Companies should not be satisfied with a low injury rate if they are experiencing repeat type injuries. Repeat injuries should be included when determining a company’s safety performance. A repeat type incident means that certain controls, procedures or actions have failed. These include

• investigations
• action plans
• communication
• training
• monitoring action plans

The following recommendations will assist to prevent these incidents: 

High-Quality incident investigations  

Suitably qualified persons should facilitate incident investigations.  These persons and the investigation teams must ensure that the quality of investigations is of a high standard and that the root causes of incidents are identified. Inadequate incident investigations prevent the development of suitable action plans to manage or eliminate risks.

Suitable management action plans

Once the investigation is concluded, management and the investigation team should develop action plans which address the root causes and contributing factors that were identified during the investigation. The action plans must be developed with a “Zero Injury Mindset” to eliminate the possibility of the incident being repeated.

A “Zero Injury Mindset” means that the persons developing the action plans must be certain that the action points will prevent the incident from recurring.  If this is not the case, the investigation should continue until suitable action plans have been developed.

Good communication with the relevant persons

The details of the incident should be clearly communicated to all relevant employees and contractors to ensure that they understand what occurred, the causes and the resulting action plans.  This communication should also include details of revised standards, procedures, engineering revisions and any other changes implemented to prevent a recurrence.

The responsible manager or supervisor should create this communication as soon as possible after the incident investigation has been completed. All relevant departments and operations should be required to share this content throughout the organisation within an agreed time frame.

Follow-up audits

Follow-up audits play an important role in ensuring that repeat type incidents do not occur.  In most instances, the follow-up audits will aim to determine whether the action items developed during the investigation have been completed. However, it is more important for these audits to determine whether the actions implemented are adequate to prevent a repeat of the incident.

These audits should also be conducted with a “Zero Injury Mindset”. This means that if the implemented action plans are ineffective at preventing a repeat of the incident, the team should return to the drawing board and address all pertinent issues again.

Holding persons accountable for their actions

Persons failing to adhere to the company’s safety standards, rules and procedures and who endanger the safety of any person should be held accountable for their actions.  Some organisations believe that safety and disciplinary actions are not related. This is incorrect because disciplinary actions can discourage unsafe behaviour.

If an organisation tolerates at-risk behaviour, and non-compliance with safety standards, rules or procedures, employees are likely to take risks and work in an unsafe manner. Conversely, organisations that do not condone such behaviour generally achieve a much higher level of safety compliance. These organisations mostly exhibit a good overall safety performance.

Supervisors and foremen who knowingly permit their subordinates to work in an unsafe manner should also be held accountable and disciplined accordingly. 

Ongoing safety programme

Once all of the above has been completed, managers and safety professionals should revise some of the focus areas of the safety programme to ensure that employees and contractors remember the incident and the issues surrounding it.  This includes: 

• Focusing a selected number of behavioural audits on the issues identified during the investigation.
• Focusing certain system audits on the issues identified during the investigation.
• Developing and providing safety toolbox talks which address issues arising from the incident.
• Developing and providing safety posters to support communication about the incident.

Senior managers and safety professionals should only be satisfied that enough has been done to prevent a repeat of the incident when they have treated an incident with a “Zero Injury Mindset”. Managers and safety professionals are responsible for providing a safe and healthy working environment for all. Therefore, they must ensure that all departments learn from the incidents and suitable actions are implemented.

Neil Enslin

Occupational Health and Safety Manage