Safety is discipline with a lot of attention last years. Human health and life were never valued at whole human history as it is now. Which is great and wonderful. Safety became a number one priority. And the fastest assessment to have safety under control is 5 points method.
this article covers:
- Risk, or hazard definition
- Risk assessment – how to?
- Risk assessment criteria
- Counter-measurement identification
- Download risk assesment excel matrix
Hot news, folks. In order to help you as much as I can in your improvement efforts, I have launched non-binding consultation program. I would like to help you with:
- Lean culture implementation in your organization
- Six Sigma projects consultations
- Lean Six Sigma trainings and certifications support
- Project management theory turn into practical usage
- Your career planning
First 30 minutes of consultation for free, every additional 1 hour 10 USD.
Risk, or hazard definition
There is exert pressure on employees, to care about own and co-workers safety and health. Consequences of accident can last for whole life. Everybody would like to return home from work, in the same condition as started, right? Prevention is a key.
Hazard or risk does not mean danger of personal injury.
Hazard is combination of incident probability and severity of incident consequences.
Hazard thus, is not a workspace itself. But likelihood, that accident occurs on the workspace in some time period.
Part of safety at work must be ergonomics and person comfort behind computer. as well as risks with long term influence on humans health, too.
How to use Pareto? 3x example (+template) – read here
Risk assessment – how to do?
3 steps to proceed with risk assessment:
- Risk source identification
- Risk seriousness evaluation
- Counter-measurements introduction. if not to full risk elimination, so at least for risk reduction.
Identify one process, to start risk assessment, and evaluate each step in that process.
Do not try to solve whole facility at once. You can use existing facility value stream map to identify required process. If not existing, try to create simple process map to identfy all cells to be addressed in assessment
Let me show you source identification example on cutting planks:
Inhaling sawdust. Eyes injury by chip. Limbs injury during machine cleaning. Slash by saw. No operator at running machine. Painful spine due to not good ergonomics. Painful joints, due to excessive standing.
Write down risks under each other and create table. You are free to download assessment excel table in the end of this article.
How to be successful with 6sigma training? – read here
Risk assessment criteria
There are two criteria in risk seriousness evaluation as mentioned earlier. Incident probability, And consequences severity. Each criteria have 5 categories.
Probability categories are:
- Randomly to happen
- Improbably to happen
- Probably to happen
- Very probably to happen
- Permanently to happen
And consequences severity categories are:
- Injury without inability to work
- Injury with inability to work
- Injury with hospitalization
- Injury with permanent impact
- Fatality
Identify and Fill probability and severity to each risk row. To discover hazard rate multiply both numbers. The higher number is, the higher risk, that accident occur. That means higher importance for countermeasures. It is time to decrease risks to allowable limit.
Counter-measurement identification
There is effectiveness of countermeasures shown in this chart.
Measure with highest effectiveness would be, risk full elimination. The lowest, protective aids usage.
Find the right balance between countermeasure and its price.
Review hazard rates After taking measures. Numbers should go down under tolerable limit. If not, review what else you can implement to improve it.
Repeat assessment, until risk will not go under acceptable limits.
Download risk assessment excel matrix
You will get excel matrix with automated calculations. Just follow guideline notes in the the top of the table. Probability and consequences cathegories + countermeasurement efficiency is part of downloaded file. So hurry up, use it, eliminate risks in your processes.
Download 5 step assessment template:
Download Risk matrix excel template:
Download risk matrix excel template here- it will help you to visualize finding from 5 step method.
I do videos, blog posts, and all templates in my free time. I will appreciate if you can donate me a cup of cofee, for more energy in my creation. (1 dollar counts, too 😉 Click on this link: I would like to support Erik in his effort
Do not forget to visit and subscribe my YouTube channel. I am uploading Six Sigma, Lean and Project oriented videos regurarly. So, stay tuned.
Yours sincerely Erik.