Occupational safety and health (OSH), also commonly referred to as occupational health and safety (OHS), occupational health, or workplace health and safety (WHS), is a multidisciplinary field concerned with the safety, health, and welfare of people at work. The goals of occupational safety and health programs include providing a safe and healthy work environment. OSH may also protect co-workers, family members, employers, customers, and many others who might be affected by the workplace environment. In the United States, the term occupational health and safety is referred to as occupational health and occupational and non-occupational safety and includes safety for activities outside of work. In common-law jurisdictions, employers have a common …show more content…
Today employers define a healthy workplace as one that “maximizes the integration of worker goals for well-being and company objectives for profitability and productivity.” Three main factors were identified as influencing employers’ views on the promotion of health and wellbeing in the workplace and these are summarized. These included (1) employers’ ideas of workplace health and wellbeing, (2) employers’ descriptions of unhealthy workers and perceptions surrounding importance of healthy workers, and (3) employers’ beliefs around the role the workplace should play in influencing employee’s health and wellbeing. Productivity was the most frequently mentioned outcome of importance in relation to having healthy workers. Greater productivity was believed to translate into higher business profitability. Unhealthy workers were perceived to be more likely to take sick days or carry out their duties in a slow manner due to fatigue, thus costing the business. It was also noted that there were difficulties associated with the need to fulfil duties when workers with unique roles were …show more content…
Safety can also refer to the control of recognized hazards in order to achieve an acceptable level of risk. Safety is no more and no less than a condition or judgment of acceptable control over hazards and risks inherent to what an organization is doing at a point in time or chooses to do at some future point. Hazards inherent to the business process, especially those not controlled to an acceptable level, represent the true challenge. The potential outcome from an uncontrolled hazard is harm. Safety is frequently defined as the inverse of risk, the lower the risk, the higher the safety. Safety as the antonym of risk certainly captures the important dimensions of safety, but it does not provide an exhaustive understanding of the concept. Risk and risk management are inherent in all work tasks, whether it is realized or not by individuals performing the work. Each organization should develop and utilize a process for assessing risk and determining when ALARP is achieved. When workers and managers collectively understand acceptable risk for that organization, it is more likely that desired safety performance will occur. Formalize the risk management process; it will occur regardless and may lead to undesired safety performance. In the vacuum of no formalized risk management process, an informal risk management process will occur that relies on individual
Employee wellness programs, also known as a “worksite wellness program”, are programs that are designed to promote and support the health, safety, and well being of a company’s employees. Wellness programs are meant to improve the health of the staff, their morale, and in turn also help improve their productivity. There are many components that make up employee wellness programs, for example; Health Screenings, Health Fairs, Fitness classes, Smoking cessation classes, and even wellness issue workshops. Employers have begun adopting these programs in hopes of helping their employees while they are at an age when health interventions can still help transform their long-term health choice. This paper will focus on trends found between employee weight and productivity, and the impacts these could have on a business overall.
The people in the workplace can be categorize into two groups: the employer and the employees. The employees work for their employer and in turn the employer has the duty and responsibility to ensure that the minimum safety requirements are met. However, employers are not required to provide health insurance benefits to their employees. More often than not, providing health insurance benefits is very costly to the employer and in an attempt to mitigate the costs, employers’ encourage employee participation in various healthy lifestyle programs and initiatives as well as providing incentives for their participation in such programs. These kinds of action are not always met with enthusiasm, some find it unreasonable to be expected to do so on their own time to change their lifestyle to suit their employers.
The OSH Act gave OSHA the authority to come into work places and inspect facilities for health and safety risks. Due to shortages in personnel, OSHA inspects accidents and safety complaints that are filed, and those facilities that have a high volume of accident rates. If an individual state has an approved safety and health enforcement plan, then they may be exempt from yearly inspections by OSHA and have their own state personnel conduct the inspections. The Act sets a maximum penalty for safety and health violations, but OSHA has the authority to calculate fines. If an industry objects to the citation or fine, they can go before the Occupational Safety and Health Review Commission.
While the strain on the health care system is evidently a major issue, poor health of employees also has been proven to negatively affect the overall performance in the workplace. Alternatively, good health in the workplace has been proven to reduce absenteeism, reduce the costs of disability and dru...
Occupational Safety and Health Administration also known as OSHA is a U.S. regulatory agency that is used to implement the safety of employees, patients and the enviro...
When it comes to safety most people think they are safe, and they have a true understanding on how to work safe. Human nature prevents us from harming ourselves. Our instincts help protect us from harm. Yet everyday there are injuries and deaths across the world due to being unsafe. What causes people to work unsafe is one of the main challenges that face all Safety Managers across the world.
We, as people in the workforce, are depended on to follow through with work commitments. A healthy employee is able to do more and feel well enough to enjoy it. We strive to do our best but how can we when we have low morale at the office. Healthy employees directly impact the bottom-line of all companies, from the sole proprietorship to the large corporation (1996). Keeping health-care costs low, boosting morale, increasing productivity, and reducing the absent rate is a payoff that every good business owner should recognize. When a small business is trying to become larger, having employees who are healthy and stress free is important. Losing a member of an already small number due to being ill is not the way to succeed. Working in an environment that is happy and productive is the perfect place to work, regardless of what the job is.
An SMS is a formalized approach to manage organizational safety by developing a policy based on formal methods of identifying hazards, analyzing and mitigating risk, devel...
Employers negligent in providing health and safety in the work environment could become criminally charged, fined or sent to jail. Providing an unsafe workplace is no longer considered just as morally unjust, but an act of crime. Health and safety in the workplace has become more encompassing and broader, accepting new causes and problems that influence occupational health and safety. Health is no longer just defined as wellness of the physical body, but also wellness of the mind. Mental health is considered an area of workplace safety.
Some companies give discounts on insurance premiums for those employees who attend wellness classes, exercise programs and get their wellness physicals from their personal physicians. They will also offer incentives for those employees who lose weight and partake in a healthy lifestyle. Companies are becoming more proactive in healthcare for their employees knowing a healthier workforce will save them money on healthcare costs. A healthier employee will see an increase in productivity and satisfaction with the job. There is less absenteeism and turnover for the company by not having to replace employees who are unable to adequately perform their job duties due to health risks (Chalupka, 2011, p. 236).
Another large debate in the issues and impacts of obesity is the responsibility of employer’s. Especially for those whose obesity comes from a sedentary lifestyle. Or perhaps need the preventative measures of keeping obesity at bay. A hot topic on the rise is whether or not employers should be mandated to give employees a work-out period in their schedule. The employers could offer employee’s incentives for utilizing resources (a company gym, discounted memberships, and dietician, walking a company track) and by using the resources keep costs low. Though initially it could be costly to take on the responsibility to offer extra incentives to employee’s it could offer long term potential savings. (Villareal, Apovian, Kushner, and Klein 2005) Those whose companies offer various programs and actively engage in them express more happiness, productivity, a greater quality of life, and overall better health. Better health allows for employee’s to serve their employers better. They use less sick pay, keep insurance premiums low, and are more likely to be in tune with their daily job. So while the initial cost may be high, the long term financial gain of a happy, healthy, productive team is hard not to invest in!
In the early 1900s industrial accidents were commonplace in this country; for example, in 1907 over 3,200 people were killed in mining accidents. At this time legislation and public opinion all favored management. There were few protections for the worker's safety. Today's industrial employees are better off than their colleagues in the past. Their chances of being killed in an industrial accident are less than half of that of their predecessors of 60 years ago. According to National safety Council (NSC), the current death rate from work-related injuries is approximately 4 per 100,000, or less than a third of the rate of 50 years ago. Improvements in safety up to now have been the result of pressure for legislation to promote health and safety, the steadily increasing cost associated with accidents and injuries, and the professionalization of safety as an occupation. When the industrial sector began to grow in the United States, hazardous working conditions were commonplace. Following the Civil War, the seeds of the safety movement were sown in this country. Factory inspection was introduced in Massachusetts in 1867. In 1868 the first barrier safeguard was patented. In 1869 the Pennsylvania legislature passed a mine safety law requiring two exits from all mines. The Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) was established in 1869 to study industrial accidents and report pertinent information about hose accidents. The following decade saw little progress in the safety movement until 1877, when the Massachusetts legislature passed a law requiring safeguards for hazardous machinery. In 1877 the Employers' Liability Law was passed. In 1892, the first safety program was established in a steel plant in Illinois, in response to the explosion of a flywheel in that company.
Workers of every organization need to embrace the culture of living a healthy lifestyle rather than implementing specialized health programs and insurance plans (Goetzel, 2012). Coca-Cola Company initially perceived health and well-being as only integrated into the safety programs that employees are given. The company needs to distinguish between health and wellness from safety concerns. Many governments have encouraged wellness programs through the Affordable Care Act; this raises the legal limits on the penalties imposed on the employees by employers for the health-contingent wellness plans (Baicker,
The term ‘occupational health and safety’ (often abbreviated to OHS), is used describe work practices that will keep employees safe. The absence of OHS can be detrimental to a company and its workers alike, as there is a high risk of serious injury. Safety on many worksites must be the top priority for any corporation. Though at our walk-around of Juggernaut Industries, we noticed it wasn’t monitored at all. The following is a list of possible effects and laws that will remind you of the consequences.
It starts from OSH policy and objective of an company/organization. The OSHMS aim can be achieve if employees implementing and practicing what they have learned from the programmes conducted by their management. The OSH programmes like personal protective equipment, first aid, fire preventive plan, incident/accident investigation, hazard identification and many more are playing an important role to achieve the OSHMS’s aim. The management’s commitment towards safety and health like organizing training and education is resulting in raises the employees awareness on work place safety and health and employees’ involvement to success the safety and health programmes. To enhance the OSHMS, preventive and corrective action and continual improvement are playing an important role. So that the company/organization is keep moving forward successfully in achieving occupational safety and health management system’s