Case Study 1

In 2003 KIS Safety was asked to implement their system into a medium sized gold mine. The mine owner had decided to replace the contracted labour force and manage the mine's production 'in-house'. When the contractor left they took their company's Safety Management System (SMS) with them so the new system was built from 'scratch'. The previous SMS on this site was highly labour intensive with the workload falling on the Safety Officer.  

All the mine's operators were involved in the putting together of the new safety system. This involved meetings at the start of each shift informing the people of what was happening and why. The operators were asked to identify the jobs and tasks they carried out and to indicate the hazards encountered. These hazards included safety, financial and environmental or a combination of the three. We used the Chamber of Minerals & Energy Operator Ticketing Documentation as a guide and drew on the knowledge and skills of the experienced operators employed in the mine and involved the people new to the industry to review and follow the Job Hazard Analysis's (JHA's) produced to ensure that what was being stated was clearly understood, gave achievable outcomes and standards and that there was a logical flow to the process.

In carrying out the above it highlighted areas where further training was required as some controls to eliminate or minimise the hazards were crossed out in the review process as not seen as necessary by some. When this occurred these areas were raised for further discussion between the operators and across all shifts as to why they were required. Some areas of concern that were raised were identified for engineering out of the process and the rest were debated until consensus was achieved. This method standardised practices across the shifts and greatly assisted in giving ownership of the tasks to the operators. It is also of interest to note that although the system had not been implemented at this point that the process of analysis by the operators was already starting to show results in the reduction of Lost Time Injuries (LTI's) and Medically Treated Injuries (MTI's) in the workplace. The tasks being carried out were now being approached from a different mental aspect and being checked against the JHA's for validity and areas for improvement.

From the in-depth analysis of the tasks carried out Safe Work Procedures (SWP's - also known as Safe Work Instructions, Method Work Statements, etc) were produced for sign off. Task Observations, a Task Observation Schedule, Competency Assessments and various analytical reports were produced at the touch of a button.

The resulting system placed the management of risk with the front line management team and the operators (the task process owners). This greatly freed up the time of the safety professional on site to be pro-active in other areas requiring his attention. The annual testing of operators tickets by the Safety Officer to verify ongoing skills and competency in the various tasks being carried out has been removed with shorter, critical assessments being carried out on a more frequent basis by the middle management team.

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