Four Pillars of Safety Management Systems - Essay Example

This component establishes the top management’s dedication to constantly improve safety. This is because it entails the organizational policies and structure that define the responsibilities of the management to ensure safety precautions (Waring, 2006). Organizations cannot effectively operate without the observation of safety policies, which help in reducing confusion and errors. The safety policy component is efficient for creating a proactive and predictive program because it offers new regulations that can help in improving equipment and system designs (Ludwig, 2007).

For instance, the management can decide to employ new safety programs that will reduce the occurrence of risks. Safety risk ManagementThis SMS component determines the requirement for improved risk controls based on the appraisal of suitable risk. The pillar also offers a formal system of hazard recognition, risk evaluation, resource distribution, and system monitoring. The component is suitable for creating a proactive and predictive safety program because it helps engineers develop, determine, and administer a safety culture that decreases injuries (Waring, 2006).

As a result, the safety risk management pillar provides a proactive response before the occurrence of risks. This is because it predicts and tries to prevent accidents through appropriate response mechanisms.Safety promotionThis SMS pillar comprises of coaching, communication, and other activities to establish a favorable safety culture within all workforce levels. It is prudent that constant communication of safety values and performances help to support sound safety culture. Its value in the predictive safety program is that communication and training initiatives are essential for equipping workers with the required skills to tackle emerging threats (Ludwig, 2007).

The workforce needs to acquire modern training facilities in order to prepare for risks that may undermine safety in the workplace. Safety AssuranceThe Safety Assurance SMS pillar measures the continuous success of executing risk control strategies. It also supports the recognition of new hazards that may affect operations. The pillar is instrumental in creating predictive and proactive safety programs because the management is capable of undertaking the continuous quality enhancement of procedures and products.

This is because it ensures that safety data is acquired and justification of the predicted risk and mitigation strategies undertaken (Waring, 2006).ConclusionThe 4 main pillars of SMS entail safety risk management, policy, assurance, and promotion. The pillars work in separate ways to ensure that an organization maintains its safety standards. This helps in the creation of proactive and predictive safety programs that predict and prevent hazards.