This article points out some of the key mistakes that organisations need to avoid while establishing their occupational health and safety management system (OHS) for the health assurance and safety of workers.
An organisation needs to ensure a number of factors to establish a strong and effective health and safety management system that can contribute to making its workplace safe. Things are not as easy as they seem. With many occupational health and safety mistakes consistently being made by the management team or workers in the workplace, it becomes necessary for organisations to have appropriate strategies to avoid committing them again and again.
Having an OHS management system implemented organisation-wide is useful in promoting certain practices and actions that can help to systematically prevent workplace risks or mitigate them. However, falling for these common mistakes might make it challenging for you to implement a robust and uniform OHS management system. It is essential for an organisational management to consider all possible mistakes and make appropriate plans to avoid them.
Haste in OHS Training
Many organisations feel urgency in providing training to their employees about safety measures and practices. The management team needs to pass on their OHS policy and management system guidelines as soon as possible. Effective OHS training takes time and to make sure that each of your employees are aware and well educated about the safety practices. It is the role of organisational management to appoint certain health and safety consultants that can provide appropriate training programs according to potential hazards or risks at your place. Rushing through training process needs to be avoided. You should track the progress of employees to see how well they are grasping all OHS guidelines and management practices.
Delayed Workplace Inspections
A lot of occupational risks occur due to machinery or equipment breakdown, infrastructure failure or substandard facilities at worksites. Irregular or delayed inspections of workplaces are to blame for these. Inspecting each area, process, infrastructure and piece of equipment at regular intervals is the key to identify potential risks and take measures to prevent them. Many companies hesitate in doing so because inspecting a process or worksite sometimes means shutting down of operations. That can affect overall productivity. However, to avoid that, you can schedule inspections earlier and allow employees to plan their operations accordingly avoiding any major delays.
Overlooking Near Misses
An organisation should never neglect their near misses, i.e. incidents which could have caused injuries or severe hazards. The same incidents may happen again causing accidents or injuries. It is necessary to keep record of those incidents or close calls when they happen to cause minor consequences and take them seriously. If they are reported once, concerned safety management officials should be aware of them, analyse probable causes, and take corrective actions to prevent them in future.
Use of Easy Affordable Substitutes
One major reason workers face risks or vulnerabilities at the workplace is because of the use of inadequate tools such as using a ladder instead of proper scaffolding, a normal trolley instead of a proper forklift management, a rope instead of proper harnessing. If you use cheap alternatives instead of proper facilities in order to save costs, it could expose your workers to immense risks. It can also make work less productive or efficient. Even the necessary work equipment or facility is costly, you should choose to use only that to improve both workplace safety and efficiency.
Failing to Adopt the ISO Compliance Standard
Organisations that have their OHS management practices compliant with an international standard like the ISO 45001 are better at managing workplace risks than those who just have a generic set of OHS management practices. To maintain compliance with the ISO standard, an organisation compulsorily needs to review their OHS management system, track its effectiveness, and improve it continuously. Failing to invest in a proper management system and make it compliant with an ISO standard can also demonstrate your OHS management system as weak. It may cause unwillingness or lack of motivation in workers of your organisation to perform with maximum effort.
A regulatory health and safety management system must be at the core of your organisation if you want your workers to be safe and help them give in their best performance to drive your productivity. You just have to make sure to not commit these silly and common mistakes regarding your health and safety practices. Avoiding these can help you have an effective OHS management system involving practices that assure all-around safety and wellness of workers in the long run.
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