Question:
Purpose:
To apply your understanding of the provisions and principles of the Alberta Occupational Health and Safety Act within an organizational setting.
You are a manager who has recently hired three new supervisors to supervise staff within your organization. You can choose between the following two organizations which are both located in Calgary, Alberta:
- An office supply business where your supervisors are responsible for the stock room, the office furniture assembly area and the office delivery service, OR
- A hospital where your supervisors are responsible for food services, housekeeping services and laundry services.
You have been concerned about the recent number of safety incidents resulting in injuries and lost time (employees away on leave because of their injuries) in these particular work areas. You believe it is very important to orient your new supervisors to the importance of health and safety and to ensure they understand their roles and responsibilities. In particular you want to orient them on the following five components of the health and safety management system within your organization which was put in place to ensure compliance with the Alberta Occupational Health and Safety Act:
- Identification of workplace hazards
- Occupational Health and Safety Training
- Workplace inspections
- Accident investigation
- Accident reporting
Includes the following sections
- Identification of five responsibilities of a supervisor (representing the employer).
- Identification of five responsibilities of a worker.
- Description of each of the five components of the health and safety management system noted above.
- Explanation of the importance of each component to ensure the organization is in compliance with the Occupational Health and Safety Act.
- Description of two types of metrics each supervisor is to prepare to measure how their work areas are performing in regard to health and safety.
Answer:
- In hospital, supervisors are responsible for various duties such as, food services, house-keeping services and laundry services. They must ensure the health and safety of all the workers. They need to handle several responsibilities and they are as follows:
- Conducting orientation and training of employees: Training is important for them to understand the ways to work with the equipments properly in a safe manner.
- Enforcing safe work practices: In order to avoid accidents, supervisors must enforce safety.
- Preventing and correcting workplace hazards: It is the duty of supervisors to remind employees about the ways to prevent hazards.
- Investigating workplace accidents: In order to ensure the number of occupationally injured employees, supervisors must investigate properly.
- Promoting quick return to work: Injured employees, who are on leave in the organization, must be encouraged to return to the work (National Institute of Health Office of Management, n.d.).
- In order to maintain the occupational health and safety, workers also play a vital role. They also have several responsibilities and they are as follows:
- Following the guidelines: Following the safety guidelines of any organization is always a duty of the workers.
- Gaining enough knowledge: Before handling equipments, workers should get enough knowledge in order to avoid accidents.
- Reporting immediately: If workers find any hazards, they should report to the supervisor immediately.
- Obeying the supervisor: Maintaining a good relationship and obeying the supervisor is necessary to maintain a safe working environment.
- Updating regularly: A regular update of the working practices can be helpful to avoid hazards (Health and Safety Management in Healthcare, 2010).
- There are five different components of health and safety management system.
- Identification of workplace hazards: If any health hazards occur among the workers, while working in the workplace then that should be identified properly.
- Occupational health and safety training: There should be an arrangement of training for the workers about the health and safety in the workplace.
- Workplace inspections: A regular inspection of workplace safety should be done. It will help to identify hazards if any.
- Accident investigation: If any accident occurs in the workplace, then proper investigation should be done to measure the actual amount of loss.
- Accident reporting: Workers should report the occurrence of accidents to their supervisor immediately (Loeppke et al., 2015).
- According to Alberta Occupational Health and Safety Act, all the components of health and safety management system are necessary. It helps to identify the actually causes of health hazards of the employees which in turn, provides an idea to prevent that. The components are helpful in developing a positive working culture in the workplace. Inspection, investigation and reporting of accidents are highly necessary in keeping all the workers safe (Sinelnikov, Inouye & Kerper, 2015).
- Supervisors should prepare strategic planning or metrics to help the employees with the occupational health and safety law in the hospital area. They should conduct a meeting make all the workers aware of the act. Apart from that, arranging proper training session for the workers about the health and safety law will also be helpful in avoiding the workplace safety hazards among the workers (Sinelnikov, Inouye & Kerper, 2015).
References
Health and Safety Management in Healthcare. (2010). Information sheet. Retrieved from https://www.hsa.ie/eng/Publications_and_Forms/Publications/Healthcare_Sector/Health_and_Safety_Management_in_Healthcare.pdf
Loeppke, R. R., Hohn, T., Baase, C., Bunn, W. B., Burton, W. N., Eisenberg, B. S., ... & Hymel, P. A. (2015). Integrating health and safety in the workplace: how closely aligning health and safety strategies can yield measurable benefits. Journal of occupational and environmental medicine, 57(5), 585-597. Retrieved from https://pdfs.semanticscholar.org/8be5/03edb2dae0b837fa12fd2a4003ff3cdd29e9.pdf
National Institute of Health Office of Management. (n.d.). Division of Occupational Health and Safety. Retrieved from https://www.ors.od.nih.gov/sr/dohs/HealthAndWellness/Pages/Safety-Responsibilities-for-Supervisors.aspx
Sinelnikov, S., Inouye, J., & Kerper, S. (2015). Using leading indicators to measure occupational health and safety performance. Safety science, 72, 240-248. Retrieved from https://pdfs.semanticscholar.org/76a8/881087d69d0f1f30bad551de7ee30d07a74b.pdf
