Maintaining Safe Work Environments: Manager's Role & OSHA Compliance - Essay Sample

Introduction

In any organization, maintaining a safe working environment is a collective responsibility. Human resource personnel and organization managers play a significant role in making standards and ensuring safety and enforcing health laws (Federal Osha Regional and State Osha Offices, 2004). The organization managers, as well as other leaders, play a significant role in maintaining the standards and enforcing health laws. The OSHA ensure accidents occurring in the workplace are tracked down and corrected.

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Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) Laws

According to labour statistics, about 3.3 million people were injured while 4340 fatalities were reported in 2009 (OSHA 2002 Recordkeeping Simplified, 2003). the information collected involved individuals who were working in various companies. The United States Labor Department released Labour statistics showing that a large number of represents the employees' condition as well as time and financial cost. As a result, in any Human resource management (HRM), there is a great need to incorporate health safety in the strategic plan (Federal Osha Regional and State Osha Offices, 2004).

Duties of OSHA

Occupational Safety and Health Act (OSHA) released in 1970, led to the creation of Occupational Safety and Health Administration which is responsible for monitoring the health and safety issues of the workers (Federal Osha Regional and State Osha Offices, 2004). the goal of the agency is to maintain safe and healthy working state for both women and men by putting into place standards as well as the provision of assistance, education, outreach and training. Some of the activities done by the agency include giving training about the health hazards at the workplace. the OSHA is also responsible for assisting in the effort of maintaining order organizational order maintenance. OSHA agency is one of the United States Labor department whose central administration is being the assistant to the secretary of labour for occupational safety and health.

Some of the businesses have been specifically mentioned to apply for some companies as Construction, marine terminals, Shipyard. OSHA standards are designed to not only apply to companies related to Construction, manufacturing and production but also in organizations with primary functions. This means every company should abide by the OSHA rules and regulations. Some of the safety rules by OSHA standards include:

Rules Set by OSHA

States on working/walking surfaces - 15 per cent of total accidents in the workplace result from falls, slips and trips. the standard applies to almost every permanent places of employment. the rule states that "all passageways, storerooms, and service rooms shall be kept clean and orderly. Every floor and working space shall be kept free of protruding nails, splinters, holes, or loose boards (OSHA 2002 Recordkeeping Simplified, 2003)."

Evacuation means (egress) - the rule states that the physical structure of any building should provide exit ways which are not obstructed in every point of the building. There should be no physical prevention or lock which may hinder escape from the building. the only buildings which are exceptional to this rule include correctional institutions (OSHA 2002 Recordkeeping Simplified, 2003). the standards emphasize that a visible sign must mark every exit.

Occupational noise exposure - the employees should be offered protection to harmful noise, especially when certain levels are exceeded. Controls should be put in place to regulate the sound levels, and the workers should be provided with protective equipment (OSHA 2002 Recordkeeping Simplified, 2003).

Hazardous material handling - OSHA offers regulation against workers exposure to at least over four hundred dangerous substances as well as providing communication to possible chemical hazards (OSHA 2002 Recordkeeping Simplified, 2003).

Protective gadgets - protective equipment such as respirators, face and eye protection should be used to prevent direct exposure to hazards. Giving head protection to workers in areas with high potential for falling can help reduce fatal accidents. In risk flying particles, the workers should be equipped with eye and face protection gadgets (OSHA 2002 Recordkeeping Simplified, 2003).

Sanitation - working environments should be supplied with a portable water supply. In cases of enclosed working environments, vermin should be provided. The organization should provide toilets separately for the two sex. The number of bathrooms should be proportional to the number of employees (OSHA 2002 Recordkeeping Simplified, 2003).

On-site supply of first aid requirement - in every organization, present of first Aid kits are mandatory according to OSHA laws. Each safety kit should at least contain, gauze roller bandages, gauze pads and other required items (OSHA 2002 Recordkeeping Simplified, 2003).

Fire equipment supply - every organization should have on-site fire extinguishers should be supplied for employees to use in case of fire accidents. the rules hold except for cases where written policy is issued, asking for immediate site evacuation (OSHA 2002 Recordkeeping Simplified, 2003).

Power and machine tools guard - any moving machine needs a safeguard (depending on the industry) to avoid cases such as blinding, burns, amputations, hands, crushing fingers. The guards may include guards attached to the system (Roughton, 2003).

Electrical requirements and standards - electrical standards by OSHA are meant to protect the workers from electric shocks, explosions and fires (Roughton, 2003). The wiring should be insulated to protect the Electricals.

Commercial diving operation requirements - safety aspects information on commercial diving, which includes, mixed-gas diving, post and predive procedures and other necessary qualification of the dive team (Roughton, 2003).

Human resource personnel, such as the managers, should know the OSHA laws to ensure they are implemented in working environments. the HR personnel should incorporate the requirements in the company's strategic plans governing the employees. the rules are more important in companies specialized in manufacturing (OSHA 2002 Recordkeeping Simplified, 2003).

Some of the OSHA violations in existence include workers entering a trash compactor while power supply, blocked fire extinguisher access in companies such as Dick's Sporting goods store, Pennsylvania, Queensbury. As a corrective mean, Dick's was fined over $57, 300 by the OSHA team (OSHA 2002 Recordkeeping Simplified, 2003). the company gave the company a maximum of fifteen days to comply with the rule expectations.

Violated OSHA Standard

Most of the OSHA set criteria to include: respiratory protection, fall protection, machine guarding, Electrical wiring procedures, ladders, hazard communication, and industrial power trucks, among other basic rules set by OSHA. Different companies end up ignoring most of the regulations established under the act which may endanger employee's health and safety (OSHA 2002 Recordkeeping Simplified, 2003).

OSHA Enforcement

OSHA encourages record keeping according to its laws. Companies which consists of few employees do not require record keeping. Record-keeping should not be confused that the company or the employees are at risk of health or safety (OSHA 2002 Recordkeeping Simplified, 2003). Also, the aspect of keeping record does not mean the employee can claim for compensation due to any work injury or illness. Record keeping is done to keep the frequency of injury and disease in a company or give the organization. OSHA records keeping shows the rate of incidences or number of illness on an individual among over a hundred employees in a given set. To obtain the rate of disease on the employees within a company: two hundred thousand is used as the standard figure in representing a hundred full-time employees working at a rate of 40 hours in a week over 50 weeks of a fiscal year (OSHA 2002 Recordkeeping Simplified, 2003).

A human resource individual uses the data obtained after computation of the above formula and carry out a comparison with a given set of related companies (Michaud, 2017). the circulation of such data can be used to produce comparable data regardless of the company size if the incidence rate is observed to be higher than the average obtained from comparison with other companies, training of personnel within the working environment (Michaud, 2017). Also, the human resource management may develop new approaches on how to fight the increased injury or health hazard rate.

OSHA has developed a strategy to determine which injury or health issues are eligible to be reported. According to "The OSHA Decision Tree for Determining If an Injury or Illness Should BE Reported (Michaud, 2017)". the OSHA team has to enforce rules by performing an inspection on various companies as well as determining the level of safety measures taking by those organizations. In the United States, OSHA overseers over 7 million companies which call for priority to identify the ones to be visited before others. Priority in company inspection is determined using five main metrics, Imminent danger situation, responding to complains, companies in which two or more employees have suffered harm, illness or even being killed, an organization which had previous violations and lastly according to the agency planned programs.

Conclusion

Health and safety practice in a working environment is an essential area of study. Every company should be ready to comply with the rules set by the OSHA team. Cases of OSHA rules violations should be handled with the seriousness they deserve. Any company found having put the worker's lives at risk should be dealt with and hefty fines placed on them too.

References

Federal Osha Regional and State Osha Offices. (2004). Office Building Safety and Health, 397-403. doi:10.1201/9780203491942.axc

Michaud, P. A. (2017). Osha. Accident Prevention and Osha Compliance, 107-112. doi:10.1201/9781315136578-22

OSHA 2002 Recordkeeping Simplified. (2003). doi:10.1016/b978-0-7506-7559-8.x5023-6

OSHA Instructions. (2003). OSHA 2002 Recordkeeping Simplified, 433-464. doi:10.1016/b978-075067559-8/50043-0

Roughton, J. E. (2003). Overview of How OSHA Works. OSHA 2002 Recordkeeping Simplified, 205-235. doi:10.1016/b978-075067559-8/50034-x