Tag Archives: safety management system

Worker Engagement in Safety Management Systems Improves Safety Culture and EHS Performance

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Environment, health and safety (EHS) performance significantly improves when workers are actively engaged in a company’s safety culture and practices through a safety management system.

The Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) may have said it best.

“To be effective, any safety and health program needs the meaningful participation of workers and their representatives. Workers have much to gain from a successful program and the most to lose if the program fails,” they say. But as many safety professionals can attest, employee engagement is easier said than done.

Businesses have long accepted that strong employee engagement has a direct link to better productivity and profitability. Likewise, environment, health and safety (EHS) performance significantly improves when workers are actively engaged in a company’s safety culture and practices through an effective safety management system. A Gallop study observed that “engaged employees produce better business outcomes than other employees — across industry, company … Read more...

Safety Education is Redefined by Online Learning and Training Management Software

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E-learning powered by training management software reaches employees who work remotely or in different locations and is the reason why distance learning became an invaluable tool during the COVID-19 pandemic.

The urgency to train employees on new workplace safety rules presents challenges for many Environmental, Health and Safety (EHS) managers and corporate leaders. Digital learning platforms, centrally administered through training management software and systems, have become essential tools for companies and institutions in their efforts to deliver information and training quickly and effectively to employees. Online and blended-learning programs help workplaces reach employees no matter where they’re located.

However, effective e-learning programs require a strategic approach to the use of technology, content delivery and course development. The introduction of microlearning—the ability to deliver training content in short bursts of information—has elevated the way organizations conduct distance learning. It’s a way of presenting complex topics in an engaging way and without … Read more...

Arcadis: A Trusted Partner Offers Four Differentiators Shared by High-Performing EHSQ Programs

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From filing cabinets to spreadsheets to technology: Arcadis and Intelex partner to change the way world-class companies approach EHSQ management systems.
From filing cabinets to spreadsheets to technology: Arcadis and Intelex partner to change the way world-class companies approach EHSQ management systems.

The landscape of EHSQ data management has changed quite substantially over the last 30 years. From the days of incident and inspection reports stored in filing cabinets to the spreadsheets and point solutions of a decade ago, Intelex has developed mature, enterprise EHSQ solutions to meet these changing and challenging demands.

Arcadis has been a growing and trusted partner of Intelex through many of these years, helping clients implement Intelex to meet very complex requirements in EHSQ data management. We have brought subject matter experts in EHSQ business processes and market sectors to provide the right amount of guidance for industry best practices during implementation. Arcadis is dedicated to building long-term, trusted-advisor relationships with our clients throughout the Intelex engagement and beyond. We are very proud that we are … Read more...

Look for the “Believers” to Evangelize Your Safety Culture

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Occupational health and safety, like anything, needs to be imbedded into culture and culture is created by the employees.

Safety cultures should be created by employees for each other – empowered, invested and supported by the company – as opposed to forced down and then begrudgingly adopted or ignored.

That’s the view of Neil Bedwell, a council member of Forbes magazine who heads up a consultancy that focuses on culture called Local Industries, based in Atlanta. Employees represent the most important stakeholders in any workplace initiative, he says. In the context of health and safety, guidelines may be created by a small group of senior people, but it is the employees on the floor who bring these principles to life day-by-day and minute-by-minute.

“Occupational health and safety, like anything, needs to be imbedded into culture and culture is created by the employees,” Bedwell says. “Health and safety … Read more...

ISO 45001 and ANSI Z10 Offer Valuable Safety Management Guidance

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Industry standards exist to help set the foundation for a safety management system. For those who may not have a system in place or are looking to take an existing safety management system (SMS) to the next level, standards offer a guiding blueprint for the key and necessary components and practices. Two of the most common and ubiquitous are the International Organization for Standardization’s ISO 45001 and the American National Standards Institute’s ANSI Z10.

ISO 45001 is described as the world’s first international standard for occupational health and safety systems. It provides a framework for improving health and safety performance and is intended to control the factors that may result in injury, illness or death on the job. ISO 45001 is also described as process-based and considers risks and opportunities. The standard explicitly mentions mental health as an element that should be protected by the program.

Another noteworthy feature of … Read more...

The Data Collection Components of a Safety Management System

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Safety Management Systems report essential business information, ensure compliance requirements, help to manage risks and improve operational performance.
Safety Management Systems report essential business information, ensure compliance requirements, help to manage risks and improve operational performance.

The scope and maturity of a safety management system (SMS) to manage safety risk in the workplace varies by industry type, location and company because some are more regulated than others and that dictates the level of maturity and robustness a system requires. However, there are common components every SMS has, including:

Incident Reporting to capture, track, investigate and report on all incidents and near-misses, including injuries and illnesses, spills, property damage and vehicle incidents.

Audit Management that includes scheduling, tracking, data collection and reporting for all internal or external audits to simplify and ensure compliance across all company locations and operating jurisdictions.

Document Control that improves document management across the complete lifecycle of an organization’s compliance efforts and activities. It’s important to control access to sensitive files, forms … Read more...

More Work and More Tech Needed to Take EHS to the Next Level of Success

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The COVID-19 pandemic placed EHS in the spotlight and has tasked professionals to do more than ever in managing risks within and outside of traditional workspace confines.

The future of environment, health and safety will see the need for more technology adoption by organizations as EHS professionals take on much greater workloads and a role in total worker wellness largely due to the outfall of COVID-19.  

These were among the key observations and topics of discussion during the first day of the Verdantix virtual summit on Innovating for Sustainable Operations that focused on EHS and operations.

Next Level for EHS

During a session titled, Taking EHS to the Next Level of Success, presenters considered how the responsibilities and workloads of EHS professionals have been impacted as hybrid and remote working becomes more popular. 

Verdantix CEO David Metcalfe said the COVID-19 pandemic placed EHS in the spotlight and has tasked … Read more...

Compliance or Risk Auditing: What Is the Best Approach?

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Companies need audit management to understand the safety management system and evaluate compliance with internal requirements and external regulations.

Safety program audit management provides confidence to organizations that operational risks are measured through sufficient identification, control, monitoring and governance. Audits are conducted to better understand the safety management system and evaluate the level of compliance with internal requirements and external regulations. Such audits utilize audit protocols to understand problems to correct any deficiency before a loss or a compliance issue is experienced. 

Safety auditing is conducted usually for the following reasons:

  • Ensuring compliance to the requirements of internal, international, and industry standards & regulations, and customer requirements
  • To determine the effectiveness of the implemented system in meeting specified objectives (safety, quality, environmental, financial)
  • To explore opportunities for improvement
  • To meet statutory and regulatory requirements
  • To provide feedback to senior management

Compliance Versus Risk-Based Audting

There are two main channels of … Read more...

Simply the Best: From Tips to Manage Incidents to Regulatory Compliance – The Top 10 Downloaded Reports from Intelex.com in 2021

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From software comparisons to practical advice to guidance about adopting ISO standards, we’ve got you covered with our 2021 Top 10 list of downloaded reports.

From software solution comparisons to practical advice to guidance about adopting ISO standards in the workplace, we’ve got you covered with our 2021 Top 10 list of downloaded reports.

  1. Verdantix Green Quadrant EHS Software 2021 
    This benchmark report, written by Verdantix, dives into the capabilities of 20 EHS software vendors across Air Emissions, Greenhouse Gas Emissions, Waste and Wastewater, Hazardous Waste, and Sustainability Management. Intelex was a leader in both Environment and Sustainability Management, achieving a top-3 score in all capabilities assessed.
  2. The Top 10 OSHA Citations and How to Avoid Them: A Checklist
    Each year, OSHA publishes a top 10 list of the most frequently cited violations it has recorded. The list for 2020 is largely unchanged from 2019, suggesting that little progress has been made addressing the most common workplace incidents. The Top 10 OSHA Citations and How to Avoid Them: A Checklist Approach provides checklists to
… Read more...

Lessons from 9/11: How Systems Fail and People Rise to the Occasion

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9/11 is more than just a traumatic scar on our memories. It is also a reminder of how systems lacking due care and preparation can fail in a crisis, and of how human beings with training and empathy can shine a powerful light into the darkness to bring aid to those who need it most. 

For those of us of a certain vintage, it’s hard to believe that 9/11 was twenty years ago. Watching footage of the events of that day brings back memories so vivid that it feels as though we’re experiencing them again for the first time. 9/11 is a scar on our collective consciousness. For those who lost someone in the attacks, it is a trauma that will never completely heal. 

It’s striking that the way we refer to that event—“9/11”—demonstrates an intriguing way we think about time in relation to cataclysmic disasters. “9/11” represents a day, a twenty-four-hour … Read more...