Historical Perspective and Overview

Modern Safety & Health Teams  The modern safety and health team is headed by a safety and health manager.  These managers seldom work alone.  Rather they usually head a team of specialists that may include engineers, physicists, industrial hygienists, occupational physicians and health nurses.

Modern Safety & Health Teams  These teams must deal with diverse issues as stress; explosives; laws; standards and codes; radiation; AIDS; product safety and liability; ergonomics; ethics; automation; workers’ compensation, and many others.  It is unreasonable to expect one person to be an expert in all areas.

Safety & Health Managers  Positions focuses on analysis, prevention, planning, evaluation, promotion, and compliance.  Typical college majors in these positions include industrial safety and health technology, industrial technology, industrial engineering, manufacturing technology and related technology fields.

Problems S & H Managers Face  Lack of commitment from top management.  Some may see safety and health as a necessary evil.  Production versus safety.  At times, a safety or health measure will be viewed by some as interfering with productivity.

Solutions for S & H Managers  The need for companywide commitment to safety and health.  Lack of resources may complicate the challenge.  Safety and health managers must understand the bottom line concerns of management, supervisors, and employees to gain a commitment to safety and health.

Solutions for S & H Managers  The essential message that competitiveness comes from continually improving a company’s productivity, quality, cost, image, service and response time.  These improvements can be achieved and maintained best in a safe and healthy work environment.

Solutions for S & H Managers  To compete in the global marketplace, companies must continuously improve.  Need to have the best people, the best technology, and get the most out of both by using the best management strategies.

Engineers and Safety  Engineers can make a significant contribution to safety.  Correspondingly, they can cause, inadvertently or through incompetence, accidents that result in serious injury and property damage.  Engineers have more potential to affect safety than any other person.

Traditional Design Engineers  Aerospace  Electrical  Mechanical  Industrial  Nuclear

Safety Engineer  Title is often a misnomer.  Typically the title is given to the person who has overall responsibility for the companies safety program.  Not all safety engineers are engineering majors.  Various technology degrees may have more formal education than engineers.

Industrial Hygienist  Industrial hygienist may have a degree in engineering, chemistry, physics, medicine, or related physical and biological sciences.  They are concerned with; recognizing the impact of environmental factors on people; evaluating the potential hazards of environmental stressors; and prescribing methods to eliminate stressors.

Health Physicist  Concerned primarily with radiation in the work place.  Duties include monitoring radiation, measuring the radioactive level of biological samples, developing the radiation components of a company’s emergency action plan, and supervising decontamination activities.

Risk Manager  Risk management consists of the various activities and strategies that an organization can use to protect itself from situations, circumstances, or event that may undermine its security.  We are all daily risk managers.  Two strategies are used to manage risk: reduction and transference.

Risk Manager  Reduction is any action that reduces potential hazards.  Transference is literally transferring risk to another, such as an insurance company.  These same methods apply to the workplace.