Action for Improvement

Preventive and corrective action

Arrangements should be established and maintained for preventive and corrective action resulting from OSH management system performance monitoring and measurement, OSH management system audits and management reviews. These arrangements should include:

• identifying and analysing the root causes of any non-conformities with relevant OSH regulations and/or OSH management systems arrangements; and
• initiating, planning, implementing, checking the effectiveness of and documenting corrective and preventive action, including changes to the OSH management system itself.

When the evaluation of the OSH management system or other sources show that preventive and protective measures for hazards and risks are inadequate or likely to become inadequate, the measures should be addressed according to the recognized hierarchy of prevention and control measures, and completed and documented, as appropriate and in a timely manner.

Continual improvement

Arrangements should be established and maintained for the continual improvement of the relevant elements of the OSH management system and the system as a whole.

The arrangements should take into account:

• the OSH objectives of the organization;
• the results of hazard and risk identifications and assessments;
• the results of performance monitoring and measurements;
• the investigation of work-related injuries, diseases, ill health and incidents, and the results and recommendations of audits;
• the outcomes of the management review;
• the recommendations for improvement from all members of the organization, including the safety and health committee, where it exists;
• changes in national laws and regulations, voluntary programmes and collective agreements;
• new relevant information; and
• results of health protection and promotion programmes.

The safety and health processes and performance of the organization should be compared with others in order to improve health and safety performance.

Find out more

1. Further information see managing health and safety
2. To help you structure a policy, there is an example and an interactive template on the HSE website