How to Create Safety Training Videos with AI

Learning and Development Evangelist at Synthesia

Use AI video to deliver consistent safety training at scale

If your safety training doesn't seem to be making a difference in employee behavior, it's probably for one of two reasons: it's passive or generic (or both).

Safety training needs to be engaging. It needs employees to actively participate, whether through scenarios or decision-based practice. And it needs to be tailored to the actual work environment (yes, that's also an OSHA requirement for those of you based in the US).

Before AI, that was an expensive proposition. Safety trainings are often delivered as large group lectures or written manuals, keeping facilitation costs down. In those situations, workplace examples tend to rely on anecdotes, slides, and the occasional video.

Whether you're building standalone training videos, or creating videos to embed in an onboarding or compliance program, you can design scenarios that let employees practice the decisions that matter most, before they ever face them on the job.

Why safety training needs to be engaging

Passive safety training (i.e., lectures, written manuals, and presentations) is often ineffective because it leads to "lower attentiveness and concentration."
More engaging training leads to greater knowledge acquisition, and reductions in "accidents, illnesses, and injuries."

Why use videos for safety training

Safety training videos aren't novel. There's evidence they were used as early as the 1950s and by the 1980s, they were being regularly produced by regulatory agencies. Historically, these videos have been passive learning experiences, shown in dark auditoriums to employees as they try not to fall asleep. That's why they're even cited in the research as examples of what not to do.

But that's changing. Video training is no longer constrained to being a one-way recording. Today, it's a medium that, when used effectively, can improve learner outcomes.

How to create a safety training video

Presumably you're here because you want to create a safety training video with an AI platform like Synthesia, in which case, keep reading. If, however, you're looking to create a safety training video without AI, I have a step-by-step guide on how to do so here.

Step 1. Choose your topic

If this is your first time creating a safety training video, I recommend picking a topic that can either be covered in 3-5 minutes, or broken down into videos of that length. ( Research has shown that engagement begins to drop around the 6-minute mark.)

If you already have training materials, like a slide deck or transcript from a live session, you can segment that into topics for a video series. Each video should cover one topic and have a measurable outcome. You can use the sentences below as a way to think through segmentation.

This video is for [specific role] who is required to [procedure or regulatory obligation].

After watching, [specific role] should be able to [recognize a hazard / perform a procedure / respond correctly] so that [safety outcome].

Let’s say I’m designing an onboarding program for new hires who are working at an industrial site. There are four things that all new hires need to know: how to wear PPE, how to handle equipment, how to lift safely, and how to report hazards. I can design four short videos that cover each topic.

Common safety training topics

Construction: fall protection, ladder and scaffolding safety, excavation and trenching, PPE, first aid and CPR
Healthcare: bloodborne pathogens, safe patient handling and ergonomics, workplace violence prevention, respiratory protection, hazard communication
Manufacturing: Lockout/Tagout, machine guarding, hazard communication, bloodborne pathogens, PPE
Office: emergency action and evacuation, fire prevention, ergonomics, first aid and CPR, workplace violence awareness
Warehouse: powered industrial trucks (forklifts), lifting and ergonomics, walking-working surfaces, hazard communication, fire extinguisher use

Step 2: Generate a first draft

Once you have a clear focus for your video, you can head over to our free AI video generator. Upload the relevant content from your existing materials, whether that’s a selection of slides or a segment of a transcript (an LLM works wonders here). You can also type in a prompt, but given the specificity of safety training, I recommend having source material to start with, no matter how dry.

Step 3: Choose your avatar

After you’ve generated a rough draft, you can choose what to focus on next. I recommend starting with the easy (and honestly, fun) parts, like choosing an avatar. If you plan to have an avatar visible, be sure to customize their outfit to align with your safety standards. You can also upload a photo of your worksite.

Step 4: Customize your scenes

With that out of the way, you can move on to customizing your scenes. That starts with uploading the branding and other assets, like footage of equipment or your site.

A majority of your time should be spent designing the learning experience (with the help of our AI Assistant). Remind yourself of the purpose of the video. What do you want employees to be able to do differently after watching it? Then design towards that goal.

Step 5: Ask for SME approval

Unless you're a subject matter expert on the topic, your final step before publishing the video is to have someone who is an expert review it. That could be an operations lead or site supervisor, or someone else.

Step 6: Publish and distribute

Once you're ready to publish, you'll want to think through a few more things, such as:

How will you distribute the video?
How will you track completion and any other required data?
How will you update content, when needed, while maintaining clear version history?

Measuring engagement

At the beginning of this post, I emphasized how important it is to make safety training engaging so that the information is retained and employees act appropriately on-site.

Part of transitioning to video is learning how to evaluate the impact of the medium on your safety objectives. To do this, you'll need to identify two types of metrics: snapshot data and impact data. The first is the information you capture from an LMS, like how many employees completed it and how they performed in scenarios or knowledge checks. The second is data that you capture from the workplace that shows whether or not the video is driving behavioral change.

Frequently asked questions

Why does safety training need to be tailored to the actual workplace?

Generic safety content is easy to ignore. Safety depends on where people actually work, and a video showing a generic warehouse is teaching people about a workplace that isn't theirs. It's also an OSHA requirement for those based in the US.

Why is passive training less effective for safety?

More engaging training, one that has employees actively participate through scenarios or decision-based practice, leads to greater knowledge acquisition and reductions in accidents, illnesses, and injuries.

How do you measure whether a safety training video is working?

Track snapshot data (completion, timing, performance in scenarios or knowledge checks) from your LMS, and impact data (like incident trends) from the workplace itself.