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Maximising The Value Of Your Health & Safety Policy

A Comprehensive Guide

How to Enhance the Value of Health & Safety Policies?

Safety Policies in the workplace are the silent guardians of our daily routines and organisational structure for health and safety management. They may not be flashy or attention-grabbing, but they work diligently behind the scenes to ensure our safety and keep us compliant. So, how do we prevent them from becoming neglected relics? 

Here are 7 key tips for enhancing the value of your Health and Safety Policy, prepared by Nicola Coote, CFIOSH, MIIRSM, MCIPD and Chartered Safety Professional with over 30 years’ experience.  

1.Define your Health & Safety Policy

Let’s define what a Health and Safety Policy actually is: it’s like the rulebook for staying safe at work. It lays out who’s responsible for what, when, and how to keep the workplace a hazard-free zone. Ignoring it isn’t an option – it’s there for a reason. 

The law requires that every organisation with five or more people should have a written Health and Safety Policy. The HSE Guidance on how to write one advocates it is written in three sections:  

  1. Your Statement of Intent (this states what your organisation commits to, i.e. its objectives and direction of travel)  
  2. Your Organisational Arrangements for meeting these commitments (i.e. who will do what to meet these commitments, and what specific role holders must achieve) 
  3. Your Arrangements, i.e. your everyday standards and procedures, i.e. how  you are going to meet your commitments. 

Make sure that the structure, format, and content is clear in their purpose, intent and reason for being.  

2.Involve and Engage your workers

Why Should Employees Care? 

Now, let’s address the elephant in the room – why should employees (including managers) care? Well, besides the obvious fact that it’s about their own well-being, think of it as a safety net. When incidents happen, everyone gets questioned, and knowing the policies, what they require and who takes what role in delivering them can be a lifesaver.  

Everyone in your workplace will have specific responsibilities in the policy, but they often don’t know about them, don’t understand them or simply don’t believe it really applies to them. By engaging with your teams in a way that is meaningful to them, you will achieve buy-in by increasing their understanding of your policies’ relevance to them personally. 

To get engagement and buy-in, you need to involve your workers. So, talk to them in simple and straightforward ways. Don’t try to make it sound too technical, bureaucratic or dry. Make it relevant, and most of all – listen to them when they offer feedback or ideas that are different to your own.  Employees often don’t engage or offer feedback because they feel that no one asks them, or if they do, their feedback isn’t taken seriously.   

In our 30 + years of experience as safety practitioners, we have often found that effective solutions emerge when we talk to the people doing the job, i.e. at the proverbial coal face. After all, they are the experts in that role, task etc and they know all the pitfalls, compromises and daily risks they accept and face. Team expert safety practitioners and I often hear phrases like: “That’s how it’s always been”, “we reported the problem, but nothing happened, so we gave up” or “Why bother saying anything – nothing gets done to fix it”.  

3. Consider basic human behaviour and needs

At the core, these elements connect deeply with basic human behaviour and needs. People have an intrinsic desire for safety and security, as outlined in Maslow’s hierarchy of needs. At a fundamental level, we seek to avoid pain and ensure our physical

 wellbeing. This is why safety policies can resonate when they are written in a way that people can understand and communicate in a way that is quick, easy and relevant – they address this basic need directly. 

By involving employees in safety procedures, you engage their sense of responsibility and belonging. This engagement is key to making your policies relevant, effective and followed in practice. Clear communication and understanding help foster trust and cooperation, which are essential components of a healthy workplace culture. 

 People are more likely to cooperate when they: 

  • Understand what’s required and why, and 
  • Know what’s in it for them. 

This may sound hugely cynical, but it’s a basic human behaviour that drives us all, whether we acknowledge it or not. For some employees the “what’s in it for me” will be positive i.e. “I get to do a good job / stay safe / get promoted.  For others, it will be a simple case of “I get to keep my job / pay my rent”. 

Want to learn more about behaviour in the workplace? Why not check out our Behavioral Safety blog. 

4. Improve Ownership 

People often think that health and safety is someone else’s responsibility, not their own. As individuals, we tend to focus on the task that we were initially employed to do, e.g. production manager, or operations supervisor, and we get bogged down on the operational aspects of that role.  

When an organisation has their own internal health and safety specialist, we find that many directors, managers and employees think it is that person(‘s) job to “do the safety compliance stuff”.  That is a complete misperception. Think about this logically. How can one or two people in a team be in all places at all times to ensure that the workplace is safe, that workers are following the various rules and policies and that no one is at risk?   It is impossible. 

Here are some simple tips to improve ownership of health and safety:  

  1. Link the responsibilities specified in your health and safety policy to your job descriptions so they are easy to access and specific (rather than using generic terms like “you will follow health and safety rules”).  
  2. When conducting appraisals, staff development reviews or having 1-1 discussions with your team ensure that at least one health and safety question is included. People do not like being caught out or to get something wrong.  They may not know the first time you ask, but they will make sure they are better prepared in the future. This will help them to go and check their responsibilities and consider how they can demonstrate compliance, just in case they are asked about it.  
  3. Offer praise, recognition or other positive reinforcement when an employee or team are proactive in following safety procedures and policies. It will show that your organisation is giving health and safety priority and some scrutiny and monitoring of what is going on.  

5. Use Simple, Clear and Concise Language

Detail everything from risk assessment controls to emergency procedures. Let’s leave no stone unturned. Ensure the procedures are suitable for those needing to follow them. 

Pages of words will simply disengage. Be more creative by using images, flow charts or simple steps to follow. Avoid using jargon, technical terms (unless the policy relates to something very technical) or legal requirements. Your policy should interpret the legal requirements into practical ways to meet them in your own organisation. This way, your policy will support your management team and give your Board assurance that by following the policies your organisation is meeting the law. 

Most of all, make sure that any local protocols, e.g. for cleaning, machine start-up etc, are posted close to where the work occurs so people can quickly and easily check if they aren’t sure. 

6. Communicate your Health and Safety Policy

Ensure know what’s what when it comes to your health and safety standards. Let’s keep the lines of communication wide open. To achieve this make sure you have various channels of communication, using a variety of the following examples: 

  • H&S meetings 
  • Emails, including a central email where people can report concerns, feedback or suggestions for improvement 
  • Toolbox talk 
  • Pre-start briefings at the beginning of a shift 
  • Include relevant policies in specific training modules 
  • 1-1 discussions, including discussion about their view on the effectiveness of relevant policies. This will help you to check their understanding of what the policy requires and identify any pain points that might be a barrier to employees following them. 

7. Ensure Policies Aren't Forgotten or Overlooked

So, how do we ensure these policies aren’t just forgotten about? Let’s keep it simple with three key questions that can test the level of employee engagement: 

  1. Do managers and employees know where to find the policies, and are they quick and easy to access? 
  2. Do they understand their responsibilities, and the positives/negatives of following them i.e. addressing the “what’s in it for me”? 
  3. Are they actively implementing these policies and taking ownership? 

Ask a random sample of your team these three questions and see how they answer – you may be pleasantly surprised! However, we often find when our expert specialists ask these types of questions that managers and staff alike know there is a policy, they sometimes know why it’s there, but they cannot recall what their own responsibilities are. Even worse, when asked how they can demonstrate they are meeting  their responsibilities, they find they are

Monitor and Review: Regularly check in and update your policies to stay current. Safety is an ever-evolving game. You should be doing this at least annually as part of a health and safety management system, as well as to meet HSE guidance. If a longer frequency of official review suits your organisation better that is fine provided you are also.

Here at PHSC we offer a range of support services to help you.

  • Review your existing health and safety policies. 
  • Develop and write new safety policies. 
  • Provide training to your staff to help with implementation of your health and safety policies.  

With over 30 years of experience, we have expert consultants who are Chartered Safety Professionals to suit different industries. For more information about our services and extra advice visit our website: www.phsc.co.uk 

Further information about health and policy requirements can be found on the HSE’s website 

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