پیشگیری از حوادث در شرکت های کوچک و متوسط با استفاده از مدل ریسک شغلی

The occupational risk model (ORM) developed by the Dutch workgroup occupational risk model WORM has been transferred to a Danish context, with the aim of creating a more simple system, particularly for SMEs. The ORM identifies the activities in a person’s daily work that contribute most to the person’s risk and also identifies which conditions need to be changed in order to reduce that risk. Our investigation seeks to determine whether we can use the ORM method to collect information about risks in SMEs and, if so, whether we can present this information in a way that allows SMEs to use it constructively. Finally, we seek to evaluate the impact of this method on occupational safety in SMEs, as the project also focuses on management factors that can motivate the SMEs to heighten their risk-awareness and expand their own initiatives. The present paper describes the methodological approaches applied and some of the preliminary findings obtained during field observations.

It is well known that the levels of work-related injuries, fatalities and illness in small enterprises are unacceptably high and at the same time it is recognized that health and safety management in the small enterprises faces considerable challenges arising from organization and culture of work (European Agency for Safety and Health at Work, 2003, Hasle et al., 2004a, Hasle et al., 2004b and Walters, 2004). Because of the heterogeneity of small enterprises this generalization may be a little doubtful. Nevertheless, the health and safety problems in SMEs are more a result of poor management of risk than of the actual magnitude of the hazards present (Walters, 2004). In small enterprises the focus on safety is influenced by the particular culture of the owner of the enterprise. It is the owner who is the pivotal point of the enterprise and of the way health and safety is prioritized and implemented in daily work. The owner has to deal with many different issues and tasks every day, and will generally regard systematic work on safety and health as a more peripheral task (Hasle et al., 2004a and Hasle et al., 2004b). In general, systematic work on health and safety in small enterprises is poor, as are other kinds of systematic management and planning. The employer/owner tends to entrust responsibility for safety to the employees themselves. Employers regard safety as an individual problem, as long as the necessary safety equipment is available (Axelsson, 2002, Hasle et al., 2004a and Hasle et al., 2004b). It is important to realize that small enterprises seldom witness serious injuries, and that their ability to recognize risks and exposure to potential injury is limited. For this reason, their understanding and appreciation of the relevance of safety and health is also limited (Hasle et al., 2004a and Hasle et al., 2004b). Over the last 5–10 years many different tools and methods have been developed and tested in small enterprises, but the general experience is that it is difficult to disseminate and create an interest in the results in small enterprises. Small enterprises need to recognize that these results give them something useful for their daily work, something which can make life simpler and which is easy to use. In the usual case the owner motivates by personal contact and when he has the opportunity of exchanging knowledge with colleagues (Hasle et al., 2004a and Hasle et al., 2004b). Another issue is that most accidents are apparently simple and related to human behavior, and very often result from everyday conditions which are not considered to be especially hazardous. This is perhaps another important reason why the rate of injury is high. All these points must be taken into account when developing a risk evaluation system for small enterprises. Fig. 1 shows accident types for carpenters and is based on data imported from the Danish Working Environment Authority concerning notified accidents at work collected in the Danish register in the period 1993–2002. The Danish data was analyzed using the Dutch framework based on the 64 bow-ties (see below), and shows that the accidents relate to working on ladders, scaffoldings, constructions, manual handling, use of hand tools and transport.The problem is that a layman cannot assess or prioritize the risks and risk factors involved simply by looking at a ladder, a stairway or a vehicle. Evaluations of these trivial risks seldom occur in traditional risk assessments, even though the majority of injuries are due to such risks. The WORM project has delivered a fully quantified occupational risk model (ORM), based on analysis of the causes and underlying causes of 9142 reported accidents in The Netherlands that took place over the course of 6 years (1998–2004) and which were investigated by the inspectors at the Dutch labour inspectorate (DLI). The accidents were analyzed by means of the Bow-tie model – a tool for integrating broad classes of cause-consequence models (Ale, 2006). The bow-ties describe the relationships between exposure to certain risks, factors that influence those risks, and the risk outcome in terms of probability of death, permanent injury and of recoverable injury (Ale, 2006). A total of 36 generic hazards or bow-ties were identified and described in this systematic way. Some of these 36 bow-ties were divided into a few more detailed categories, so that the total number of hazards distinguished in the final system rose to 64. For each of these 64 hazards a number of safety barriers which can prevent an accident from occurring were identified. The ORM is also based on surveys containing a valuable set of data on exposure to hazards throughout the entire workforce in the Netherlands and giving the average exposure to hazards and conditions of safety barriers in The Netherlands, a statistic which WORM refers to as the Dutch national average (DNA) exposure and risk. ORM is transferred into a software tool which allows users to make a quantified analysis of their specific risk and which can generate tailored advice on strategies for reducing risk for their organizations (WORM Metamorphosis Consortium, 2008). For each of the 64 bowties, the WORM project has identified the barriers that must be in place to prevent accidents from occurring, e.g. proper tools, maintenance, protection equipment, etc. To receive a tailored result, the user has to provide input (i.e. to answer questions) about each of his or her tasks, task durations, the activities that constitute those tasks, and the conditions under which these activities take place. This easily adds up to at least 50 questions. The input requirements are shown schematically in Fig. 2. If no data is provided for block 2 in Fig. 2, the conditions according to DNA are assumed in the software.

The system of collecting information on the activities and hazards associated with a certain occupation, as developed in this project, has been shown to be very easy and useful. With a PDA and the interface one can, with very little effort, collect very detailed information about activities, hazards and safety barriers for a working day. Nevertheless, one has to understand the system and be able to evaluate safety barriers in relation to the hazards and activities, and that requires some experience. Knowing that small enterprises have neither the time, the knowledge nor the necessary awareness of the risks, we must conclude that small enterprises would never use this data collection system themselves. For professionals however the system can be a way of collecting data to produce the same kind of generic version of occupations or branches, or even of concrete enterprises – as has been done in this project. Larger enterprises could also use the system to register the tasks and activities actually done by the employees in their working day. What a generic version of a risk profile will look like for a certain occupation is still part of our project, but the outline is starting to take form. One of our concerns is that, even when we follow people for several days, we may not discover the kind of risks that occur only once or twice a year. So the method has its limits. Nevertheless, the system produces a fine overview of the general risks and in particular includes the large group of risks that is rarely included in traditional risks assessments, i.e. those one may call “trivial risks”, like falls on the floor or stairs, sprain and strains after a wrong or heavy lift, sharp tools or materials and so forth. We found that the division of the risk focus into four parts was extremely useful (see Table 2). A. Look for the risk of falling from where you are walking and where you have your feet. B. Look for the risks from your surroundings, the risk for being hit by or hit against something, being hit by collapsing or falling objects, flying objects or similar. C. Look for the risks from what you are working with and use your hands for. Risks such as sharp surfaces, sticking, squeezing situations, moving tools, chemicals, etc. D. Look for the special and very specific risks related to fire, explosion, drowning, poisoning, etc. Generally speaking, most risk assessments look only at group D, because of the potentially severe consequences if or when these risks are realized. Fortunately, in most enterprises these risks very seldom occur. Where these risks exist, they must receive much attention, but most enterprises do not have these potentially severe risks. They “only” have the banal risks which no-one thinks worth dealing with, perhaps because the tasks in many enterprises do change all the time with new surroundings, new customers, new products, new weather, new colleagues, new tools, etc. Maybe we need to make a distinction between the kind of risk assessment the employer has to make and the kind of risks the employees have to be aware of. If we make this distinction, there remains the large task of training the employees to be aware of and deal with the risks they meet on a daily basis during the ever-changing occupational conditions. This comes close to the basic concept of safety culture. We see that the Dutch ORM and The DanWORM results can be fine supplements to this process.