Question

In what ways does establishing a safety and health management system in an organization complement and improve compliance with the OSHA standards? Provide examples in your discussion.

Your response should be at least 200 words in length.

Answer 1

There are certain characteristics of a Health and Safety management system that should be in place to ensure that the system functions most efficiently and effectively. These characteristics are sufficiently generic to apply to any type of petroleum installation - whether an offshore or onshore oil/gas exploration and production facility, a refinery or a petrochemical complex, bulk or retail marketing outlet, etc. The implementation of effective safety and health management programs reduce the incidence of accidents, illness, injuries and it also ensures that hazards in the workplace are eliminated or controlled to a large extent. Health and Safety management policy spell out the values, beliefs and commitments of the organization towards health, the safety of its employees, community and at the macro level of the nation.

There are many ways by which health and safety management system work and compliance with OSHA regulations because it has a policy that  

1. Safety and environment protection is everybody's business in the organization and all statutory requirements must be complied with at all times.

2. All person must use approved safe working procedures (SOP) without making any risky shortcuts and all personnel - owner or contractors - must be given relevant training before assigning them to work.

3. All plants, facilities and work procedures/ systems must be audited periodically by in-house teams as well as external agencies.

4. Plant and the ambient environment, as well as various effluents, must be monitored continuously to maintain a clean and safe environment in and around the plants.

5. A very high standard of housekeeping must be maintained at all places of work-plants, offices and facilities.

6. Every employee must be subjected to medical check-up for early identification and treatment of any occupational health hazard.

7. All employees must keep abreast with the latest codes, standards and practices on health, safety and environment.

8. All accidents, however small, must be investigated and followed up. The lessons learnt from these accidents should be disseminated to all levels of workforce

9.No modifications in the plant, facilities will be done without proper scrutiny and approval by an authorized person(s). This lower indirect costs, including training and compensation for replacement workers, repair of damaged property, accident investigation and implementation of corrective action, schedule delays and additional administrative time.

10. No contractor will be engaged without ascertaining his safety performance/record and Non-compliance with health and safety rule will attract severe disciplinary action. This will cause a reduction in the direct costs associated with illness, injuries and fatalities, such as medical expenses, workers’ compensation payments and increased premiums, additional insurance claims and lost time on the job.