Accident Prevention and OSHA Compliance

Patrick A. Michaud

• Publisher: CRC Press
• Year: 2017
• ISBN:
  9781351469180
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Tecnología e ingeniería
• Subtopic: Seguridad y salud industriales

Accident Prevention and OSHA Compliance contains all the information you need to reduce or avoid injuries, illnesses, fires, and equipment damage resulting from an accident. The book provides valuable insight into how OSHA conducts its inspections and how to avoid losses and increase profits by complying with OSHA regulations. By following the easy-to-understand techniques and guidelines, you can effectively train personnel on safety and health issues.
The book explains accident causes and describes unsafe acts and conditions. It offers suggestions about how to look for hazards and how to safety-check each step of a job. Guidelines are given for constructing a safety inspection list, conducting a job hazard analysis and how to revise it, organizing a safety committee, and reporting accidents to OSHA. It also includes steps that can be used to protect trade secrets.
Human factors and limitations, protective equipment and its proper usage, first aid and medical care, and much more are detailed. Record-keeping requirements are given and examples of direct and indirect costs of accidents are illustrated. The effects of drugs and alcohol and tips to recognize users are discussed. Helpful appendices contain numerous charts and tables, useful contacts, and valuable additional information. The book also includes various office and home hazards and injuries, and steps to follow to make both places safe.
Written by a professional with vast experience as an engineer, certified hazard control manager, professor of safety and health, and safety consultant, Accident Prevention and OSHA Compliance provides a single source covering the immense amount of information on this subject. The proven principles and practices found in this book cover every aspect of accident prevention and provide perfect solutions to profit-losing problems.

1	INTRODUCTION

“A man always has two reasons for doing anything — a good reason and the real reason.”

J.P. Morgan

AN OUTSTANDING ACHIEVEMENT

Years ago, when man stepped on the surface of the moon for the very first time, the world watched that achievement with great pride and much interest. That accomplishment was not due to chance, but rather to the work and planning of the professionals who were engineers and scientists. The event was indeed spectacular in the scientific sense, but also in the moral sense (International Labour Office, Geneva, Switzerland). The success of the mission could not have happened without a program to ensure the safety of the astronauts and the safety systems of the space vehicle.

IMPORTANT CONCERNS

Today, concerns are being expressed about pollution and damage to our environment. We are nervous about the thousands of hazardous chemicals and compounds that are produced with little thought to their handling and disposal. Admittedly, we only really got excited about physical injuries when the Occupational Safety and Health Act was signed into law in 1970. That law told employers to provide a healthful workplace for their employees; the assurance that they would comply with the Act would be the Bureau of Labor’s statistics that flagged their injuries and the OSHA inspections that would follow.

OUTSTANDING SAFETY PROGRAMS

Successful companies throughout the world all have outstanding safety and health programs, which again, did not happen by chance. They recognized that the success of their mission would be enhanced by the professional management of safety. Today’s managers will have to provide aggressive and consistent leadership. They will have to be innovative in the application of standards and controls. And, they will have to provide adequate financial and manpower resources to control the hazards that interrupt the order of good business. Without management’s commitment, progress is unlikely and injuries and illnesses in the workplace will continue.

SAFETY FIRST!

Safety is not and cannot be first. Instead, what is first is profit, mission, product, service, and the strength and growth of your business. However, safety is important because it can either support or damage the above, so it must be fully integrated into your plans and operations. Safe and efficient production will maximize your profits. In other words, safety is the avoidance of loss.

Safety is no different than your other loss control programs. No manager involved in the production of a product would ignore certain controls such as quality, fire, security, absenteeism, drug and alcohol intake, etc., yet in some companies, safety receives only token recognition. When this happens, those companies are often driven out of business.

RESPONSIBILITY FOR SAFETY

It has been said by business managers, “that accidents and their associated problems are a failure of management.”

Abraham Lincoln once said, “Next to creating life, the greatest thing man can do is to save a life.” He also said, “It is the duty of every man to protect himself and those associated with him from accidents, which may result in injury or death.”

When I am asked to give a good reason why managers should insist on a meaningful safety program, I answer with certainty:

•  to reduce injuries

•  to reduce human suffering

•  to reduce property damage

•  to reduce compensation claims

•  to increase production and profits

•  to increase morale

•  to improve job satisfaction

•  to improve housekeeping

The Occupational Safety and Health Act of 1970 tells all employers that they are indeed responsible for the well-being of their employees. There is no question that we are all responsible for safety, and it is for this reason that I will mention an article that I found years ago by an anonymous writer.

This is a story about four people named Everybody, Somebody, Anybody, and Nobody. There was an important job to be done and Everybody was asked to do it. Everybody was sure Somebody would do it. Anybody could have done it, but Nobody did it. Somebody got angry about that, because it was Everybody’s job. Everybody thought Anybody could do it, but Nobody realized that Everybody would not do it. It ended up that Everybody blamed Somebody when Nobody did what Anybody could have done.

The story tells it all. Safety is Everybody’s job, from the top person of your company to the very bottom person. Unless and until top management in any business recognize and understand their obligations in the area of occupational safety and health, there will be little, if any, progress.

When you look at the cost of accidents in terms of death, disability, illness, pain, lawsuits, delays and the loss of a worker, you will have to agree that there is only one answer — safety always.

MAINTAINING SAFETY

You can maintain safety consciousness by giving your employees safety lectures, insisting that they memorize safety rules, by putting up safety posters, and rigidly enforcing safety rules. These measures will have some effect but they will not do the whole job; they need to be reinforced by management. Why? Because you have to protect people from themselves. That is the key to maintaining a safety program.

For example, we all tend to lose our fear of the tools and equipment we work with, and we forget the hazard of the job we are working on. Familiarity soon breeds contempt for the dangers that surrounds us — and we often unconsciously create unsafe conditions and situations that lead to accidents while thinking “it can’t happen to me”.

People need to be jolted into realization that in a single second it can happen — an accident! What is the best way to drive this point home? Make an effort to change your workers’ attitudes by first changing your supervisors’ attitudes. Remember this, “The world’s best safety device is a careful worker and a concerned supervisor.”

SIZE OF SAFETY PROGRAMS

Safety programs and policies must be tailored and fitted to your objectives. There is no absolute model to follow as every company is different in size and mission, but the methods used can all be successful if they contain the elements as outlined in the chapters of this book. Within smaller companies, it may be more difficult to follow the lead of a larger company that employs many full-time safety and health professionals. However, as a small business, you can get help from a consultant and/or you can assign the role of safety manager to your plant engineer on a collateral duty basis.

When you do this, that person should report directly to you. There are many companies that operate successful safety programs this way. Whoever you assign to carry out your safety program, that person should be given time to do the job. It is a good idea to expose that person to some safety training and the reasons why safety is good business.

For larger companies, you should have a well-trained safety group. The group should be led by a qualified professional who is able to direct a safety and health staff. The staff’s primary function would be to assist your supervisory force in maintaining safe and healthful working conditions. They would also instruct your employees in general safety rules and procedures.

SAFETY NEEDS NO APOLOGY

During my 40 years in the construction and the industrial business, I have heard some managers and supervisors apologize for safety by saying “OSHA tells us to do it this way. I don’t agree, but we have to do it”, or in giving a safety talk, a foreman addressed his workers by saying “I have to talk to you about safety. This will only take a minute.” This is like saying we are wasting time, but we have got to do it. That type of attitude will have a domino effect throughout the entire structure of your business. The attitudes of your employees will be ones which pull your safety program apart.

No one should ever apologize for safety. Safety is the professional way to help you to accomplish your mission without the loss of a life, injury to your people, damage to equipment, and the loss of your business.

SUMMARY

The world’s most successful companies all have outstanding safety programs. Their safety programs did not just happen! With these companies, safety is a condition of employment. In your own company, supervisors should be charged to make certain that their workers observe safety rules. Safety should never be considered a part-time effort, but instead a full-time job for everyone from the top person of the company right down to the bottom person. Remember this, accidents are usually caused by people, and seldom by properly maintained tools, equipment, or machinery.

2	ACCIDENT PREVENTION

“Action is the proper fruit of knowledge.”

Thomas Fuller

SAFETY PHILOSOPHY

Some time ago, the owner of a small industrial firm mentioned to me that his company was experiencing a bad trend involving accidents and injuries. He wanted to know what could be done to reverse that unacceptable trend. After looking over his safety program at the paper level, then on down to the production area, I told him that the first step should be to establish a management philosophy toward safety and that he must believe that all accidents are preventable. Second, all accidents and injuries must be investigated in order to prevent their recurrence. Third, that all unsafe conditions and unsafe acts must be corrected immediately.

I also told him that good workers represent an investment in both time and money. Their absence from the labor force for any amount of time and for any reason results in production loss. When that absence is caused by an accident that could have been avoided through the elimination of an unsafe condition, the wearing of personal protective equipment or safe work habits, the loss is doubly unfortunate.

I stressed that supervisors are the key to a good accident-free program. They are expected to lead workers and not allow them to take chances that could cause bodily harm. Workers, on the other hand, are expected to follow instructions — doing the job safely and on time. No one should be required to compromise safety for the sake of more production, nor production for the sake of safety. In other words, a good job is a safe job and a safe job is a good job.

RESISTANCE TO CHANGE

People usually have mixed feelings at about a relationship or condition. They want to be safe, but they also enjoy flirting with danger. They want to be progressive, but they resist change. Employees’ relations to change are very perplexing and this applies to safety rules as well as to any other condition of employment. Because of this, your supervisors must recognize that this common, but at times ignored trait of human nature; the resistance to change — that resistance has a significant influence on your workers’ behavior and attitudes toward safety.

There is much that you can do to motivate your employees to accept change. Tell your employees in advance that you plan to enforce safety and how that will affect them. Your supervisors should explain the change because people resist what they do not understand. However, it is not enough to explain what the change is, your employees must also be given the reasons for the change, (1) to prevent injury, (2) to prevent loss of work, and (3) to avoid hospitalization. Also, it is what your workers see in a situation that governs their actions and reactions.

Remember, management does set the style. When management shows through their safety practices that they really believe in good safety concepts and methods, that attitude will be reflected in your employees’ safety behavior as well. The reverse is also true, when management gives nothing more than lip service to safety, fails to use safety equipment that they themselves expect their workers to use, or tolerates poor housekeeping and unsafe work practices, your employees will have an “I could care less” attitude about safety, and at that point, your accident rate is bound to increase.

SAFETY POLICY

As the owner or manager of a business, yo...