At The Safety Conference in Sydney in October 2009, Dr Ian Woods, a senior research analyst for AMP Capital Investors, will advise Australian employers that the cost of workplace injuries on their businesses could be around 6% of their profit. According to a media release in support of the conference Dr Woods signals three occupational … Continue reading “Injuries cost business 6% of their profit”
Businesses, more often than not, place OHS as a subset of the Human Resources Department. This gives the HR manager considerable organisational clout but often keeps the importance of OHS constrained. This structure may be functional but also reinforces that the belief that safety can be addressed in HR terms and that is not necessarily … Continue reading “HR management needs to engage with safety management”
I’m a big fan of minimising the rehashing of OH&S guides. In my WorkSafe Victoria days (the latter ones when I was doing guidance material editing) I did what I could to encourage adoption of other people’s good work. And just today I found an example of a British Health & Safety Executive (HSE) guide … Continue reading “What a good safety management system looks like”
I have experienced two situations recently which made me question the value of corporate mission statements. Recently the CEO of an Australian company spoke about how safety was a core value and how committed to safety she was. She is a recognised leader in safety and directly involves herself in safety management and meetings. … Continue reading “Vision statements = hypocrisy (mostly)”
A good safety manager is one who is aware of the social context of the job and the social consequences of injury on employees. The manager also needs to consider the operational parameters of the company. This is a difficult balancing act that many spend their careers trying to attain. But what if morality or … Continue reading “Morality in business”
There have been several incidents recently that illustrate the unenviable pressures on inspectors and Australian OHS regulators. The Tasmanian Coroner found that the mining inspectorate of Workplace Standards Tasmania was “inadequate” and incapable of “of carrying out its core function of inspecting and enforcing best safety practices within the mining industry.” Two inspectors for that … Continue reading “Role of OHS Inspectors”
Health funding and management is a constant political issue. The attention increases hugely during election campaigns like the one that is currently occurring in the Australian state of Queensland. This week the leader of the opposition parties, Lawrence Springborg, called for the release of a government report into the sexual attack on a nurse and security … Continue reading “CEO loses job over safety failures”