Discover how you should be running you Health and Safety incident investigations. This best practice guide covers the key elements of effective investigations into accidents and incidents that occur at work.

1. The Secret to Professional
H&S Investigations

2. In any organisation things don’t always go to plan.
You need to be prepared for the unexpected in order to respond effectively.

3. This SlideShare covers:
• The importance of investigation
• Essential control measures required
• Your incident reporting responsibilities
• Key actions as leaders and managers
• Accident & incident investigation
best practice

4. With the right measures, policies
and procedures in place, workers
and managers will be more
competent in dealing with
accidents and emergencies.
Effective plans need to be in place
and regularly tested.

5. The Importance of Investigation

6. Health and safety investigations
should form an essential part of your
monitoring process.
Incidents, including near misses, can
tell you a lot about the reality of H&S in
your organisation.
Investigating your accidents and
occupational ill health will help you
identify root cause and inform your
continuous improvement programme.

7. What should you investigate?
• In short: All accidents whether major or
minor.
• Serious accidents have the same root
causes as minor accidents, as do
incidents with a potential for serious loss.
It is these root causes that bring about
the accident, the severity is often a
matter of chance.
• Accident studies have shown that there
is a consistently greater number of less
serious accidents than serious accidents.

8. • Many accident ratio
studies have been
undertaken and the
one shown below is
based on studies
carried out by the
Health & Safety
Executive.

9. Accident Studies
• In all cases, ‘non injury’ incidents had the potential to develop into something more
serious.
• These ratios clearly show focus should be placed on all accidents, particularly unsafe
practices at the bottom of the pyramid. Such action will lead to improved results in the
upper tiers.

10. Investigating an incident thoroughly
reassures your workers that you take
their safety seriously.
Make sure you take proactive, as well
as reactive, steps to prevent further
occurrences.
Your investigations will also provide
essential information for your insurers
should and incident progress to a
claim.

11. Control Measures

12. Typical control measures include:
• Equipment used
• Working practices (e.g. ways of
working, supervision and training)
• Worker behaviour
Investigations can help identify why
existing risk control measures failed
and what improvements or measures
are needed.

13. • In workplaces where a trade union is
recognised, appointed H&S
representatives have the right to:
• Investigate potential hazards and
dangerous occurrences in the
workplace.
• Examine causes of workplace accidents

14. Your Responsibilities
Reporting Incidents

15. All employers, self-employed and
people in control of work premises
have health and safety duties
under RIDDOR.
Each employee has a responsibility
to comply with H&S Regulations,
look out for their own H&S and also
others around them.

16. You must report certain work-related injuries,
cases of ill health and dangerous occurrences.
RIDDOR applies to all work activities but not
all incidents are reportable.

17. Reporting incidents should
not stop employers
undertaking their own
investigation to ensure risks
are controlled effectively.

18. As a business leader or manager, it is important that you take into account the
arrangements required for you and your team to effectively investigate accidents and
incidents. This section covers the major actions leaders and managers should follow.
ACTIONS

19. Key Actions
For Leaders

20. 1) Verify that plans are in place to
deal with immediate risks following
unforeseen events
2) Make sure that there is a reporting
process so that leaders are informed
of accidents, incidents, or cases of
occupational health

21. 3) Consider lessons learned from
accidents and incidents of others
in similar industries. Could they
have been avoided?
4) Ensure people are held to
account if failings reoccur

22. Key Actions
For Managers

23. Formulate Plans
• Detail what workers must
report and how it will be
communicated to workers
• How will work-related ill health,
accidents or near misses be
notified?
• Who will assist in the
investigation?
• What action could be taken as
a result?
• How will you identify trends?

24. Examine what reporting procedures are suitable,
check all incident, accident and near-miss reports
and identify trends.

25. Be fair in any investigation, according to the level of risk identified.
Collect evidence, establish what happened, when, where and why.

26. What are the Immediate and
Underlying Causes?
• Immediate causes
Premises, plant and substances,
procedures, or people.
• Underlying causes
Management arrangements and
organisational factors such as design,
selection of materials, maintenance,
management of change, adequacy of risk
controls, communication, competence etc.
Identify Root Cause

27. Investigate accidents with a high priority - before people’s memories fade
and while evidence is still available.
Record, keep & organise findings.

28. Engage specialist help to support complex investigations, e.g. an operation
involving major accident hazards.

29. Worker Consultation and Involvement.
• Involve workers in the planning process and the target-setting process.
• Carry out joint investigation with workers and monitor their performance.

30. • Consider how to achieve, test
and maintain competency.
• Do investigators have the
necessary training, knowledge
and experience to carry out
their duties?
• Consider whether training
issues contributed to causes of
accidents/incidents/near
misses.
• Seek specialist advice if
needed.
Competence.

31. A Simple Structure
For effective Investigations
(HSE advised).

32. According to the HSE:
“The Plan, Do, Check, Act approach achieves a balance between the
systems and behavioural aspects of management.
It also treats health and safety management as an integral part of good
management generally, rather than as a stand-alone system.”

33. • To implement your Health and Safety policy, you need to establish and maintain an
effective H&S management system that is proportional to the risks.
• You should set the direction for effective H&S management and a policy that sets a
clear direction to help ensure communication of H&S duties and benefits.
Plan

34. • Delivery depends on an effective management system to ensure the health and safety
of employees and other people affected by your work.
Do
• Organisations should aim to protect people by introducing management systems &
practices that ensure risks are dealt with sensibly, responsibly and fairly.
• Profile your businesses risks, organise H&S and implement your plan.

35. • Monitoring and reporting are important parts of H&S arrangements. Management
systems allow organisations to receive both specific and routine reports on policy
performance.
Check
• When measuring performance make sure that your plans have been implemented.
Assess how well the risks are being controlled and if you are achieving your aims.
• Investigate the causes of accidents, incidents or near misses.

36. • It is important to review performance to establish whether your essential H&S
principles have been implemented across the organisation.
Act
• This tells you whether your system is effective in managing risk and protecting people.

37. How technology can help
• Managing your health and safety system manually can be time consuming and prone to human
error.
• Implementing EvoSafe, our leading health and safety software, can speed things up by
automating manual tasks and improving compliance.

38. EvoSafe, is cloud
based and available
offline, so wherever
you are you are
able to manage
your health and
safety with ease.

39. Want to know more?
If you’d like to know more about how EvoSafe can help you,
get in contact and we’ll be happy to talk you through it.
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