Basically, H&S plans and tools are only useful if they help you keep on top of what’s going on in your business.

They might include anything from a calendar alert that reminds you when vehicles need a Warrant of Fitness to a diary to jot down workers who have forklift licences.

Having strong H&S tools will streamline your business. What’s more, these processes are essential for investigating — and learning from — H&S incidents or near misses.

Read on to figure out how to approach H&S plans and tools, as well as what to do when incidents do happen.

If it’s practical to put your H&S information down on paper, then do it. If it’s more useful to do it through other means, for example pinning up a laminated image of how to safely use machine guarding instead of expecting workers to read a complicated instruction manual — do that instead.

Great practice is to do what works best for you and your workers. What’s absolutely important is for you to have an H&S culture that’s open, honest and collaborative. This will get everyone at work actively thinking and learning about H&S. It’ll also give them ownership of it so they all do what they need to.

Outside of these day-to-day processes it’s also a good idea to have:

• some workers who are trained in first aid
• an up-to-date first aid kit
• emergency planning procedures in place
• continuity and contingency planning procedures in place
• emergency contact details for each worker on file.

It’s unrealistic to expect your work will always be 100% healthy and safe. Injuries, illnesses, incidents and near misses can — and do — happen. It’s important that when they do happen, you and your workers take the time to review and learn from them.

Depending on the nature, severity and complexity of the incident, learning from an H&S incident might be as simple as chatting to staff afterwards so you can all try to figure out what went wrong — and what can be done about it.

A more formal way to do this would be to keep an incident register and to use it as part of your in-house follow-ups.

To get ideas on how to investigate incidents and prevent them happening again, read WorkSafe’s information on:

How to assess health and safety risks

If you do want to keep an incident register, you should include:

• near misses
• incidents
• occupational illnesses (or signs of such illnesses). 

Alongside these events, you should also outline:

• who was involved or affected
• what happened
• where and when it happened
• what happened after the event.

Apart from recording incidents in the register, you should also:

• get worker input into how the register should work
• make sure all staff know where the register is kept and how to fill it in
• always keep your register in the same place so it’s easy to find.

What to expect from WorkSafe visits