Behavior-based safety may have its roots in the 1930s, but the continued evolution of the workplace means that the decades-old scientific concept is just as relevant in the 21st century.

Nearly 3 in 4 Environmental, Health and Safety (EHS) professionals say their department is understaffed. Whether due to underfunding of EHS priorities or the current skills shortage, it’s a problem that many safety professionals must grapple with.

At the same time, adoption of EHS Software is growing, presenting new opportunities for improving efficiency of EHS processes.

With these facts in mind, let’s take a look at 7 ways you could be using your EHS Software more effectively to get better results.

Where do you start if you need to create a comprehensive employee safety program from scratch? What can you do if your company is struggling with high rates of injuries and illnesses?

These and other questions can be difficult to answer, particularly for companies in high-risk industries or without much in-house Environmental, Health and Safety (EHS) expertise.

What many organizations don’t realize is that the U.S. Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OHSA) offers a broad array of completely free resources to help improve safety. Today we’re looking at nine of them, from basic best practices to personalized guidance to resources designed specifically for small businesses.

Six people were killed in the collapse of a pedestrian bridge at Florida International University on March 15.

The bridge, designed to keep students safe, did just the opposite in its final stages of construction. A National Transportation Safety Board team is launching an investigation to determine exactly what went wrong.

You hear it all the time on Car Talk, the classic radio show where mechanics Tom and Ray (aka “Click and Clack”) dispense hilarious advice to clueless car owners. The caller’s car was smoking for months before breaking down. Or the driver taped over a flashing temperature light, continuing to drive her dad’s car until it died altogether.

It’s a similar story in companies struggling with Environmental, Health and Safety (EHS) problems. It sometimes seems like incidents come out of nowhere, but the signs were actually there all along. Those signs are leading indicators.

While lagging indicators like incidence rates look backward, leading indicators such as near-misses hint at potential future problems.

This post examines the 3 types of leading indicators defined by the National Safety Council, including operations-based, systems-based and behavior-based indicators.

EHS Today’s Safety Leadership Conference will take place from November 28th to November 30th in Atlanta, GA and EtQ is excited.

The Safety Leadership Conference is a great place to learn from high level safety professionals, participate in hands-on workshops with lessons in safety standards, focus on becoming a safety leader and building a safety culture and meet America’s safest companies. This year, attendees can even tour some of Atlanta’s top facilities to gather insight on best safety practices.

EtQ is the sponsor of the Mercedes-Benz Stadium Tour which will highlight the safety considerations and challenges involved in the complex construction of the stadium, which includes 27,000 tons of steel that make up the roof and how it has as many as 2,000 workers on site daily. Attendees will be guided through the process taken to identify both potential workplace and fan safety issues and programs for opening and operating the building. The tour will provide parties with the amenities that Mercedes-Benz Stadium has to offer. For more information, see here. 

EtQ is excited to be among other EHS professionals discussing and sharing best leadership and safety practices. We’ve handpicked a few things we're looking forward to!

Environmental Health and Safety organizations deal with a variety of materials, some of which may be hazardous. In any situation it is important to handle these materials with care. Chemicals or other complex materials could be hazardous to not only the health of the handler, but to the environment it surrounds.

Therefore, users must know beforehand about the specific material and how to handle it. Not knowing could result in disaster.  

This is why an automated EHS Management System is important.

It provides many different modules that help create a comprehensive solution for fostering a high level of safety, and ensures a highly trained workforce.

Some of these tools include:

To maintain a high level of safety within the Environmental Health and Safety (EHS) industry, organizations must have the ability to proactively address all incidents that occur. This is a necessity as reducing job-related incidents will help promote a safer workforce, while enabling you to maintain compliance with regulatory agencies. Managing these incidents with the help of automated solutions provides users with more control and visibility over safety processes.

EHS management software makes it easier to:

• Capture and analyze data while managing risks
• Find trends in incidents to improve safety across the organization
• Make needed changes to increase safety in all areas to ensure continuous improvement