A look at practical methods for managing hazards at work with guaranteed positive response from top management.

1. “Demystifying the Concepts
of Hazard Avoidance in a
Dynamic Work Environment
– A Case Study Approach”
SHOLA YEMI-JONATHAN, (MISPN, TECHIOSH, MNIM, MNES)

2. Learning Objectives:
 By the end of this session, participants should be able to:
 Deal with the UNKNOWN Factors that give HSE Managers a
headache.
 Recognize the significance of accident cause analysis in the
identification of hazards and the means to eliminate them.
 Evaluate the strengths and weaknesses of the engineering,
analytical, and enforcement approaches to hazard control and
avoidance.
 Devise a model for the cost-benefit analysis of safety and
health proposals

3. Synopsis
 This program attempts to sort out the various strategies or approaches for dealing with
workplace hazards.
 The sophisticated Safety and Health Manager is not content with one approach to
dealing with workplace hazards.
 There is too much uncertainty to solve the enormous problems neatly with a simple
approach such as "awards for no lost-time accidents" or "fines for anyone who breaks the
rules."
 This program identifies four principal approaches for dealing with workplace hazards:
psychological, enforcement, engineering, and analytical.
 How not to get trapped with impressive-looking analyses, scientific formulas, and
statistics.
 How to become the Safety and Health Manager that Corporate top management has
been looking for to emerge – the kind who can discern between the significant problems,
the ordinary problems, and the trivial ones.

4. The Unknown Elements
What does
it mean to
You?

5. =
RISK CHANCE
UNKNOWN
LIKELIHOOD
The Unknown Elements

6.  Dealing with the UNKNOWN is one factor that
gives a Safety Manager his/her greatest
headache. E.g. pushing for capital investment
to enhance safety or health. Improved illness
and injury statistics help and may look
impressive, but they do not actually prove that
the capital investment was worthwhile.

7. Eliminating the
UKNOWN
ELEMENT
changes the
problem from
being either a
Safety or Health
issue.

8. Suicidal Vs. Unsafe

9. Lesson 1:
“LEARN TO DISTINGUISH BETWEEN
SAFETY ISSUES & NON SAFETY
ISSUES.”

10. Lesson 2:
“SINCE SAFETY & HEALTH DEAL
WITH THE UNKNOWN, THERE IS NO
STEP BY STEP RECIPE FOR
ELIMINATING HAZARDS WITHIN THE
WORKPLACE.”

11. More than one way to successful HSE
Management.

12. 4 Approaches to Hazard Avoidance.
 The Enforcement Approach
 The Psychological Approach
 The Engineering Approach
 The Analytical Approach

13. THE ENFORCEMENT APPROACH
Ready
Punishment
for
Unsafe
Behavior.

14. Case Study 1a.
 Suppose that a properly grounded electrical appliance
used for the resuscitation of injured employees is
equipped with a three-prong plug. However, in the midst
of an emergency, it was discovered that the wall
receptacle is the old, ungrounded (unearthed) two-hole
variety. With no adapter in sight and an employee in
desperate need of the appliance, one of the employees
immediately cut off the grounding (earthing) plug and
proceeded to save the employees life.

15. Case Study 1b
 A dangerous fire was in progress as flammable
liquids were burning in tanks. To shut off the source
of the fuel, a thinking employee quickly turned off
the adjacent tank valves in order to avert a more
dangerous fire that could have cost more lives, not to
speak of property damage. The valves were hot, and
because the employee went ahead to close the
valves, his hands were badly burnt.

16. Case study 1c
 In a trench cave-in accident in Boise, Idaho, a
worker was buried and coworkers, “Good
Samaritans,” bravely jumped into the trench in
the emergency to attempt to free the buried
worker.

17. QUESTION:
 For each of the scenarios, if you are the law
enforcement agent, what would be your
response? Citation or no citation?
 Highlight the advantages and/ or
disadvantages of the actions you would have
taken as the enforcement agent.

18. REAL RESPONSES BY OSHA
 1A. Citation was issued for bending back to break the
electrical grounding regulation.
 1B. The company received a citation because the worker was
not wearing a “Hand gloves” and as such got burned.
 1C. OSHA responded by fining the company $8000 because of
the humanitarian response of the rescue workers to the
emergency.

19. Summary of the Enforcement
Approach.
 Sometimes a fine is a negative and inappropriate response in
vain attempt to place blames after an accident has occurred.
 Many organizations and employers may be forced to retreat
into a defensive position, failing to achieve production targets
and blaming government for their lack of productivity.
 Overzealous and oppressive rules can destroy themselves by
alienating the very persons they are intended to protect.

20. Lesson 3:
“Sometimes, it makes better
to serve your coffee with a little

21. THE PSYCHOLOGICAL APPROACH

22. Activity 2
 You have been nominated as a Team of employees
saddled with a responsibility of developing a draft of
the general attributes you would require of the new
Safety Manager about to be employed.
 Develop a list of 10 attributes that you would love
the new Safety Manager to have, for review and use
by the Hiring Manager.

23. Who Would You Rather Have As Your
Safety Manager?
Mr. Peter
 Bold
 None compromising
 Very intelligent
 Straight faced
 Insular
 Feared
 Rewards individual brilliance
 Plays strictly by the rules
 Non communal
 Result oriented
Mr. Paul
 Sociable
 People oriented
 Compassionate
 Average intelligence (willing to
learn)
 Respectable
 Revered
 Advocate
 Success oriented
 Rewards team effort

24. ENFORCEMENT VS. PSYCHOLOGICAL
APPROACH.
Unlike the Enforcement model, the
Psychological approach attempts to
reward safe behavior.
Which would you rather deploy?

25. Characteristics of the Psychosocial
Approach.
1. Religion vs. Science (persuasion, pep talks, peer pressure, etc.)
2. Top Management Support (day to day decisions, recognition
pins, safety related decisions, commitment to safety program,
etc.)
3. Worker age (New workers, ‘older role models)
4. Safety from ground up. (Employee involvement in recognizing
and addressing the gravity of hazard exposures. What would
they do when management is not looking?)

26. Question:
How useful/ reliable is a written
endorsement from top management
to a successful OH&S Program?

27. Case Study 2:
Experienced Worker Killed.
 On an extra weekend shift, a steel mill worker was removing a 5 ton
piece of equipment using a crane. The equipment was attached to the
overhead crane, but did not lift properly because one of the
equipment “hold-downs” was still attached. This caused the
equipment to cock to one side. The worker saw the problem and went
into the mill to detach the hold-down. Since the lift was under crane
tension, the release of the hold-down caused the load to swing
unexpectedly. The worker was crushed in a pinch point between the
mill stand and the hold-down. The employee was 62 years old and
had been employed in the industry for 3 years. Tragically, he did not
quite make it to retirement.

28. The Engineering Approach.

29. Heinrich’s Studies (1959)
 Unsafe Act – 88%
 Unsafe Conditions – 10%
 Unsafe Causes – 2%
 Total Causes of workplace accidents – 100%
* Efforts to recover the original research data have proved sketchy results.

30. Three Lines of Defense
Engineering Controls
Administrative Controls
Personal Protective Equipment
Engineer out the
Hazard.

31. Question:
Deploy the 3 Lines of Defense to
manage a worker’s chronic exposure
to noise that can damage the
worker’s hearing.
- (First 2 correct responses gets a gift)

32. Safety Factor
In recognition of the chance element in safety, engineers have long provided
for variations – this is captured in the safety factor.
 E.g. for the design of scaffold components, the S.F. is 4:1. For overhead
crane hoists, the S.F. is 5:1, and for scaffold ropes S.F. is 6:1.
Factors that affect Safety Factor could include:
 Cost
 Weight
 Supporting Structure
 Speed
 Horse power
 Size, etc.

33. Fail Safe Principles
General fail-safe principle
Fail safe principle of redundancy
Principle of worst case

34. General Fail Safe Mode
 All systems or subsystems generally have 2 modes:
active and inert mode.
 The inert mode is usually the safer of the 2 modes.
 Simple principle: “If you pull the plug, the
machine cannot hurt you.”
 NB: Danger! In some systems, pulling the plug may
deactivate the safety systems and predispose worker
to the prevailing hazard.

35. Case Study 3
 An electric drill has a trigger switch that might be
continuously depressed to operate the drill. The
trigger switch is loaded with a spring, so that if some
failure (on the part of the operator in this case )
results in the release of the trigger, the machine will
return to the safe mode (off, in this case). Such a
switch is often called a deadman control. This
example illustrates the common situation in which
the inert state of the system is the safer one.

36. Case Study 4
Consider an automobile with power steering
and power brakes. When the engine dies,
both the steering and braking may become
very difficult ; so at least as far as these
subsystems are concerned, the inert state is
more dangerous than the active one.

37. General Design Principles
 Eliminate
 Substitute
 Reduce
 Guard personnel
 Install barrier
 Warn personnel with visible and audio alarm
 Use warning labels
 Use filters
 Design exhaust ventilation systems
 Consider the human interphase

38. Analytical Approach

39. Analytical Approach
Accident Analysis
Failure Modes and Effects Analysis
Fault Tree Analysis
Fish bone diagrams
Swiss cheese theory
Loss Incident Causation Models
Toxicology
Epidemiological Studies
Cost Benefit Analysis

40. Case Study
(CBA OF INSTALLING A MACHINE GUARD)
Cost (Amortization of initial investment)
Initial Cost -
$4000
Expected useful life – 8 years
Salvage Value - 0
Interest Cost on Invested Capital – 20%
Annual Cost
($4000 x 20% interest factor for 8 years) - $1042
Expected Cost of annual maintenance - $0
Annual expected cost due to cost in reduced
production rate (if any) - $ 800
Total Expected Annual Cost - $ 1842.
Benefit
Estimated tangible cost/ injury of this type -
$350
Estimated intangible cost/ injury of this type - $2400
Total Costs per injury - $
2750
Ave. nos of injuries per year on this machine
due to this hazard
- 1.2
Expected no. of injury of this type after
guarding – 0.1
Expected reduction in injury per year
- 1.1
(Expected Annual Benefit = $2750 x 1.1) - $ 3025

41.  Regardless of the approach taken, the ultimate is to reduce and possibly
eliminate the teething hazards.