Page 48 - IGC BOOK

Accidents

The level of accidents in an organisation clearly shows the state of health and safety
performance within that organisation. Accident data must have collected as per the legal
requirement, required as the basis of risk assessment. All such statistical analysis can provide
information on trends and patterns of accidents and comparisons with similar organisations.

Accident reports need to be clear about the causes of accidents, not simply their outcomes in
terms of injuries caused. In this case, then, near misses are just as important. If they show a
regular pattern of similar causes, then that may indicate a cultural problem in that the causes
are not being addressed.

Accidents and their causes represent a learning opportunity for the organisation – to prevent
recurrence.

Absenteeism

Worker may frequently may find problem to come to work or not willing to come increase higher
level of absenteeism, this may be due to ill health conditions caused from the workplace, these
are recognised and addressed as an poor safety culture.

Ill-health may take some time to become evident and it is not always obvious that it is caused by
activities at the workplace. In addition, conditions which are made worse by the work situation,
rather than caused by it, are not easy to spot.

Sickness Rates

Monitoring absences and sickness rates is one way to gather information about potential health
and safety problems in this area. The information required is likely to be collected by the
organisation for its management of resources, identified causes of ill-health may provide
indicators for health and safety issues.

Staff Turnover

A low level of staff turnover is observed in the organisations where there is a positive safety
culture, the workers feel that the workplace is safe for them work, where is a support and
morale from the employer, good level of communication systems and training is available
maintained.

A high staff turnover is a general indicator of problems in the workplace. There may be many
reasons for this – poor pay, poor morale, lack of direction, lack of training, lack of opportunities
for advancement, etc.

Exit interviews are likely used by organisations to identify the reasons for the employees to
Leave the organisation, as result, these may provide indicators for health and safety in the
organisation. For example, reasons such as excessive workloads or lack of training may

ENSIGN| Unit IG1 – Element 3 – Managing Risks – Understanding People and Processes 3