Occupational risk assessment is used to plan preventive actions in the company, taking into account priorities. Regardless of the method used by a company to assess its professional risks, the key to success lies in respecting a few basic principles.
Preparing the risk assessment, identifying risks, prioritizing them, setting up an action plan and evaluating the results, discover the 4 essential steps in an occupational risk prevention approach.
Preparing the risk assessment
In general, the assessment of occupational risks begins with the creation of a workgroup which will make it possible to define the framework of this evaluation and the resources made available (finances, documents, checklists, evaluation grids, software, etc.).
It is necessary toInvolve employees to the process, who are in most cases in the best position to know dangerous situations and the reality of work.
Identify risks
This step consists of making a State of play of the situation by targeting dangers and risks to be analyzed. Several indicators can be taken into account such as health data (number of accidents at work, occupational diseases, severity rate of accidents at work...), thetruancy Or the Turnover, the resources and risks implemented (training, gestures and postures, corrective actions, etc.) or other factor depending on the sector of your company.
The dangers may be related to intrinsic properties of an equipment, of a chemical or biological agent used by the manufacturing process, of a work organization (work rotation, time...), and likely to cause physical or mental damage to employees.
Risks are measured by the conditions in which employees are exposed to these dangers.
For this stage, it is necessary to collaborate with employees, to identify positions, situations and sectors at risk in a real situation.
Classify risks
Risk ranking is an essential step in the process of assessing occupational risks. It makes it possible to go from identifying risks to defining an action plan, and to determine which serious risks must be controlled first.
According to the results obtained by identifying risks, it is necessary to target workstations and/or sectors of activity, which require a more thorough diagnosis according to the priorities previously defined.
Suggest preventive actions
Depending on the work situations that require a more thorough diagnosis, several methods can be used:
- Controls and verifications based on the use of a repository (questionnaires, checklists, etc.)
- Job analysis, here an ergonomic approach that results from the observation of the workplace, from the analysis of statistics (work accidents, occupational diseases,...)
For each identified risk, it is necessary to propose and define an action plan that may concern the design of tools, products, the workspace or even the organization of production and work.
Once the actions are in place, you can assess the results obtained, the technical and organizational changes following the implementation of the actions, the evolution of the activity of the targeted sector, the appearance of new risks (equipment, technologies, installations, installations, installations, products, premises, etc.).
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