Construction Health and Safety Management

Alan Griffith, Tim Howarth

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2014
• Print ISBN: 9781138140226
• eBook ISBN: 9781317876403
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Technology & Engineering
• Subtopic: Construction & Architectural Engineering
• Index: Technology & Engineering

Provides knowledge, understanding and guidance to the detailed and complex requirements of health and safety legislation as applied to the construction industry. This book provides the knowledge, understanding and guidance to the CDM regulations that students in particular will need when they start working in the industry. It links in with the CIOB Education Framework at levels 2 and 3.

Part C Effective health and safety management

10 Health and safety management within the construction process

Introduction

This brief chapter introduces the conceptual thrust of health and safety management in the context of its application within the construction process. It should be seen as an introduction to the chapters which form Part C of this book. In appreciating the role, duties and responsibilities of the principal contractor, which is the focus of this book, it is important also to be cognizant of the contributions and responsibilities of other participants to the construction process.

The management of health and safety is without doubt one of the most important functions within and throughout the construction process. Construction work is intrinsically dangerous. Injury to persons on and around construction sites occur regularly. It is fortunate that many injuries are minor, but, others are serious and some are fatal. It was seen in Chapter 2 that the construction industry has over the last 20 years suffered a poor health and safety record. While the number of fatalities declined in the 1990s, this must not encourage complacency. Construction management has an unquestionable and definite challenge to ensure a safe working environment.

The Construction (Design and Management) Regulations 1994 (HSE, 1994), introduced welcome and much needed legislation to construction health and safety. The Regulations focus purposefully on the management of health and safety throughout the total construction process. Responsibility is unambiguous and specifically placed upon clients, designers and contractors to be proactive in the planning, coordination and management of health and safety. The Regulations bring into focus the identification of potential hazards to health and dangers to safety through each major phase of the construction process, together with the assessment of their risk.

The health and safety plan

The CDM Regulations require that project health and safety planning and management be considered in two parts. The first part focuses on the client's project evaluation and design processes with the objective of producing a pre-tender health and safety plan. The second part focuses on the site production processes with the objective for the appointed principal contractor being to produce a construction phase health and safety plan. It is the essential element of planning within each part which forms the basis for a systematic management approach, within which risk assessment is an important theme.

Establishing effective health and safety management is the goal of the principal contractor supported by the inputs of the main parties to the construction project. The lead consultant, representing the client and working with sub-consultants, is charged with delivering the pre-tender health and safety plan and implementing project supervisory procedures that make a full contribution to project health and safety. The principal contractor is charged with delivering the construction health and safety plan. Moreover, the principal contractor must establish a management system and working procedures which ensure the maintenance of safe working conditions and practices.

A well-formulated project health and safety management approach will identify, assess and control risk both within and across the professional boundaries of the parties. Feedback loops within both the designer's and the contractor's systems will do much to ensure that information is directed not only within the span of control of the individual party but contributes to the management processes within other project phases. Within the context of the CDM Regulations a full and effective contribution will be in evidence as the principal output from the planning and management approach to health and safety in the delivery of the health and safety file - a complete profile of health and safety planning and management throughout the construction project.

Health and safety management system

The most appropriate way for the principal contractor to address the requirements of construction health and safety is to establish within its organization a health and safety management system. This might be a dedicated system or one encompassed within other organizational systems, such as total quality management. By adopting this approach the organization is likely to generate the necessary company policies, culture, procedures and practices to ensure that health and safety is given the attention and respect that it truly demands. Moreover, effective health and safety management will be based on a sound corporate system, with project procedures which consider health and safety as a major contributor to the organization's holistic success.

A concerted approach to health and safety management in construction is absolutely essential. Government has recognized and the industry accepted that the undesirable accident record of construction must be improved. The CDM Regulations place clear and onerous responsibilities upon the main contractual parties to deliver effective health and safety management. It is suggested throughout Part C of this book that the implementation of a clearly conceived, well-structured and highly organized health and safety management system is the most appropriate way for any principal contractor to ensure that it makes a full contribution to providing a safe construction process.

Key points

This chapter has identified that:

• The CDM Regulations (HSE, 1994) focus on the management of health and safety throughout the total construction process.
• The CDM Regulations require the establishment of a health and safety plan, delivered in two parts - (1) the pre-tender health and safety plan, and (2) the construction phase health and safety plan.
• A well-formulated project health and safety management approach will provide for the purposeful interaction between the two-part process.
• An appropriate way for the principal contractor to address the requirements of health and safety management and meet its obligations under the CDM Regulations is to establish a health and safety management system within its organization.

Reference

Health and Safety Executive (HSE) (1994) The Construction (Design and Management) Regulations 1994, HMSO, London.

11 Organizational framework

Introduction

This chapter focuses upon the consideration which needs to be given to establishing an effective organizational framework to underpin successful health and safety management. Contracting organizations, like organizations in many other business sectors, have had to respond to considerable changes within their respective marketplace. In so doing, many have established management systems in response to particular demands, such as quality assurance, environmental impact and, indeed, health and safety. It is not uncommon for the term 'system' to be confused with 'management'. In this chapter the concept of the organization establishing a parent management system and specific management concepts being the subsystem functions, of which health and safety is one important function, is presented. The chapter provides the basis for appreciating the fundamental aspects and issues associated with organizational framework and sets the scene for considering management structure and health and safety management system development.

The influence of change

There has been considerable change in the orientation and practice of management by organizations in all sectors of business over the last 20 years. The customer focused marketplace and highly competitive business positioning has demanded clear attention to performance improvement and added value delivery. Changing and more demanding business environments have highlighted the need for organizations to have dynamic and strong strategic leadership coupled with robust and effective directive and operational management. Organizational change appears to have become synonymous with outsourcing, downsizing and re-engineering. Such practices have been widespread and their effects have often been radical, severe and not without some degree of resistance within many organizations.

There has been a considerable culture shift from the morphostatic, or inward looking, organization, with its traditional and often outdated business practices, to the morphogenic, or open-minded, organization in which change is proactively championed and even revered as being prerequisite to business dynamicism (Griffith and Watson, 1999). Such change has influenced most significantly employment structures and the skills and attributes valued by organizations (Anderson and Marshall, 1996). In the 1970s, bureaucratic type structures and strictly prescribed job specifications valued in employees the educational basics such as literacy, honesty and reliability. In the 1980s, a greater focus on business operations and in particular the drive for quality led to a preoccupation with personal skills development such as communication, self-desire and assertiveness. In the 1990s, the flatter lean-organization culture, where more employees were responsible directly for parts of the business, led to a greater need for commercial and entrepreneurial vision and the targeted delivery of outcomes by empowered project managed teams.

With the evolution of organizations into the morphogenic type, external influences become equally as important as intra-organizational aspects to structure and human resourcing. Greater cohesiveness in management is needed to accommodate more demanding customer requirements within the marketplace. Competitiveness must be better understood to ensure the added value of products or services. Increasingly stringent legislation, for example in environmental matters and in particular health and safety, has had to be recognized and responded to. Such important factors require that organizations are clear in the designation of corporate management roles and that project managers are supported in their enabling and empowering functions.

Human resource management has evolved from traditional personnel management. It advocates a holistic approach, where personnel matters are given greater attention by line managers and are considered with direct reference to the core business planning of the organization. Emphasis is given to the business objectives and relating these to the performance management of teams and individuals. Bringing the efforts of the different business team strands together forms the basis of organizational systems management.

Construction organizations

Within many organizations the structure and organi...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half Title
• Title
• Copyright
• Contents
• List of figures
• List of tables
• List of abbreviations
• Preface
• Acknowledgements
• Part A: The nature of construction health and safety
• Part B: The framework for health and safety legislation
• Part C: Effective health and safety management
• Appendixes
• Select bibliography
• Index