Many safety personnel don’t have experience dealing with major incidents because they don’t happen very often. However, if they do occur, organizations need to have an established incident investigation plan in place to:
- Reduce the sense of chaos and confusion when an incident occurs.
- Control and manage an unexpected and damaging situation.
- Maintain and advance corporate integrity.
- Determine true root causes and identify significant problem areas.
- Prevent repetition of incidents.
A thorough and structured incident investigation enables organizations and employees to identify hazards in their operations and gaps in their Environmental Health & Safety programs. Failing to identify hazards and risks can result in injuries, deaths, work stoppages and property or environmental damage. All of these scenarios have financial impacts on the organization, and will affect its ability to operate and remain competitive.
When organizations take a preventive stance by leveraging root-cause analysis, they improve employee engagement and retention, boost productivity and revenue performance, and garner a positive image within the community and marketplace.
We recently released an e-book titled, “Incident Investigations: In Search of the Prime Root Cause of Major Incidents.” Download this report to put preventive measures in place to keep your workers safe, your products sustainable and your operations productive.