Creating A WHS System For Workplace Safety And Security

Financial Stability and Human Resources for WHS System

Discuss about the implementation of Health and Safety management system in an organisation.

• The employees and the members of work safety management team should have knowledge base regarding the Work health and safety management.
• The work safety management team should have a proper understanding regarding the nature of the business operation of the organization and should take initiatives to improve work safety management accordingly.
• The work safety management team should make sure that all the general employees have the basic idea about the dos and don’ts at the time of emergency.
• The members of the work safety management team along with the managing body of the organization should take initiatives regarding these issues that will comply to the standards set in the Work Health and Safety Act 2011(Qld).
• The work health and safety management team members should ensure that they possess all the necessary resources to fight the odds in the workplace.
• The work safety management team should look for the loop holes in the safety system and if they identify any, they should report about it to the supervisors and take proper actions.

According to the type of the business processes of the organization, the WHS team members should set a system of WHS in the workplace. As provided in the case study, the organization is the result of a merger of two business organizations. Those two organizations are an insurance company and the other one is a call center. The new organization is located at the central business district area of the city. In this way, it can be said that mostly employees perform deskwork in the premises of the workplace. Thus the safety and security system should be as per the requirement of the business organization. The WHS team should make the WHS system in the following way;

• There should be adequate communication among the employees of the organization.
• The employees should abide by the health and safety policies set by the management of the organization.
• There should be some specific programs to identify the hazardous elements present within the premises of the organization.
• Within the office premises there should be proper arrangements regarding first aid treatment and there should be a first aid box in the office.
• In the workplace, there should be the presence of a continuous mechanism for identifying the hazardous elements and evaluating the potential of those elements.

In the present scenario, the management o the organization will have to stress on two important factors and those are financial back up and adequate human resources to execute the initiatives taken by the managing body (Bahr 2014). It is seen that to implement the policies the management the managing body needs to invest a fortune as that would help them to install expensive modern machineries and equipments to identify and prevent the elements of hazards within the workplace. Adequate human resources is also very important to sustain the system of WHS within the organization. It is undoubted that without adequate financial stability, the management of the organization would not be able to sustain the WHS team to support and secure the WHS system of the business organization. The team of WHS of the organization should have proper training regarding this issue and to make it happen the management will have to hire professionals with great skills in this regard to enhance the ability of the employees of the WHS team. Apart from the financial stability, the management should acknowledge the fact that after buying useful equipments and hiring an experienced troop of trainers regarding identifying and preventing workplace hazards, the most important duty of the managing body would be to recruit new professionals to make a WHS team in the organization, or they can choose professionals from the existing workforce. The team members of the WHS team of the organization should have the qualities like excellent observation power, vision to foresee the future, have the capability to determine the fatality of the hazardous situation, compassionate approach. These are the qualities or characteristics those should be present in a competent WHS team member.

Appropriate method for consultation to comply with legislation

Consulting with accordance to the legislation imposed by the government to manage health and safety issues in an organization is essential. As opined by Straker et al. (2016), if all the employees with ease can communicate within themselves, the identification of the hazards and the risk factors would be much easier. Consultation can be explained as a two way process between the management and the employees of the organization.

The management of the organization should ensure that

• The employees talk among themselves regarding WHS issues.
• The managing body should listen to the issues from the employees.
• The management of the organization should consider the opinions of the employees before making any decisions.
• The management should advise the employees regarding the outcome of the consultation.

Training WHS team Members

Apart from these, when required, the management should consult with the WHS team. When it would be better to consult with the employees are mentioned below;

• While identifying the hazardous elements.
• While making decisions regarding the techniques to eradicate the risks.
• While proposing the amendments that can potentially affect the health and safety issues of the employees.
• While making decisions regarding the health and safety issues

Three possible indicators which could be used to measure and evaluate WHS performance

Three major indicator of performance in the organizations are the rate of reports regarding hazard and incidents within the workplace, the level of Safe work procedures and the rate of risk assessments. Evaluating these factors, the management of the business organization would be able to determine the level of performance of the WHS team. 

The management can see the frequency of the reports submitted by the WHS team of the organization and the number of hazardous elements present within the premises of the workplace and then decide the performance level regarding this issue (Bahr 2014). Apart from that, the management can count the number of resolved issues regarding WHS issues to determine the level of performance of the WHS team.

Monitoring the completion of the safe work procedures regarding the operative actions taken by the management of the organization can potentially improve the level of performance of the WHS team of the business organization.

The governing body of the organization can monitor the rate of completion if the risk assessment in the organization can determine the performance level of the members of WHS team of that particular company. These three aspects are the major indicators of the performance level of the WHS team and the management body of the organization should focus on these three aspects to determine the level of performance for the employees under WHS team.

Task	Check list	Elements	date	Initial
Contract of employment
		Job classification
		Award/ Agreement
		Status of employment
		Job description
		Probationary period
		Leave
		Pay rates
Hours of work and roasters
		Availability of the rosters
		Where to apply for the time off
		Where the rosters get posted
Standards and procedures documents
		Where they are located
		Smoking
		Uniform
		Reporting absences
Company policies
		Disciplinary and grievances procedures
		Personal visits and telephonic conversations
		Parking
EEO and harassment policies
		Copy sighted and available
OHS and rehabilitation policy
		Copy sighted and available
OHS hazards (provided training/ scheduled)
		Equipment
		Chemical
		Environmental
		Manual handling
Emergency procedures
		Whom to contact at the time of emergency
		First aid stations and officers
		Evacuation procedures and muster points
Tour of workplace		Outlets
		Back of house areas
		Front house areas
		Grounds
Introductions		Colleagues
		Supervisors
		Management
		Other areas
Paperwork
		Tax declaration
		Superannuation
		Employee detail form
		Union membership
		Bank account details

Source: Created by author

WHS training for the managers or supervisors

It is a matter of fact that in today’s world, in the business organizations, the managers and the leaders should have a proper training regarding the work health and safety systems of the organizations in order to ensure a safe workplace for all the general employees. In most cases the training received by the managers or supervisors takes only one day or a couple of days to complete (Chen et al. 2014). These types of courses are especially designed for the managers with specified responsibilities regarding safety issues. There are no pre entry requirements, pre requisites and co requisites for the completion of the training and development procedure of the managers of an business organization regarding WHS systems.

In most cases, these types of courses focus to provide a deep and thorough understanding of the potential role of the managers for the incessant improvement of the safety systems within the workplace (Britt et al. 2013). These courses allow the managers and the supervisors to develop their skills and expertise regarding the issues of WHS system. In this way, the managers and the leaders will attain the ability to effectively eradicate the hazardous elements from the workplace. According to Chen et al. (2014), the course of these types of training includes:

• Legislative responsibilities
• Risk management process
• Importance of positive safety performance
• Consultation
• Incident management
• Organizational safety culture

After the completion of the course, the managers and the supervisors get the basic idea of

• Roles and responsibilities of the safety managers
• Processes regarding risk management
• The requirements regarding consultation and incident management
• Safety culture of the organization

Consultation Process for WHS System

Apart from the managers, the management of the organization should provide thorough training and development session with the general employees. As stated by Straker et al. (2016), it is essential to develop the skills and awareness of the general employees of the business organization. There is a legal aspect of this procedure and according to the legislation the management of the business organization should include:

• Safety committee training
• First aid training
• Training regarding operating cranes
• Training regarding construction
• Training on manual handling
• Training regarding coordinating
• Training regarding forklift driving

Besides providing training regarding these issues, the management of the business organization can allow the employees to receive training regarding:

• Training regarding legislative requirements
• OHS audit
• Investigation of the hazardous incidents
• Assessments regarding specific hazards
• Job safety analysis

Thus, it can be said that the management of the business organization should focus on the training and developmental issues of the managers as well as for the general employees of the organization. Apart from the team dedicated for the WHS system, the general employees should have basic training and awareness regarding WHS because it would enhance the general safety of the employees of the organization (Bahr 2014). If the general employees have the basic knowledge regarding this issue, at the time of emergency they would be able to act accordingly and the WHS professionals will be able to perform more effectively to eradicate the hazardous elements from the workplace.

References

Abubakar, U., 2015. An overview of the occupational safety and health systems of Nigeria, UK, USA, Australia and China: Nigeria being the reference case study. American Journal of Educational Research, 3(11), pp.1350-1358.

Bahr, N.J., 2014. System safety engineering and risk assessment: a practical approach. CRC Press.

Bong, S., Rameezdeen, R., Zuo, J., Li, R.Y.M. and Ye, G., 2015. The designer’s role in workplace health and safety in the construction industry: post-harmonized regulations in South Australia. International Journal of Construction Management, 15(4), pp.276-287.

Britt, H., Miller, G.C., Henderson, J., Bayram, C., Valenti, L., Harrison, C., Charles, J., Pan, Y., Zhang, C., Pollack, A.J. and O’Halloran, J., 2013. General Practice Activity in Australia 2012-13: BEACH: Bettering the Evaluation and Care of Health(No. 33). Sydney University Press.

Chen, J., Ou, L., Hillman, K., Flabouris, A., Bellomo, R., Hollis, S.J. and Assareh, H., 2014. The impact of implementing a rapid response system: a comparison of cardiopulmonary arrests and mortality among four teaching hospitals in Australia. Resuscitation, 85(9), pp.1275-1281.

Duckett, S. and Willcox, S., 2015. The Australian health care system (No. Ed. 5). Oxford University Press.

Healy, J., 2016. Improving health care safety and quality: reluctant regulators. Routledge. 

Holt, A.S.J. and Allen, J., 2015. Principles of health and safety at work. Routledge.

Josif, C.M., Kruske, S., Kildea, S.V. and Barclay, L.M., 2017. The quality of health services provided to remote dwelling aboriginal infants in the top end of northern Australia following health system changes: a qualitative analysis. BMC pediatrics, 17(1), p.93.

Kushniruk, A.W., Bates, D.W., Bainbridge, M., Househ, M.S. and Borycki, E.M., 2013. National efforts to improve health information system safety in Canada, the United States of America and England. International journal of medical informatics, 82(5), pp.e149-e160.

Magrabi, F., Baker, M., Sinha, I., Ong, M.S., Harrison, S., Kidd, M.R., Runciman, W.B. and Coiera, E., 2015. Clinical safety of England’s national programme for IT: A retrospective analysis of all reported safety events 2005 to 2011. International journal of medical informatics, 84(3), pp.198-206.

Newnam, S., Warmerdam, A., Sheppard, D., Griffin, M. and Stevenson, M., 2016, September. Identifying the organisational determinants of work-related road traffic injury. In Australasian Road Safety Conference, 2016, Canberra, ACT, Australia.

Stewart, A., 2013. Stewart’s guide to employment law (Vol. 3). Sydney: Federation Press.

Straker, L., Dunstan, D., Gilson, N. and Healy, G., 2016. Sedentary work. Evidence on an emergent work health and safety issue.

Xiang, J., Bi, P., Pisaniello, D., Hansen, A. and Sullivan, T., 2014. Association between high temperature and work-related injuries in Adelaide, South Australia, 2001–2010. Occup Environ Med, 71(4), pp.246-252.