Workplace Safety Fundamentals: Risk, Prevention, and Management

1. Defining Hazard and Risk

Risk

Risk refers to those work situations that can disrupt the balance of physical, mental, and social well-being of people.

Hazard

A hazard is defined as the inherent property or suitability of a situation, substance, or activity that has the potential to cause damage.

2. Work Accident, Prevention, and Security Definitions

Work Accident

A work accident is an abnormal, sudden, and unexpected event, usually avoidable, which disrupts the continuity of work and can cause injuries to people.

Prevention

Prevention is a set of activities or actions taken or planned in all phases of business activity in order to avoid or reduce risks arising from work.

Security

Security is a set of techniques and procedures aimed at eliminating or reducing the risk of causing accidents at work.

3. Integrated and Participatory Security Concepts

Integrated Security

Integrated Security involves the collaboration of managers, technicians, and workers to successfully perform any productive work or process using safety criteria in both the conception and design, as well as the execution of the work.

Participatory Security

This type of security allows workers to collaborate actively in the defense of their health, based on corresponding legal rights.

4. Technical Security: Conception vs. Correction

This section explains and compares the technical conception of security and correction:

• Conception: Technical security applied during the initial project, design, or method planning phase.
• Correction: Techniques applied after detecting dangerous working conditions (in facilities, equipment, or methods) to improve these conditions.

5. Stages of Applied Preventive Security

The key stages of preventive security applied within a company are:

1. Detection of risks.
2. Assessment of risks.
3. Establishment of appropriate controls.

6. Factors Underpinning Successful Risk Detection

Successful risk detection consists of identifying two main areas:

• Material Conditions: Unsafe materials, facilities, or machinery in their proper operation and use at the workplace.
• Human Actions: Unsafe or reckless actions of employees related to any material item.

7. Defining the Risk Assessment Process

Risk assessment is the process of evaluating the damages that could arise as a consequence of risks to the health and safety of workers, providing the opportunity to verify the presence of a particular hazard in the workplace.

8. Obtaining Danger and Justification Degrees (Fine Method)

Explanation of how to obtain the degree of danger and the degree of justification for the Fine method.

9. Factors Influencing Prevention Management Evolution

The important factors that have influenced the evolution of prevention management in the company are:

• The cost of damage, injuries, and accidents.
• The protest action of the union movement.

10. Manager's Obligation in Risk Prevention Management

The obligation of the directors of the company is to successfully manage human and material resources to achieve social and economic benefits, thereby ensuring satisfactory working conditions.