Due Diligence Index - Safety
Improve safety, build organisational capability
grow performance and increase operational
resilience
The new face of safety performance measurement
The (DDI-S) has been developed to provide a metric for Boards and Executives of organisations to understand the presence of safety in their organisation by collecting and reporting on the state of assurance activity being taken at the organisational level.
The DDI-S examines the extent of capacity building activity being undertaken in terms of reflecting on the investment the organisation has built up in the skills and capability of workers over and above the minimum competencies for their work. That is, the DDI-S provides an index on the extent of resourcing for enablers of safety.
The DDI-S uses as its base, the high-water mark of the legislative obligations placed on officers to exercise due diligence under health and safety laws in jurisdictions such as Australia and New Zealand.
The DDI-S is informed by an approach to health and safety that looks to build the health and safety capacity and resilience of an organisation, founded on engagement and trust with workers.
The new face of safety performance measurement
The current approaches to reporting on safety performance do not provide reliable data on the state of safety. The current established approach to safety performance metrics is based on lost time and injury frequency rates. However, such frequency rate data tells us nothing about the state of safety. Such data have no predictive value in relation to future incidents and has been shown to be prone to manipulation.
An alternative approach that actively assesses the state of safety whilst also being both objectively measurable and comparable across organisations is required.
The DDI-S places people in an organisation at the heart of decision-making and is framed by a philosophy that sees:
People as the solution, not the problem;
Safety as the presence of positives, not the absence of negatives; and
Safety as an ethical responsibility rather than a bureaucratic activity.
Due Diligence Index Elements
The following are the 6 elements of Due Diligence subject of the DDI-S:
Know
Acquire & keep up-to-date knowledge of health and safety matters
Understand
Understand the nature of the operations of the organisation and generally the hazards and risks associated with those operations
Resource
Ensure the organisation has appropriate resources and processes in place to eliminate or minimise risks to health & safety
Monitor
Consider information regarding incidents, hazards and risks & respond in a timely way to that information
Comply
Ensure the organisation has processes in place to comply with all WHS duties and obligations under legislation (i.e. ensure legal compliance)
Verify
Personally & proactively verify the provision and use of the resources and processes outlined steps 3-5 above