Health and safety management programs can significantly reduce workplace-related illnesses and injuries. From a regulatory perspective, health and safety management systems are proactive ways of collaborating to rectify, remedy or prevent workplace hazards before employees become ill or injured. By implementing health and safety management systems, a company can protect workers, fine tune existing hazard-preventing programs, and save the company significant financial resources, downtime, and productivity-related concerns. Businesses across the board can benefit immensely from these types of programs. According to OSHA, there are 50 injuries taking place every minute in a typical 40-hour work week. That amounts to an estimated 3,000 injuries every hour, and 120,000 injuries every week.
OSHA is tasked with assuring the safety and well-being of people in the US workforce. It does so by raising the bar on training, research, education, outreach, and prevention of improper work practices that may impede health and wellness. In the United States, any business with 10+ employees is mandated by law to keep a record of all work-related illnesses and injuries of a serious nature. The maintenance and provision of these records must remain on-site at the workplace for a minimum of five years. Nowadays, the injury tracking application (ITA) provides guidelines on how these types of reports can be electronically submitted. This naturally lends itself to the types of EHS software solutions that organizations can implement to manage health and safety-related matters with greater efficiency.
How Can Environment, Health and Safety Software Solutions Help?
EHS software is database-driven software that is responsible for a wide range of potential hazards such as industrial hygiene, health and medical, waste management, and environmental concerns. EHS software solutions cover many subcategories as well, such as ergonomics, greenhouse gas emissions, and incident investigation. The best occupational health systems are capable of collating large quantities of data into a centralized management application. Once the organization has access to extensive data over long periods of time, it is possible to analyze various trends and patterns, and to act decisively to prevent mishaps from occurring. Risk management is central to EHS software systems. By preparing for eventualities before they become problems, the right occupational health systems can keep a business running optimally by keeping employees healthy, safe and productive. As part of a broader risk management system, EHS software is integral to the process.
Once health and safety management software has been implemented in an organization, it is incorporated in a centralized database. Prior to the introduction of these systems, most companies would have multiple departments, each with their own database of incident reports. This typically requires regular audits, collaboration and integration of data via additional software programs. Fortunately, the adoption of health and safety management software streamlines this process by integrating everything together. It’s not only the well-being of employees that is enhanced and protected by the software solutions, it’s also the bottom line. Few elements can impact the return on investment (ROI) more than an integrated system comprising a centralized database of legacy data, trends and patterns. A myriad of categories is covered by EHS software, and the best systems are flexible and adaptable to incorporate the ever-changing requirements of modern-day business organizations.
How Important is it that these Software Systems are Accessible to all Employees?
Various studies have shown that when workers are engaged in safe workplace practices, they are more productive, and thispositively impacts the company’s ROI. According to the Queens School of Business, the rates of absenteeism are 37% higher when workers are disengaged from EHS. Further, the study indicates that the numbers of defects and errors are 60% higher with disengaged workers, and there are some 49% more workplace accidents too. While the study was conducted in 2014, the results are just as relevant today. At the time, disengaged employees were said to have cost in organisation around $10,000. However, when workers are committed to workforce safety through the implementation and adoption EHS software systems, the results are phenomenal.
However, worker engagement begins not at the grassroots level, but at top management level. When leadership is empowered to provide the necessary direction to all layers of the organisation through health and wellness, and safety considerations, it is that alone which instills a culture of worker engagement in the organisation. From there, these engaged employees become the change that the company wants to see. Management can facilitate greater adoption and engagement of these software systems by clearly explaining the guidelines, investing in the future of employees, encouraging two-way communication, recognizing and rewarding employees for hard work, and by instilling employees with a sense of ownership in the company. When employees are invested in the company, they care what happens to co-workers. This has an overall positive effect on morale, productivity and the bottom line.