Embedding Health and Safety Checks with Mobile Data Capture
Mandating Risk Assessment in New Zealand using Handhelds
Lessons in the use of mobile software from Australia
Abstract
This White Paper outlines the business case for councils and contractors looking to meet the new health and
safety requirements. Those who are interested in mobile software that can mandate health and safety checks
as well as dispatch crews and capture job and asset data will gain the most benefit from this White Paper.
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Embedding Health and Safety Checks with Mobile Data Capture
Table of Contents
TABLE OF CONTENTS .................................................................................................. ERROR! BOOKMARK NOT DEFINED.
WHAT’S THE SHAKEUP IN WORKPLACE HEALTH AND SAFETY IN NEW ZEALAND?............................................ 3
FOLLOWING THE AUSTRALIAN MODEL IN LOCAL GOVERNMENT ......................................................................................... 3
BENEFITS OF MOBILE SOFTWARE FOR RISK ASSESSMENT .................................................................................................. 4
WHAT’S ESSENTIAL WHEN CONSIDERING MOBILE SOFTWARE FOR HEALTH AND SAFETY? .......... ERROR! BOOKMARK NOT DEFINED.
Integration ....................................................................................................... Error! Bookmark not defined.
Scability ............................................................................................................ Error! Bookmark not defined.
Crew involvement ............................................................................................ Error! Bookmark not defined.
Usability ........................................................................................................... Error! Bookmark not defined.
An enterprise-wide solution ............................................................................. Error! Bookmark not defined.
WORKSAFE AGENCY BY YEAR END, LEGISLATION WITH GREATER PENALTIES IN 2014............................................................. 7
Bibliography ................................................................................................................................................... 7
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Embedding Health and Safety Checks with Mobile Data Capture
What’s the shakeup in workplace health and safety in New Zealand?
In New Zealand, a major overhaul of the workplace health and safety framework is underway. This
follows the damning Royal Commission inquiry into the Pike River mining disaster and the
Independent Taskforce’s investigation into our abysmal health and safety record.
In New Zealand we have 25 percent more workplace accidents than Australia, with one in ten
workers harmed a year. There are 200,000 claims annually to ACC for work related injuries and
illnesses. It is a systemic problem, says the Taskforce, pointing to deficits in legislation, regulation,
implementation, and in workplace culture.
The government has announced radical rebuild of health and safety regulation and structures,
following Australia’s lead. It is introducing new legislation on Australian model law, where employers
have to ‘secure’ workplace safety, not just ‘promote’ it. Soon in New Zealand, workers are to be
given the highest level of protection against harm from hazards and risks at work.
As well as a new Act to strengthen the legal framework, and penalties, there’ll be a new WorkSafe
crown regulator with new codes of practice and guidelines. There’ll be greater encouragement of
worker participation and of more specific risk assessment to clarify factors that should be
considered.
The vision is to ‘work smarter, target risk and work together,’ and the public sector is to be the
shining example of health and safety practice. In New Zealand we have been very outcome
focussed, but we will be moving to much greater process focus.
New Zealand’s culture of “a high level of tolerance for risk and negative perceptions around health
and safety” needs to change says the Taskforce, which points to “Kiwi stoicism, deference to
authority, laid back complacency and suspicion of red tape…”
So what can we learn from across the Tasman? The Australian health and safety culture is much
more demanding, more prescriptive and more compliant.
Following the Australian H&S model in local government
Across the ditch, a worker arriving at a gushing sewer pipe has to first complete a health and safety
checklist on a handheld or tablet, while the waste keeps flowing.
And that’s just the start. Depending on the identified risks, software then takes them through all the
necessary work rules – traffic management, electricity or water supply or heavy machinery usage amongst other safety hazards. All before a tool is lifted or a toby turned off.
Australian councils and utilities often use mobile technology to manage field crews and to require
the completion of health and safety checks. Many field workers receive all their job details on
handhelds, but before they start, these workers have to complete a comprehensive risk assessment
using the device.
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Embedding Health and Safety Checks with Mobile Data Capture
But it can be a streamlined process, without paper forms or manual hazard reports. When using
mobile enterprise software, workers are taken through a checklist to identify site specific hazards,
and which prompts crew members on the best ways to mitigate against these.
Workers help design the health and safety assessment forms, as well as those for job and asset data
capture. Frontline staff members define the risk factors, workflow rules and suggest remediation,
drawing on their industry knowledge.
Australian clients often configure software so no further job details are available until the health and
safety boxes are ticked, apart from a general task overview. New hazards are logged on the
handheld by creating a new issue, and field crew staff must sign-off to show that issue has been
identified, assessed and communicated.
Benefits of mobile software for risk assessment
1.
Embedded in software and systems
Across the Tasman, organisations have had to prioritise and mandate health and safety practices as
regulations require H&S to be planned, systematic and cover all reasonably foreseeable hazards and
associated risks.
The health and safety duties require duty holders to consider all risks associated with work, not only
those for which regulations and codes of practice exist.
The more familiar workers are with an environment, the riskier it can be. They take less care, they
overlook the obvious, and they take short cuts. This is why organisations insist on a step-by-step
process. Employers rely on systems and software that require workers to check health and safety
hazards, plus communicate their assessment in real-time, along with any issues to be addressed.
And that this can all be verified and audited by the regulators.
2.
Risk Assessment Approach
Council and utility workers are required to complete a full risk assessment before they pick up any
tool. And this analysis is often completed in real time on mobile software loading on field devices.
All field work for local government or utilities require a risk assessment, as there is always
uncertainty about how a hazard may result in injury or illness, the work activity usually involves a
number of different hazards and there’s usually a need to understanding how the hazards may
interact with each other to produce new or greater risks.
There’s always the temptation to ‘tick and flick,’ so the forms and procedures are configured to get
crew members to stop and think.
The Australian model is also very prescriptive, and this can be a disadvantage if workers aren’t able
to anticipate all situations. Software needs to be flexible enough to be able to prompt for new
possible risks.
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Embedding Health and Safety Checks with Mobile Data Capture
3.
Uses workers’ knowledge as the basis for business rules
A structured, computer generated health and safety analysis demands that workers agree on basic
rules for safe work - what can and can’t be done and in what circumstances. These rules are used to
build the risk matrix and should include all possible hazards – weather, traffic, electricity, gas,
machinery.
Australian employers have to consult with workers who are (or are likely to be) directly affected by a
work health and safety matter. Their workers must be given a reasonable opportunity to express
views and taking those views into account before making decisions on health and safety matters.
Building business rules for a mobile health and safety risk matrix with field workers ensures
essential, on-going participation.
As an Australian code of practice points out, “by drawing on the experience, knowledge and ideas of
your workers you are more likely to identify all hazards and choose effective control measures.”
New Zealand’s new health and safety framework emphasises worker engagement, to capitalise on
experience and to change the current culture.
Crew management and dispatch can use mobile software to dispatch only qualified crew and those
with the right health and safety training are allowed to work on certain sites.
4.
Eliminates paper form filling, incomplete and lost records
Using mobile software for managing health and safety checks completely eliminates
paperwork, increasing productivity. Forms are legendary for getting dirty, getting lost, being
incorrect or incomplete, and for the time it takes to repopulate or cleanse for audit. Yet
most crews in New Zealand still have manual timesheets, health and safety checklists, handover forms, new job requests and inventory orders, all requiring manual entry at both ends.
Workers can enter the job details once, and the necessary fields are populated with the
possible hazards and remediations, without having to switch between applications, and
logon again.
5.
Up-to-date, real time data on assets and jobs improves safety
Works management software can also be used to automate work orders to fix, repair
maintain equipment or assets for safety. Having identified a hazard that requires further
work to remediate, workers can raise a work order for this. They can also take a photo and
attach this to work orders or job requests.
Works management software can be configured using business rules, and as the software
sequences work practices, it improves safety and consistency. Software that shows a
graphical representation of procedures is easy to use.
The ability for dispatch staff to see what jobs workers are carrying out in real-time, and to
also communicate work or asset updates or traffic or weather hazards also improves the
safety.
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Embedding Health and Safety Checks with Mobile Data Capture
Crew and managers are working from the same job and asset details, and all share the visual
picture of each job’s risk, improving collaboration.
6.
Responsible for contractors
If an organisation engages contractors or hire workers as part of its workforce, it will in
future share a duty of care to these workers. This means making sure they are involved in
assessing the hazards and risks associated with the work and what precautions should be
taken.
When entering into contracts, an organisation will have to communicate its safety
requirements and policies, review the job to be undertaken, discuss any safety issues that
may arise with contractors and how they will be dealt with. As with the Australian
legislation, an organisation will not be able to transfer health and safety responsibilities to
another person, even if they are a contactor.
Organisations will need to assess contractors’ health and safety management systems and
undertake audits of safety requirements when they are on site. Contractors can use a
works management version of mobile enterprise software, with health and safety checklists
along with works dispatch and scheduling, but without the asset data capture functionality.
7.
Records for audit and compliance
Organisations have to demonstrate compliance with the Act and regulations by keeping
records of the risk management process. It also helps identify maintenance requirements,
and also target training needs.
Risk assessment software automates record keeping on identified hazards, assessed risks
and chosen control measures. It automates hazard checklists, worksheets and assessment
tools in risk management.
8.
Streamlined health and safety has other benefits
Organisations that put effort into health and safety systems have been found to have more
productive workers, with greater job satisfaction.
Being organised for health and safety requires workers stop and think ahead. This emphasis
on crew engagement translates into more safe and responsible business operations.
Careful risk management is good for the environment as workers are more likely to are less
likely to spill chemicals, fuels and other pollutants, and more likely to store them properly.
Business rules laid down for safety can also improve resource use and sustainability.
Automated work orders for repairs can improve asset management and lifecycle, for
instance.
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Embedding Health and Safety Checks with Mobile Data Capture
Real time data on job hazards can alert customer services and the citizenry to traffic
disruption, floods and fires. This in turn reduces further traffic and risk for workers and
members of the public.
Mobile starts with health and safety
Organisations are looking to mobility as the new dynamic, the opportunity to revolutionise
work practices. Now workers in the field can be safer with instant communication of issues
and repairs. Being able to work through health and safety processes without paperwork
eliminates manual entry with its delays and mistakes.
This instant visibility of health and safety procedures is the real difference from mobile
works management. Everyone can see that the risk analysis and can also follow jobs as they
are carried out and completed. Crew and head office know the details of what is being
working on - the location and condition of those assets.
Mobility is now the most compelling technology for improving the efficiency and safety of
work practices in the field and managing crews. Cheaper field devices and plummeting data
costs have also made it inevitable.
Worksafe legislation with greater penalties in 2014
Soon every business will have to ensure health and safety systems are fit-for-purpose,
sufficiently resourced and implemented, and that this can be verified for audit. Mobile
works management software helps generate compliance data and audit reports, meeting
legal obligations. Inspectors will check health and safety systems regularly, even without
notification of any accidents, and there are fines for
With an ambitious target of a 25 percent reduction in injury and deaths from workplace
accidents, the New Zealand government has started the rebuild of our health and safety
framework.
For councils and council owned companies, and for their contractors, it means a focus on
proactive measures to protect workers. Systems can be configured to ask the right
questions first, so organisations don’t have to investigate costly or fatal accidents later.
Bibliography
MBIE and Institute of Directors, 2013, Good Governance Practices Guidelines for Managing
Health and Safety Risks.
Wisker, Marie et al, Chapman Tripp, 2013, New Zealand: Ambitious prescription from the
Independent Health and Safety Taskforce.
Independent Taskforce of Workplace Safety and Health, 2013, Executive Report
http://www.safeworkaustralia.gov.au/sites/SWA/about/Publications/Documents/633/How_to_Man
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Embedding Health and Safety Checks with Mobile Data Capture
age_Work_Health_and_Safety_Risks.pdf, viewed September 2013.
http://www.safetycouncil.org.nz/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=28:is-it-worththe-risk&catid=59&Itemid=66, viewed September 2013.
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