Training over 100 cleaning staff across multiple sites without disrupting daily operations is a major challenge. Recently, two large organisations – a UK Metropolitan Borough Council and a multi-site Academy Trust – approached us independently with nearly identical needs. Both employed 100+ full and part-time cleaning staff responsible for general janitorial duties in offices, classrooms, and public areas. The key difference: the council required an additional module on managing biohazardous waste (Safe Handling of Bodily Fluids, Sharps, and Hazardous Waste).

As you can imagine, the logistics of training a large number of cleaning staff and caretakers posed a problem for our customers – how could they ensure continued service while some of the staff were sent for training? The solution, and what we were tasked to propose, was to develop a series of highly customised short training modules that could deliver the most effective and practical content within the constraints inherent with busy cleaning work.

We designed and delivered a series of highly customised, short onsite training modules. This flexible approach ensured effective, practical learning within the constraints of busy cleaning schedules, minimising disruption. Our extensive experience in practical cleaning, hygiene auditing, and training thousands of staff allowed us to craft engaging content tailored precisely to their needs.

Our course structure targeted key aspects of their work:

1. Impact of Cleaning: An introduction section emphasising the importance of cleaning and their role in maintaining a safe and clean place for staff, visitors and public. This topic discusses three major areas: cleaning for appearance, cleaning for safety and cleaning for hygiene.
2. Cleaning Techniques: This part is divided into cleaning techniques completed by hand (wet and damp cleaning) and manual floor cleaning. Wet cleaning by hand is a technique used to thoroughly clean surfaces, whereas damp cleaning is used to remove dust, glass and mirrors. Any relevant health and safety aspects were also included at the appropriate moment.
3. Cleaning Order: A short section covering the principles that govern the order of cleaning rooms from start to finish. To ensure cleaning is carried out as efficiently and effectively as possible, the cleaning tasks are carried out in a certain way. E.g. top to bottom, clean to dirty, etc. This is particularly important in bathrooms and biohazard cleans.
4. Cleaning Standards: A short section on the cleaning standards staff are reasonably expected to achieve.
5. Biohazard Cleans: This last section covers the safe clean up and removal of any biohazardous materials (bodily fluids) and Sharps in public spaces. It will also include aspects of infection control principles. This section only applied to more experienced cleaners, supervisors and caretakers.

This case study demonstrates our ability to create and deliver highly customised and flexible (modular based) training to large numbers of staff.

Would this work for you?

Contact us today for a no-obligation consultation to discuss how this can be tailored to your organisation’s specific needs.