If your aim is to improve the level of safety and wellbeing for your employees, then getting a Work Health and Safety Management system [WHSMS] might prove to be a good idea.
As the name suggests, a Work Health and Safety Management system helps to track, measure and act upon issues related to the safety of employees in the working environment.
The systems approach that is at the core of a WHSMS involves the management of different components of employee performance in the workplace, to ensure that the employees have the required level of safety and wellbeing as they work in the organization.
In the modern business environment, having satisfied employees is an asset for your business. Skilled and knowledgeable employees can contribute to the achievement of the short- and long-term goals you have set for your business. Satisfied employees can also turn out to be your brand’s greatest ambassadors. So, it only makes sense to use a WHSMS in creating an environment that supports optimal employee performance, but one that also gives them an opportunity for career growth and development.
Understanding the components of a WHSMS can shed light on how Work Health and Safety Management systems work and help you identify the benefits that such a system can bring to your business. Below are the components of a Work Health and Safety Management System and the importance of each stage in the promotion of workplace health and safety.
- Policy and Commitment
- Planning
- Implementation
- Measurement and Evaluation
- Management Review
1. Policy and Commitment
As the first stage in implementing a WHSMS, the importance of policy and commitment lies in ensuring that the system’s implementation adheres to relevant policies and has support from the top leaders in the organization.
Policies on how the business will handle emerging issues on health and safety at the workplace are at this stage. The commitment of leaders in the business ensures that the WHSMS implementation process will have the needed tools and support from the organization’s leadership team. The lack of support from the leaders in the organization can cause failure in the system implementation process.
The employees also have a role to play at this stage. They are involved by being made aware of their contribution through different roles and responsibilities in the WHSMS implementation process.
The completion of the policy and commitment stage enables a transition to the planning stage.
2. Planning
In the planning phase, a review of the work health and safety management issues facing your business are identified. The main reason for outlining the (health and safety) issues facing the business is to ensure that the WHSMS is designed to meet the organization’s specific needs. Having a WHSMS that cannot address the health and safety issues in a specific organization might end up creating problems rather than providing solutions.
The planning phase will help you determine whether the organization is ready for a WHSMS. Ensuring that all the people in the organization work in collaboration will set the foundation for success in the system implementation process. Successful planning for the WHSMS implementation leads to the implementation stage.
3. Implementation
Implementation involves setting the components of the WHSMS into action. You might need to offer training to the people in the organization that are involved in the WHSMS implementation process. Conducting a training needs analysis will help with identifying the knowledge and skill gaps that can hinder the effective implementation of the WHSMS.
Employee training in WHSMS implementation contributes to success achievement in the early and latter stages of the system implementation process. The content covered through the training can involve a prediction of the potential health and safety issues that are likely to arise in the specific organizational setting. Here, a proactive rather than reactive approach to dealing with health and safety challenges emerges in the course of WHSMS implementation.
It might be easy to overlook the importance of personnel training in the course of WHSMS implementation processes. This is because, sometimes, the lack of training has a negligible impact on the success of organizational operations. But in other cases, the mistakes resulting from the lack of training can be catastrophic. Ensuring that your workers are equipped with knowledge on how to promote health and safety using the WHSMS in the workplace will go a long way in ensuring success in business operations.
Training through the implementation stage can ensure the establishment of standard operating procedures that touch on risk mitigation in the business. Promoting the health and safety of employees occurs as a top priority in operating standards that will guide the organization. Periodic review of the WHSMS policies could help to ensure that the system provisions contribute to the attainment of the set health and safety goals in the organization.
4. Measurement and Evaluation
In the measurement and evaluation phase, performing audits helps with the identification of gaps arising after implementing the Work Health and Safety Management system. Gaps show that there is room for system improvement, which can enable the attainment of optimal performance following implementation in the organization.
Continued monitoring and evaluation entails noting any arising health and safety issues that are reported in the organization. The noted issues are used to improve the system as used in the organization.
The importance of measurement and evaluation is that it leads to continuous system improvement. Optimal performance is achieved over time as the Work Health and Safety Management system is tuned to meet the organization’s goals and objectives.
Using the WHSMS does not end at the monitoring and evaluation stage, it proceeds to the management review stage.
5. Management review
The management review stage ensures that the managers and other leaders in the organization review the organization’s performance following the implementation of the Work Health and Safety Management system. Leaders in the organization can check whether the provisions of the WHSMS are aligned with the goals and objectives of the business. Management review also provides the opportunity to identify the success and failures of the Work Health and Safety Management system implementation process.
Using a Work Health and Safety Management system can catapult your organization into achieving short- and long-term success in operations. By ensuring that the needs, safety and health of your employees are closely monitored and taken into consideration in decision making, you can retain and continuously ensure the improvement of the greatest asset available in your business–your employees.
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