Fact Sheets and Toolbox Talks

The Office of Occupational Health and Safety has developed a series of Fact Sheets and Toolbox Talks on various health and safety topics. Some topics may have a related Fact Sheet AND a Toolbox Talk. For other topics, it may be appropriate to have only one or the other.

Fact Sheets:

• Are for use by supervisors, managers, and safety staff.
• Are intended to provide easy-to-understand explanations of a particular compliance area, and what must be done to address the issue and/or comply with a regulation.
• Generally do not provide information that would be useful to individual employees and are not a good tool to use for training.

Toolbox Talks:

• Are intended to provide information that would be useful and beneficial to individual employees.
• Contain very little information about the actual OSHA regulations or requirements placed on the employer.
• Focus on what an employee must know about a specific type of hazard or compliance area.

Using Toolbox Talks for Training
Locations are strongly encouraged to begin providing brief weekly or monthly documented training sessions using Toolbox Talks or other suitable information. Each Toolbox Talk has an attendance page for documenting training. When Toolbox Talks are used for training, please be sure to attach the attendance page to the rest of the Toolbox Talk. Keep these records with other safety training records.

If you need assistance with required training programs or would like us to generate a Fact Sheet or Toolbox Talk on another topic, please contact us at uohs@umn.edu or (612) 626-5008.