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4.2 Active and Reactive Monitoring
The difference between active and reactive monitoring
| Active monitoring | Reactive monitoring |
|---|---|
| Proactively checking conditions, arrangements and controls without waiting for an adverse event | Learning from identified incidents, ill health and other failures |
| A measure of your successes | A measure of your failures |
| Monitors the design, development, installation and operation of management arrangements, which are preventive in nature | Monitors evidence of poor health and safety practice, but can also identify better practice that can be passed to other parts of the business |
| Examples: routine inspections of premises, plant and equipment by staff; appropriate health surveillance to identify early effects and inform control improvements; the number and quality of risk assessments (for example ergonomic or noise assessments); provision of health and safety training; committee meetings held; safety review meetings; safety surveys; safety tours by groups or individual managers; safety sampling | Examples: accidents and incidents; cases of ill health; sickness absence records |
Active monitoring methods and their usefulness
The following techniques should be used to measure the safety and health management system actively.
- Inspections on a regular basis, to identify existing conditions and compare them with agreed performance objectives.
- Safety sampling: systematic sampling of particular dangerous activities, processes or areas.
- Tours: unscheduled workplace inspections by top management to check things such as the wearing of PPE and housekeeping.
- Safety surveys that concentrate on one activity, such as manual handling, a training programme or workers' attitudes to safety.
- Audits: systematic, independent evaluations of management arrangements against defined criteria within an agreed scope.
- Health or medical surveillance, using techniques such as audiometry and blood or urine analysis.
- Benchmarking: comparing the organisation's performance in certain areas with that of other organisations with similar processes and risks.
OHS inspections
Regular inspection measures how well the workplace complies with health and safety requirements. Hazards are found in good time, so the company can put corrective measures in place. Systematic inspection is a helpful way to monitor performance actively. Inspections allow you to:
- find existing and potential hazards
- understand jobs and tasks better
- determine the underlying causes of hazards
- recommend corrective action
- monitor the steps taken to remove hazards or control risk, such as engineering controls, administrative controls, policies, procedures and PPE
- meet regulatory and management system requirements
Look at every element of the workplace: people, environment, equipment and materials.
- People: the number of workers, demographics, shift schedules and supervision.
- Environment: the structure and setting of the workplace and the conditions around workers, such as noise, vibration, lighting, temperature and ventilation.
- Equipment: machinery, tools and apparatus for producing a product or service, plus any safety devices and PPE required.
- Materials: items such as parts, ingredients, chemicals, services and wastes.
OHS sampling
Sampling checks selected activities or records. A large sample is not necessarily representative: selection, timing, shifts and task variation matter. Use a competent sampling strategy and investigate significant exceptions rather than assume every unsampled activity is compliant. Examples:
- interviewing some workers about PPE and extending the results to all workers
- checking a few permits to work and extending the findings to all permits in use
OHS tours
A walk-round inspection of the workplace with the directors or management shows the workforce that management is committed. It identifies good and bad practice, and it is always followed by a formal report. A safety tour may be used to:
- show visible leadership on health, safety and wellbeing
- recognise and reinforce good health and safety practice
- give a chance to identify hazards and risks, including those caused by unsafe acts and unsafe conditions
- encourage two-way discussion on health, safety and wellbeing
- encourage safe behaviour and raise general safety standards
A safety tour is generally people-oriented. It does not replace audits and routine inspections, which are more technical. It is good practice on the journey towards zero accidents.
Summary notes for Element 4 · Cheat sheet · Glossary. A study aid, not published or endorsed by NEBOSH.