'You can't manage what you can't measure' – Drucker

‘If you don’t know where you are going, chances are you will end up somewhere else’ – Yogi Berra

Measurement has been a problem in the safety field for years. Despite analyzing the standards over and over again, it has been difficult to come up with meaningful measures of safety performance.

Safety metrics are very important for many reasons. Through safety metrics you can track your progress either up or down.

The primary purpose of measuring health and safety performance is to provide information on the progress and current status of the strategies, processes and activities used by an organization to control risks to health and safety.

Measurement information sustains the operation and development of the health and safety management system, and so the control of risk, by:

• providing information on how the system operates in practice;
• identifying areas where remedial action is required;
• providing a basis for continual improvement; and
• providing feedback and motivation.

The following flow chart presents the role of performance measure in a Health & Safety Management System.

There 2 basic types of measures: 

1. Activity measures: What step do we take to ensure safety? 

   • Are supervisors inspecting more frequently than before?
   • Are they finding more violations?
   • Are more new employees being oriented in safety before starting work?
   • Are more rewards given to employees who work safely?
   • New safety campaigns and initiatives
2. Results measures: Have we accomplished those safety objectives?
   • Before the accident
     • Are people working more safely than before?
     • Are physical conditions improving?
     • Safety sampling
     • Safety inspections
     • Interviews
     • Observations
   • After the accident
     
     • Are people working more safely than before?
     • Are physical conditions improving?
     • Safety sampling
     • Safety inspections
     • Interviews
     • Observations

The basic questions you have to answer while preparing a Health & Safety Measuring program are:

• Why measure
• What to measure
• When to measure
• Who should measure
• How to measure

Process Engineering may support efficiently your organization on setting an effective Health & Safety Measuring by:

• Analyzing processes and defining the measuring indicators.
• Developing measuring procedures and training the involved personnel
• Evaluating measuring results and developing and prioritizing action plans to improve performance.

Process Engineering can support you in delivering new Management Systems approaches using up-to-date Management Tools in order to minimize risk, manage growth and support your existing business strategies.

For more information, please contact the technical department of Process Engineering.