By Nicole Horton, OSSA Consultant, Windsor
When we at the Ontario Service Safety Alliance began our journey just 5 years ago, we knew that to truly meet the specialized needs of our service sector clients we needed to depart from traditional Health & Safety approaches. We needed to learn, grow, and be innovative; to lead Health & Safety in a new direction – a direction for success. We needed to embrace change.
We believe that integrating health and safety into normal business practices and culture is the most practical and effective way to prevent workplace injuries and illness. The theory of integration began as a theoretical concept that over the past five years has been made practical, and has proven to be successful.*
By adopting OSSA’s integrated approach to health and safety, our clients are already leading and inspiring change and setting themselves apart from other employers.
Each year, OSSA’s clients save the system:
$11 million in premiums
$7 million in benefit costs
44,000 lost work days
620 lost time and non-lost time injuries
*Further information on OSSA’s Unique Service Approach and the OSSA Success Story, can be found in the archived article OSSA’S FIRST FIVE YEARS – OUR UNIQUE SERVICE APPROACH IS WORKING can be found in our archives.
Integrated Health & Safety systems help our clients to build their internal capacity to become self-reliant.
Our clients do not depend on us for the future of their system, but rather, lean on us during development in order to reach the stage where they are able to maintain and adapt their Health & Safety systems to their changing business requirements virtually on their own.
Integration is a process which requires the business owner to commit to the development of a healthy and safe working environment. Integration requires sufficient allocation of time and resources.
When a basic Health & Safety system has been established, the OSSA Consultant can guide the business owner to develop best practices with tools like OSSA’s Manager’s Guide to Safe Work Practices.
Integration also means addressing the key elements of the Human Performance System, like Task Interference and Feedback before allotting company resources to training solutions.
In the development of an integrated health and safety system, we will assist clients to identify any gaps between their Health & Safety and general management systems. Once identified, these gaps can be addressed, and through problem solving and solution development, an integration action plan will be developed with the consultant’s guidance.
An OSSA consultant can assist you. You can locate the consultant for your area on our Web site at Find A Consultant, by entering your postal code, or by calling our toll-free client services line at 1-888-478-6772.
Business owners and operators interested in Health & Safety integration are encouraged to join us at one of our half-day, regional, Invest in the Future events. Attending a workshop will assist you to further manage for peak health and safety performance. You will get tips for developing effective, integrated orientation programs and you will find out more about the key elements of the human performance system and techniques to improve employee health and safety performance through communication and coaching.
Ministry of Health
For more information on the conference, visit our Events Page, or contact your OSSA consultant.
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