Because Health & Safety is everyone’s business: ISO 45001

In March 2018, amidst the worst snowfalls the UK has yet seen, a keenly awaited new standard was published. ISO 45001:2018 is the world’s first International Standard for Occupational Health and Safety (OH&S), and replaces its British predecessor OHSAS 18001.

Why the change?

An international standard was needed, to address working conditions, workplace injury and fatality across the globe. Though OHSAS 18001 had international application, the standard was essentially a British one. In stark contrast, some 70 countries have worked together in the creation of ISO 45001, in a concerted effort to make the standard applicable anywhere, and in any sector.

What are the differences between the two?

According to the late Steve Jobs, founder of Apple, “great things in business are never done by one person. They’re done by a team of people.” Interestingly, it’s this core belief in contribution and shared responsibility that keeps popping up throughout the revisions.

Shared responsibility and context

• Health and safety is no longer a business ‘silo’ that may be handled by one representative. Rather, management have a more strongly defined responsibility to promote a health and safety culture throughout their business processes, and to engage their staff with that. Management will own Health & Safety, rather than nominally oversee it. The goal is to build managers that measure themselves as much on employee safety as they do on commercial success.
• Employees will have more opportunity to participate in the implementation of safety management systems. They’ll receive training to better identify risks, and be encouraged to actively contribute to the creation of Health & Safety processes. Two-way consultation has become key.
• Audits and risk assessments will be shared with workers to highlight their shared responsibility for managing and improving Health & Safety in the workplace.
• Companies can no longer merely look inward to create an effective safety management system that applies behind closed doors. In ISO 45001, the ‘organisation’s context’ is given new importance. What does the public expect from them in regard to Health & Safety? And how could the environment outside the company pose risk within it? Organisations have a new duty to listen to, and be aware of, what’s going on in their communities and wider.
• Organisations must consider how their suppliers and contractors also manage risk, and be able to demonstrate this. As a result, there are changes to the standard regarding procurement, outsourcing, appointment and management of contractors.

A helpful new structure

The new structure is based on ISO Guide 83 (or Annex SL) which lays down a generic template for all new standards. As a result, organisations who’ve worked towards ISO 9001, 14001 and others will be on familiar territory. Implementation will in turn be easier, and the new standard will slot into the suite of existing standards more efficiently. The structure will give a head start to all companies who’ve made an effort to achieve certification already.

An active, rather than passive approach

The semantics have changed a bit in the new standard too, and the slight change speaks volumes. While OHSAS talked about ‘hazard control’, the new standard uses the term ‘hazard risks’. Under the new standard, companies will find and prevent hazard risks before they cause incidents, rather than control them later. It’s a proactive rather than reactive approach that underlines the focus on collective responsibility. Unsurprisingly, the definitions of ‘worker’, ‘workplace’, ‘monitoring’ and other terms are tweaked to reflect the fact that OH&S is everyone’s job, wherever they are.

In a nutshell

ISO 45001 is great news for anyone who already holds certification in the core management standards. It’s a pre-emptive standard that urges the whole workforce to keep their eyes and ears open and gives them a voice in the Health & Safety culture of their own working environment. It’s a standard that will make management roll up their sleeves and truly prioritise their workers’ safety. And lastly, it’s a standard that places businesses into their community, their country, and in their supplier network, and urges them to be mindful of all of them.

Sources:

https://www.iso.org/news/ref2271.html

https://www.iso.org/news/ref2272.html

http://isoupdate.com/resources/differences-between-iso-45001-and-ohsas-18001/

https://safety.grainger.com/facilities/ohsas-18001-vs-iso-45001

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Tags: 45001:2018, audit, compliance, health, health and safety, iso 45001, OHSAS 18001, safety, teamwork