Australian Occupational Health And Safety Portfolio - Health and Safety Hazards - Assignment Example

Running Head: OCCUPATIONAL HEALTH AND SAFETY Occupational Health and Safety Name Institution Date Task 1 It is apparent that Occupational Health and Safety (OH&S), Portfolio Health and safety in the workplace are still a major problem to the workers, the community and even the economy. The noble cause of the OH&S in focusing primarily on the prevention diseases, injuries and fatalities more effort should be employed by organizations and safety managers in order to realize the target of fulfilling the basic needs of their employees as well as obtain maximum returns from an improved performance in the business. An active commitment towards the creation of an effective health and management system is the most prudent way to combat the new threats to our safety and health which are constantly emerging. The should frank and genuine consultation among workers, their representatives, supervisors and managers in order to build a rapport and culture which seeks to uphold promote a healthy organization. Organizational practices can be tailored towards providing a proper environment by managing current and new forms of hazards. A myriad of problems and hazards that are detested emerge at the work place are inevitable if proper precautionary measures are not undertaken. Working relationships with colleagues and supervisors is one among the factors that affect an employee psychologically. This factor is among various other factors such as: tight deadlines, lack of regulation of given work and high work loads that psychologically affect the workers and their performance at work and are referred to as psychosocial risks. Psychosocial factors lead to stress that may pronounce to depression if adequate control measures are not taken. Several muscle skeleton disorders can also arise due to psychosocial hazards. Increased muscle tension and changing moods and behaviors can result from stress if somebody works for a long time without rest in order to meet given deadlines. Psychosocial and physical factors need to be identified and controlled together to be effective. There should be a balance between the working environments, the work as well as the needs and capacities of the workers. Bullying and Harassment at the work place are psychosocial hazards that affect the work of the employees. Bullying can be both physical and psychological since the perpetrators use physical or behavioral actions against the victim. The health of the victim is negatively impacted since they may suffer mal-development, death, psychological harm or deprivation. Sexual harassment or discrimination based on gender, sex, race or religions are some of the most prevalent form of bullying in the work place. Stringent measures need to be put in place to guard against the mentioned forms of psychological hazards at the work place. No one should be forced to resign on the basis of the mentioned or any other divergent characteristics. Threats, verbal/written and emotional abuse or stress due to inappropriate management are psychosocial hazards as well. These may cause harm on the victim and need adequate compensation from the perpetrator or the management. Malicious damage to property of the customers, staff or the business with the intent of causing harm should be discouraged. Continual allocation of low grades or withholding of important information required to complete a given job is also a psychosocial hazards (Clarkes & Cooper 2004). Psychosocial hazards lead to stress and anxiety, withdrawal, loss of esteem and self confidence, headaches, and back aches that negatively impact on the workers productivity. The worker will be unable to sleep, be irritable, experience panic attacks and relax from coming to work. Bullying can be stopped by standing up to the bully and not believing in what thy say; be confident even when abused and despised. Management should acknowledge bullying occurs and never trivialize its effects. Stringent measures should be taken by the management on the known bullies (Jefferies 2005). A number of practices need to be developed to prevent psychological breakdown and other psychological hazards. Workers should be accorded a significant amount of control over their work and methods of work so as not to strain. Workers can decide to do their work in shifts or decide when they cannot input any more effort due to fatigue; The employees should also make use of their abilities but should not be forced to exceed what they are unable to; the rules should be designed to cater for the needs of the workers, the decisions of their workers should be taken into account when setting up the rules for working; workers should never be given repetitive monotonous chores since they will be bored and distressed; appropriate paces for working should be developed since the workers are human but not machines-even machines breakdown when overworked out of their pace; payment and remuneration should be adequate in order to boost the workers moral and social interactions should be encouraged by providing a proper environment for the process. These measures when designed will help reduce problems from psychosocial risks (Creighton & Rozen 2007). Prior exposure is an important practice for the management of safety and health of the work station. Workers should be trained on first aid and other life saving strategies in order to reduce diseases, injuries and fatalities whenever an accident occurs. Fire drills are important training for getting people ready to act in the event of a fire accident. First aid training for burns, fainting or nose bleeding as well as other eventualities at the work place are necessary for reducing the magnitude of the damage. These are significant steps that will help to significantly reduce panic that arises whenever an accident occurs and indeed only aggravates the situation that it already is. Organizations should endeavor to provide and safe and healthy work environment for its staff, visitors, contractors and other stakeholders who access the work station. Better practices should be adopted to prevent and reduce hazards. The workers comprehensive compensation scheme over injuries sustained at work should be spelt out in order to avoid conflicts and losing of workers due to demoralization. (Taylor, Easter & Hegney 2004). Task 2 The incident of Tony, who was injured while working as a casual driver in a concrete truck for a concrete supplier brings to light the issue of notifying, reporting and managing incidences. Tony lost his balance while attempting to clean the back of the truck where he broke his leg. A thorough risks assessment should be conducted in order to identify the hazards in the workplace. Inspection of the workstation for all the workers is an important examination aimed at establishing the hazards that these areas are prone to. The teams of workers should be consulted when conducting this assessment in order to get the correct picture of the hazards; for example, the workers may lack adequate working space and room ventilation which they will reveal when consulted. Management cannot just assume that they know the hazards better. These consultations can be conducted through daily informal consultations of the employees as well as through regular formal meetings of the employees. The audits of the OH&S are very important resources for the hazards assessment. These provide concise information after a previous analysis of the problem and are therefore invaluable to the course. It is also good practice to check equipment prior to, during and after usage. Health and safety records such as: hazards reports, dangerous goods registers, hazards substances reports and injury records should be reviewed to provide information that is useful at the present and also to the emerging issues (Falconer 2004). Hazards control entails removal or rather elimination of the inherent risks. This is important since it prevents a disaster or reduces reduce the chances of an accident. Removing a barrier from an emergency exit is a step towards saving a disaster since the barrier is a risk to that would increase fatalities in case of an accident where people would not be able to escape or step over each other. Selecting the best alternative hazard control measure is also an important step. The hierarchy of the most effective to the least effective option is used towards this end. It is better to keep highly flammable material from the fires than to extinguish the fire. Proper equipment and manual handling techniques should be developed and the work plat forms raised or lowered in accordance to the needs assessment after thorough consultations with the employees and their representatives. Reference: Clarkes & Cooper L. (2004). Managing the risk of workplace stress: health and safety hazards. Routledge. Sydney. Creighton B & Rozen P. (2007). Occupational Health and Safety Law in Victoria. Federation Press: Perth. Falconer H. (2004). IRS Managing Conflict in the Workplace. Butterworth-Heinemann: Brisbane. Jefferies B. (2005). Workplace counseling in the NHS: person-centered dialogues. Radcliff Publishing: Sydney. Taylor G, Easter K & Hegney R. (2004). Enhancing occupational safety and health. Butterworth-Heinemann, Adelaide. http://www.accessmylibrary.com/article-1G1-173646970/impact-occupational-health-and.html http://tpu.bluemountains.net/unit-display.php?recordID=24871&s=176 http://tesda-occupational-health-safety.blogspot.com/ http://www.accessmylibrary.com/article-1G1-173646970/impact-occupational-health-and.html Read More