"Audits measure how well you are doing against your established goals and objectives. Audits are critical to the success of your goals and objectives."
Safety Audit - Program Evaluation
A safety audit evaluates safety programs and practices within an organization. Employers conducting an audit should: Measure and collect information about a safety program's reliability and effectiveness. Look at whether a safety program meets the company's stated goals.
Safety Audit - Evaluate injuries records, hazard records, safety management elements
Where have you been? (Injury/illness records, hazard reports, safety management elements, written programs and procedures) Where do you want to be? (reduce injury/illness by a certain percentage, ensure all near misses are reported, ensure all hazards are reported and fixed, implement safety management elements)
Steps to Setting Goals If you do not know where you've been in the past or do not know where you want to be in the future, then you won't know where to start or how effective what you plan to do or are doing even is. You need to conduct an analysis of injury/illness, hazards, and elements of Safety Management program.
Step #1-Determine where you've been in the past. Collect injury/illness records, reports of hazards by employees or teams, or known hazards for your industry. Organize your information by departments or job sites so you'll know where to focus your efforts Step #2-Conduct a hazard assessment. Develop a checklist of hazards to look for and establish a matrix to evaluate the significance of the hazards so you can prioritize solutions
Step #3-Develop Goals, Objectives, and Action Plan. Develop long term goals (to achieve by the end of the year), establish the Objectives (shorter term items that need to be implemented to support the goals), and an Action Plan to achieve the goals and objectives. (Assign responsibility to specific people and establish target dates to accomplish and measurements to determine how well you do)
If you/your team do not know what hazards to look for then your first step will be to attend some hazard identification training. You can't just rely on common sense to identify hazards. You need to know some of the basic OSHA safety rules, so you'll know what could cause accidents in your workplace
Author: Deborah Grow, Safety Consultant
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