ABSTRACT

The Safety Management System The Components of a Safety Management System A Safety Management System contains all the items used in managing safety. This must be understood and recorded if an understanding of the safety situation relating to something is to be obtained. This includes all the people, all the procedures, all the hardware and all the computers and software that is employed within the system that has an effect on the level of safety of the system. The safety management process is actually going to deliver the safe functioning of the system. Many of the component parts will be fairly obvious – a simple fire protection system for example: 1. There will be hardware – the extinguishers and sprinkler systems (from water

store to sprinkler head) 2. The training and operating procedures for using the extinguishers, raising the

alarm and undertaking an evacuation 3. There may well be fire control officers and certainly fire-fighters even if they

are the external emergency services 4. There may also be smoke, heat and infra-red detectors relying on software and

computers. This is just for a simple fire protection system in an office building, imagine what the fire safety management system would be like for an entire offshore oil installation. This is just one component of the overall Safety Management System – there will be similar system components for all the safety risks present on a particular site or within a particular operation. One of the contributory causes to many of the publicly known accidents (as cited in Chapter 1) has been shown to be management failure. This is not always the ‘Management’ as a group of people, this is ‘management’ as a corporate function – for which all employees have some responsibility. It is absolutely true that those in senior management positions should take a lead in safety – otherwise how can the employees lower down the pay scales be expected to understand their own responsibilities. As an excellent example of this NASA’s Safety Manual [NASA 2004] states in Chapter 1, Part 1, Section 1.1.1 (i.e. right at the start!) that:

Safety program responsibility starts at the top with senior management’s role of developing policies, providing strategies and resources, and is executed by the immediate task supervisor and line organization. All employees are responsible

for their own safety, as well as that of others whom their actions may affect (Requirement 25001).