that, well, you know, supervisors take a training and then you know it's always recommended that maybe they have some, uh, recurrent training. But it'd be nice to have a guide. You know it's, it's just a small book book, you know, it's not 300 pages or anything, and so supervisors can go back and look up stuff. Okay, they can read it before the training, they can read it after the training. It's going to enhance the training that they have. It's got a pretty comprehensive table of contents and it kind of mirrors the training that we do.
Speaker 2:You know, talking about DOT, non-DOT, we're talking about what is a drug-free workplace and in a company policy, talking about drug testing and how it works, when to test, when not to test. Of course we got to talk about marijuana, post-accident testing, but then it kind of gets into the harmful effects of drugs, Part of what the supervisors really need to know for making these determinations. Illicit drug information, indicate indicators of drug use. What do you see? You know, harmful effects of alcohol, indicators of alcohol use. We have different effects of drugs and alcohol in the workplace. Some of them are the same, some of them are different.
Speaker 2:And what's reasonable suspicion? And is it what we call immediate reasonable suspicion or non-immediate, and how do we confront an employee in either case? And it talks about next steps and confrontation techniques and things like that. So it's a great little guide. It's inexpensive and we can make it available to folks. We give it out sometimes at conferences as prizes or people that are kind of interested in what we're doing with reasonable suspicion training. So I'm really proud of it. It's been around for a while and we've moved quite a bit of them.
Speaker 3:Yeah, I know it's been a popular prize on our prize wheel when we do conferences and exhibits. People really seem to like those and they come to try to figure out how they can bargain away the pen that they won for the reasonable suspicion guides. So it's been a very popular thing. And I know one of the things that you focus on in the book too is the two different types, and you just mentioned it briefly. But there's a couple of different types of reasonable suspicion. So there's one where you know you think there's an issue right now. We've got to stop what's happening, and then there's one where maybe immediate action is not required. Can you kind of break those two down and tell us a little bit about each one of those and what the aspects of them?
Speaker 2:Yeah, and a lot of people don't understand this and there is definitely confusion with it. With regard to DOT required reasonable suspicion testing, that must be the immediate action type and that must be based on specific, contemporaneous, articulable observations concerning the appearance, behavior, speech or body odors of the employee. There is an immediate safety issue, an immediate risk issue and, again, specific and contemporaneous. This is not third-party information. This is not he said. She said this is a supervisor observing things that would indicate that this person is possibly impaired. It doesn't prove they're impaired, it doesn't necessarily mean they're definitely impaired, but it does mean we need to get them into a reasonable suspicion test. Whether we call out a mobile collector or we bring them to a facility, we certainly would never say okay, drive down to Joe's Drug Testing Clinic and get your reasonable suspicion drug test.
Speaker 3:Yeah, absolutely. That would be a little liability to say I think you're stoned or drunk and get on the road, go for it. That would probably not be a good idea.
Speaker 2:Now the other type is what I call immediate action, not required, and this would not be DOT. Okay, this would always be non-DOT. And this is really based on a pattern of behavior performance, maybe attendance issues, tardiness issues, not getting along with employees, not avoiding me, your supervisor. You do that all the time, Tom. Where is Tom? I don't know.
Speaker 2:Yeah so it's kind of a pattern over time, it's not an immediate situation, so it does give a supervisor an opportunity to kind of take some notes and get ready and maybe talk to the person and say, okay, here are some things that I'm seeing and I need to see some corrections here. And if I don't see some corrections, you know we're going to have to have another meeting and talk about it some more. And when we talk about it some more, if we haven't seen these corrections improvement, better behavior, not having, you know, outbursts or attendance problems we are going to have to do a reasonable suspicion drug and alcohol test, which would be non-immediate, but we still do it. If we're not seeing. You know that things get cleared up after an initial meeting.
Speaker 3:Yeah, and I think one thing you point out that made a really big distinction for me years ago was that you know we're using the reasonable suspicion to test to not to get the employee in trouble or whatever, but to eliminate drugs and alcohol as the cause of the concern. So you can address something else if it is the concern to then be able to take action on that. And speaking of kind of taking action on that, I imagine that each one of these you know we need to have a different confrontation method for the employee. So if it's more of there's an impairment issue right now, there's probably a different approach to that employee than if it's an ongoing thing. You kind of alluded to that in talking about the um, the ongoing meetings and all that. Can you give us a little bit more on the distinction between those two and how you would confront the employee based on each type of those?
Speaker 2:Absolutely. So we break down the um, the confrontation format or technique, based on the immediate situation and the non-immediate situation. And the immediate situation as we outline in our training and in the book on reasonable suspicion, it's five steps and it's five quick steps, okay. So we're observing what we're observing, we're smelling what we're smelling, we're seeing what we're seeing and we tell the employee that we'd like to have a word with them and we try and step into kind of an isolated area where it's going to be confidential. You know, accompany me to my office or let's step over here to the side. We tell them that we're concerned about safety and that we see something going on here and we might mention you know, I'm smelling marijuana, your eyes are bloodshot. We are going to go for a reasonable suspicion drug and alcohol test and we're not going to back down from that. Okay. So we're going to go for the test, we're going to get the person there safely, we're going to get the person home safely and we are going to document what we saw, what we observed, so that we have complete documentation. We're going to document that we did the test and that's going to be our five-step confrontation format, as I mentioned previously, with a non-immediate reasonable suspicion.
Speaker 2:We've got some time to make some notes. We've got some time to prepare for a meeting, make some notes and an agenda. We have the meeting we talk about. These are our concerns. We'd like to see improvement in these areas. Whatever we're talking about, we're going to meet again in 10 days or set a date for another meeting. We're going to say great job, we see that there's been a hundred percent improvement here. We're not seeing these issues anymore, or we're continuing to see these issues and now we are going to take you down for a reasonable suspicion drug test, we're going to have a lot more documentation than we had in the other one.
Speaker 2:Because we've accumulated documentation, we're going to document the testing and then, when we get the test result back, we're going to take the appropriate steps. So when you take the training or read the book, you're going to see one through five outline for the immediate testing, one through nine outline for the non-immediate testing.
Speaker 3:Yeah, and as you mentioned how important the documentation is, the way we always kind of look at it and I know you do expert witness testimony as well, and this has come into play. I believe it in situations you've done that, but it's kind of like the HR adage if it's not documented, it didn't happen, or didn't happen the way that you said it happened, and it's always going to be negative to you. So documentation, I know, is absolutely critical in that. So you did touch on the documentation. Do you have a specific way that you would document, say, the immediate impairment differently than maybe the ongoing performance meetings? Obviously, if it's multiple meetings, it's going to have different documentation. Can you speak to that a bit?
Speaker 2:Yeah, so the non-immediate, you know it's going to be kind of text. This is what I'm observing, this is what I'm seeing, these are my concerns. But for the DOT reasonable suspicion and for the immediate reasonable suspicion, even in DOT, in our training and in our book on reasonable suspicion, we provide what's called a reasonable suspicion testing checklist. So we make it real easy for a supervisor. They're looking for behavioral items and there's a list and all they got to do is check off what they see. Okay, irritable, moody, okay, tremors, shakes, hyperactive, fidgety, unsteady gait, stumbling, agitated. And then we go to appearance so we may see flushed complexion, bloodshot eyes, watery eyes, dilated pupils. What do we see? And then there's speech. What do we hear? Slurred speech. They're incoherent, exaggerated communications, exaggerated, loud and boisterous, rapid and pressured talk. And then also body odors. Do we smell alcohol? Do we smell marijuana? I never smelled marijuana. Well, most of us have.
Speaker 2:I know you have Tom right.
Speaker 3:Yeah, I was in a test lab. I'm sure. I'm not sure it was a controlled environment like that. Yeah, I was just at an.
Speaker 2:ACDC concert in Raymond James Stadium over in Tampa and I smelt it everywhere.
Speaker 3:Oh, yeah, yeah, no doubt but anyway.
Speaker 2:So you've got to document what you see, what you smell, what you hear, and that's going to give you the ammunition to back up what you did. And don't be alarmed if they come back negative. You still did your job as a supervisor.
Speaker 3:Yeah, absolutely, and I think many of those things that you mentioned are important to point out their objective criteria, not subjective, and so using a checklist or something like that, so you can be as objective as possible as well as consistent. I imagine that's important between employees and how you go about documenting that. So let me ask you this as far as for supervisors who are making this determination, do you have any recommendations of things that they should follow or they should look to as kind of guidance when making reasonable suspicion determinations? I mean, obviously follow the checklist, but any other specific things that they may deal with in making that determination.
Speaker 2:Absolutely Tom. Number one take the training. So you got to take the supervisor training, but also some tips and tricks and some things to be aware of. You got to know your company's drug-free workplace policy. So not only take the training, but read that policy over. You got to know what your company's policy is because you might get questions when you confront an employee and you're having that conversation with them.
Speaker 2:Keep the discussion on track. They're going to try and get you off track. They're going to bring up other stuff. What about Susie? She's doing this and what about this and what about that?
Speaker 2:Especially for the immediate confrontation, you got to get that drug test done as soon as possible and that alcohol test done as soon as possible. So keep the discussion on track. Know when to test. You test immediately when it's an immediate situation. Keep everything confidential. You don't need to discuss with anybody right now about what's going on. Okay, you might want to alert HR or your safety manager, but it's a need-to-know basis. Don't discuss it with any other line employees and everybody knows that Billy had to go for a reasonable suspicion test and then they're teasing him and all kinds of bad things can happen. And always emphasize and keep going back to it and repeat it if you have to, that your concern is with work, performance, safety, demeanor, nothing else, and primarily safety. You're making sure that we're not going to have an accident and that Bobby's not going to get hurt or hurt other people. We talked about documentation, critically important. You mentioned, tom, that if you don't write it down, it didn't happen and it didn't okay. And if things get out of hand, if there's some big confrontation, write down what happened and if there's any witnesses around that overheard what was going on, get a statement from them also. So those are some specific actions to take. Some tips that we might provide are to be confident, and the training will help you to be confident.
Speaker 2:Don't be an enabler, okay. Don't let them off the hook or look the other way and don't try and diagnose the problem. You're not a clinician. You're not their drug counselor, their substance abuse counselor, their addictions counselor. Don't diagnose the problem because you don't even know that there is a problem. Yet you might find out that maybe there's something going on in this person's life that's caused symptoms that you're observing, or caused absenteeism or lower performance or being absent more often. So you may find that out in the non-immediate situation in the meetings that you're having. Or maybe you recommend they talk to an employee assistance program and things clear up, because they got, you know, assistance for a personal problem that they may be having, which could be anything. It could be a death in their family, it could be an illness, it could be a marital problem, a financial problem, kids get sick. Whatever it might be, there can be problems and so don't try and diagnose the problem.
Speaker 2:Don't allow an employee to drive when you suspect them to be impaired, because if they go down the road and they crash into the daycare center and you suspected them already to be impaired, you're going to be named in the lawsuit and they're going to call Morgan Morgan and you're probably going to pay out. So don't allow them to drive. And finally, don't worry about jeopardizing a substance abuser's job. The only person that's jeopardizing their job is that person themselves, because they're making a choice that using that drug is more important than their job, because eventually it's going to catch up with them. Now we know that addiction is a terrible thing and it's's going to catch up with them. Now we know that addiction is a terrible thing and it's very hard to get out of addiction. So that's why reasonable suspicion training is even more critically important, because hopefully we catch this person before they're addicted to the point where they can't function without the drug and hopefully they take advantage of getting help utilizing an employee assistance program and getting back into being a productive employee.
Speaker 3:Yeah, I think those are all really important topics. And the training you know one of the things is being able to make that determination. You know when you need to. Especially, you know when that immediate concern comes up. If you're not trained and you don't have a level of confidence, you're not going to be able to do that.
Speaker 3:And we see that from employers quite often that they may be reluctant to actually make that determination and do what you're talking about there because they haven't been trained. They don't know what to do, they don't know how to be objective, they don't know how to keep things on track. They may have come up from working with that employee and been a co-worker previously and now they're a supervisor and they need to have that skill set. So being a trained supervisor and trained in reasonable suspicion determinations, I think is absolutely critical in being able to actually follow through with your job and protect the safety of the employee. Critical in being able to actually follow through with your job and protect the safety of the employee, health of the employee the company and the public in general?
Speaker 2:Yeah, absolutely. And, tom, that kind of leads to one of the questions I was just about to ask you. Okay, because I was going to flip things around and ask you a couple questions. So one of them, which you just kind of answered, is what else do you want to mention about? How do employers determine reasonable suspicion of impairment leading to a drug test?
Speaker 3:Yeah, I think it's really critical to kind of look at it from the perspective of, you know one, being objective, which we talked about, the checklist and all those different things. I think being objective is huge. Don't try to diagnose what they're on, you know. Look at the signs and symptoms and check those off and then be able to handle it that way and understand too. You mentioned something that was very important to me Don't be judgmental. You're not making a judgment that they're actually a drug user or a drug abuser. I mean there's other things that can mirror symptoms. I mean dilated pupils. They could have gotten back from the eye doctor. Just one thing alone is not going to be enough. There could be a medical interaction. We had this with a supervisor that I'd done training for reached back out and said, hey, we actually had a situation, we were making a reasonable suspicion of termination and the guy had such issues. They ended up calling the ambulance. It was a medical interaction between prescriptions that two different doctors, who weren't communicating, had prescribed the guy and they actually said they saved his life. I mean this is again secondhand from them.
Speaker 3:And you mentioned about not driving, you know being prepared to have a plan in place.
Speaker 3:You know what if the person wants to refuse, what if the person is clearly intoxicated and they're trying to go driving somewhere? We had another company again this is from the supervisors I've done some training on reached out. They had one guy who was so drunk and when they said they were going to send him for a reasonable suspicion test, he was actually stumbling around and he said forget it, I'm out of here, you're out to get me. And he actually tried to leave. He went out to the parking lot and was getting ready to drive somewhere and they actually had to take steps to keep him from doing that because there's very likelihood he would have hurt himself or someone else. So being prepared is, I think, is absolutely critical for any supervisor out there, so that you kind of know what to expect. You know when this situation comes up and hopefully for you, many people, it doesn't ever come up, but it will come up at some point, very likely, and you need to be prepared for that.
Speaker 2:Yeah, those are great points and I think you know you've been out there doing supervisor training and you've gotten feedback and a lot of times, like I have, I'm sure, you do one class and then you were able to share some experiences from that class with the next class and I think that that leads to more effective training and that these supervisors are not alone and sometimes it's difficult for them because they may have come up through the ranks with their buddies and they go out and, you know, have a happy hour together and now they're their supervisor and they have to make a reasonable suspicion, determination. It can be difficult and, as you mentioned, don't accuse people of something. You're not there, as you mentioned, to be judgmental or to be accusing them. You're really there all about safety. We don't want people to get hurt, we don't want people to die and we want to have a safe and productive workplace. So, tom, thanks for all your input, thanks for getting those questions together. So, tom, thanks for all your input, thanks for getting those questions together.
Speaker 2:No-transcript. And I think, jesse, we still got about four more podcasts to do, right? Oh yeah, plenty of time. So we need more topics. So did I do that right about the ring the bell stuff the bell stuff?
Speaker 1:Yeah, because a lot of the YouTube videos. You get a instant reminder and notification when we upload new content, so ringing that bell helps you be one of the first to enjoy new content as soon as it's uploaded and delivered.
Speaker 2:Okay, excellent. So, jesse, before you close out the show and promote our sponsor, tell us if you learned anything from this episode.
Speaker 1:Yeah, 100%. You know some of the. You know over and over again I heard the word safety. You can never feel bad defaulting on safety. As a supervisor or someone in charge of a workplace, nobody could disagree with you not your fellow employees, not your, not your the people ahead of you, your superior administrative level bosses and supervisors. Nobody can fault you for just defaulting on safety. It's one of the easiest things to lean on and, again, it is the number one rule, right when it comes to the workplace environment Absolutely.
Speaker 2:Great, great takeaway, jesse, and we hope that all the supervisors we train have that same takeaway. So tell us about the sponsor and close out the episode for us.
Speaker 1:Yeah, 100%. I'd like to once again thank Joe Riley and Associates for being a part of the show for this episode. If you have any kind of drug testing industry questions, please reach out. They include expert witness services, marketing and sales consultation, policy writing If you don't have a policy, now's the time to do it. New startup comprehensive training and consultation, as well as drug-free workplace trainings and supervisor trainings. So thank you once again, joe Riley and Associates, for sponsoring and bringing the show to life.
Speaker 2:Awesome, Jesse. Thanks. Great job today. Tom, appreciate you being here.
Speaker 3:Thanks Joe, thanks Jesse.
Speaker 2:We'll see you all on the next podcast.