Occupational Health and Safety: Audit Proposal - Report Example

Occupational Health and Safety: AUDIT PROPOSAL Customer Inserts His/Her Name Customer Inserts Grade Course Customer Inserts Tutor’s Name Insert Date Here (Day, Month, Year) Company Name: Company Address: Date: To: From: Subject: Occupational Health and Safety: Audit Proposal The main objective of my proposal is the preparation of the Audit report for the risk assessment and guidelines and suggestions thereafter according to the Occupational Health and Safety Guidelines. The proposal highlights all the aspects related to the health and risk factors in the organization that would be covered in the audit report. Main purpose of the Audit is the use of the established methods and techniques to make sure that the findings are relevant, reliable and sufficient. In the proposed report, the objective and scope of the audit is defined properly. The audit proposal ensures that the audit report would identify all the kinds of risks or hazards as mentioned in the Occupational Health and Safety Guidelines and find out all the performance measures or indicators, the person responsible for conducting of audit and consultations of the same and all the strategies involved in the collection of information. The cost factor would also be taken into account. In the progress of the audit, the limitation can come from the staff that could be reluctant in giving the feedback in their area of work regarding any risk factor. It is found that little research work has been conducted on the reliability and validity of the OHS management audit instrument therefore it is proposed that more and more studies and research should be undertaken. Introduction and Scope of the Audit Occupational Health and Safety Australia was established to check the health and safety of the workers in the changing environment of the industry and checking risk factors associated with it. Many changes have been initiated by Federal and State Legislation taking into account various risk factors associated with the health and safety of the workers in any organization, whereby any organization or company having less than or more than 20 employees must keep in account Occupational Health and Safety of the workers and in case of non compliance, fine up to $550,000 could be imposed. (OHS, Australia: Online) Here the purpose of the Audit Report comes in. Audits are prepared by industries to verify the exact specifications, quality, control in the environment and caring of the aged. Any audit by the Court of Audit starts by preparing of the audit proposal which helps the Court of Audit to decide whether the organization should invest in the proposed audit during the period or not? It is very important that employees, supervisors and other workers in the workplace are carrying out the legal duties, making assessment of the risks and hazards in the workplace and adopting all the precautions as regards those risks. Any breach in this regard can land the company or organization in court, making it all the more imperative on the part of the organization to take all the precautions. In the following audit proposal, I would give in detail information on the composition and what is the cost involved in the audit. Besides there would also be mention of the performance measures or indicators, the persons responsible for conducting the audit, who will be consulted for preparing audit and what strategies would be involved for collecting of information? Purpose of Audit Report The main purpose of preparing this Audit Report is making plans and monitoring of the safety management according to the priority basis. In other words, assessing and finding out the risks on the basis of the gravity of the effect on the organization. Secondly auditing will monitor the way emergency situation will respond to the procedures and requirements. Thirdly, for making plans and monitoring of OH&S activities. This proposal is not only meant for internal but also for external purpose as well. Performance measures or indicators To monitor and evaluate OHS performance, performance measurement is a necessary aspect as it helps to identify the problem areas and the preventive action to be taken and also provides required feedback relating to OHS initiatives. Measuring OHS performance also helps an organization to evaluate its OHS strategies. These performance indicators are concerned with the management processes, planning and design, risk management, monitoring and psycho-social working environment. Management process requires management at various levels to provide leadership and its commitment to OHS and it can be measured from the effective implementation of the specific OHS plans in an organization; percentage of the reviews conducted by the management over a period of time; rating of management dedication and commitment through surveys from workforce; and percentage of the warnings issued to any contractor or employees for non compliance of the safety regulations. Design and planning activities of any organization are planned and implemented to ensure design and structure is safe for its employees and incidents are verified. Other risk factors could be measured by implementing physical inspections. These inspections are done by analyzing indicators like identifying the risk level that could be on medium to very high level; the time the plant and equipment goes down unplanned; the percentage of the incidents or accidents that result in injury compared with those that could not in a specific time frame; average time taken for the rectification of high risk hazards; and percentage of the hazards rectified in a particular time frame. The performance measures are also undertaken looking at the psychosocial working environment, which provides capabilities and opportunities to employees to add to OHS management as they contribute their services in problem solving and decision-making. The indicators are the percentage of the employees competent in inductions, number of professional degree holders and training programmes undertaken by the company; rating of the communication effectiveness and employee participation in OHS management through surveys from the workforce. As regards monitoring, OHS is assessed for the effectiveness of systems and practices. The indicators are percentage change in audit score over particular frame of time and proportionate number of corrective actions undertaken over specified time period. These indicators should be considered while measuring the effectiveness of the OHS programmes and strategies of an organization. Audit Instruments and Tools There are different kinds of audit instruments which could be formulated for the auditing process of the OHS management systems and these are: the Diekemper and Spartz (D&S) method, the Method for Industrial Safety and Health Activity Assessment, the International Safety Rating system, the Complete Health and Safety Evaluation (CHASE) and Process Risk Management Audit (PRIMA), an auditing tool for the quantitative assessment of process safety management systems etc. (Bigelow & Robson 2006: 4) The process safety management system evaluation would be used as a system of evaluation for the quantitative risk management system. This safety management ensures good safety technological development; ensures safety management services for the identification and evaluation of the process related hazards; makes assessment of the safeguard measures; and identify other measures to reduce the opportunities of risks. With the help of the process management system, management would be able to formulate many of the studies related to the analysis of the risks, formulate consequence analysis, calculate quantitative risk assessment and fault tree assessment and also assist in the formulation of the emergency preparedness and response system program. Person Responsible for Conducting the Audit Report Auditor General would be responsible for formulating the audit report. The Auditor General would look into the extent to which the statement of the proposal conforms to the requirements as laid down by the Occupational Health and Safety Department. He would ensure the information and assumptions laid down in the proposal are of qualitative in nature. He would also ensure the proposed measures would provide adequate framework for the overall audit assessment of the Occupational Health and Safety procedures. The audit report will also be prepared keeping in mind complete information and explanations necessary to gain assurance regarding the statement of proposal does not contain any misconstrued statements and that the decisions regarding the methods and procedures for the safety of the workers are taken adequately within the prescribed cost. Managing Director, CEO and the operator would be consulted for preparing the audit report. Strategies for collecting of information Information pertaining to the risk assessment tasks can be done for the development of the Audit tools. These tools can be formed so that they are easily used to assess quality and maintenance of audit. For e.g. site level audit tool, which could be used to assist worksites to analyze their companies safety management system. This tool ensures that the work areas are inspected for any risk factor associated, review of the documentation, and response of the staff to the questions about the OHS system. In case of any emergency situation and any activity requiring immediate action then it is noted immediately. The search strategy can also be used to collect the information and this strategy is being adequately implied in the occupational health and safety areas. For the audit report, data can also be collected through assessments of the various working areas, and feedback from the employees. Cost Factor This Audit report will be cost friendly as from the analysis of the risk to the process of the implementation would involve very little cost as the collection of the data would be based on the surveys and feedback from the management team and workers and the policies adopted to ensure safety of the workers would also involve least possible investment. Reference List Bigelow, P.L. & Robson, L.S. 2006. Occupational health and safety management audit instruments: A literature review. [Online] Available: http://www.iwh.on.ca/system/files/sbe/summary_ohs_audit_instruments_2006.pdf [10 January 2009] National Occupational and Health Safety Commission. OHS Performance Measurement in the Construction Industry. [Online] Available: http://www.ascc.gov.au/NR/rdonlyres/11CB0577-DCDA-467D-ADCC-D984F5B12C0E/0/opmconppi_fact.pdf [10 January 2009] OHSAUSTRALIA. Welcome to OHS Australia. [Online] Available: http://www.ohsaustralia.com.au/ [10 January 2009] Read More