Introduction
Occupational health safety is a concept that cannot escape the attention of any workplace safety and the welfare of the employee in the work environment. There are several causes and things that can be attributed to be the main contributors of incident causation at the workstations of human beings. Empirical data and research studies have shown and established some of the major lines of actions of actions and thought that might lead to the happening of accidents in workplaces. In principle, there are models and/or perspectives which inform this line of thought and reasoning. There are two major models which give meaning to occupational injuries. First, is the organizational error, which implies by extension that the whole work unit has some loopholes and operational deficiency, which, if left unchecked could lead to injuries or fatalities at the place of work. Maybe there are certain lee ways and substandard procedures and/or non-compliance to the set rules of safety.
Comparatively, there are ACC workplace safety procedures which can be helpful to gauge and correct the problem if need be.
ACC workplace safety guidelines include
- Hazard identification and management approaches
- Incident investigation, so that care is given to avoid future likelihood
- Training and supervision of the workers on safety protocols
- Employee participation to et the feedback and response from them on what ought to be done
- Emergency readiness, how to act in the event of an accident to minimize damage to the victim
- Injury management
- Organization, or contract management (Janicak, 2007, p. 121).
Organization accident and laxity cannot be excused, and in most cases it means that the victim of the accident or injury was harmed by circumstances beyond his or her control. It may also include the involvement of a defective technological system or a broken down or inferior state of technology Secondly, is the human error model, which means that the accident or injury could have been caused by personal error of the victim or mistakes by another person in the work station. In most cases the accident or the injuries are affected or caused by circumstances that were well within the reach and perfect control of the victim, colleagues or seniors. The victim could be blamed because maybe he or she failed to adhere to standard safety procedures or failed to question a routine or procedure that had no proper safety protocols.
Analytical perspectives
-The consequence perspective,
The cause or origin perspective
-The action perspective
Causative perspective focuses and seeks to explain and comprehend the underlying dangers that the workers at that particular workstation are exposed to. This notion seeks to analyze the occupational hygiene, psychological awareness and preparedness, sociological factors such as the human relation between the workers in a particular workstation. By and large, it implies that, what are the chances that a person can risk or expose another to risk or occupational hazards. For instance in the construction industry and business, this model and perspective seeks to single-out the possible loopholes within the organizational structure and setting of the workplace and how those structures may be risky for the workers there (International, 2009).
Action perspective is concerned with the decision making process and the judgement call that the individual worker makes during the dangerous or risky situations and conditions. This perspective brings on board the technical expertise of the company and the technical situational awareness of the individual worker. Borrowing from the case study provided where the employee falls from fourteen meters high up the ground. In this perspective it does analyze the judgement call that Raymond made given the technical circumstances which were present at his disposal at that particular point in time (Vilkman, 2004, p. 89).
Diagrammatic steps in analyzing what happened during the accident using the ACC work safe injury model
The Work Safe Injury Model
There are fundamental differences in the model of accident analysis as discussed below, where the organizational accident/human error model examines the chronology of events using the three analytical perspectives. As shown below; organizational accident/human error (Chaturvedi, 2007, p. 67).
Steps in analyzing accident using the organizational accident/human error mode
Raymond admits that there was a missing steel frame from the floor in which he was on. On the second question he admits that he was not familiar and fully conversant with the job and duty that was assigned to him by his supervisor that on that ill-fated day. From this simple admission it shows, human error on the part of the supervisor to allow an inexperienced person or worker to handle such enormous task which required skill and tact.
The third question invites an equally interesting and disturbing response from Raymond the victim of the injury. Where on earth do people learn how to control cranes with through “trial and error?” Up to this point of the case study, the perspective that is attached to the cause of injury is the cause or origin one. This confirms that there were elements of human error on the supervisor to adopt, such as risky teaching and learning technique. Imagine that Raymond could have lost his life, and then there would be no one to learn from that trial. At least Raymond would not have had the chance to learn from that trial and/or error method employed by the company-construction firm (Rabinowitz, 2008, p. 311).
There are some elements of organizational laxity or accident, in that who was the person who checked the work patterns and behaviours of the supervisor? It seems as though the organization presented all confidence in the judgement of the supervisor. This was an instance of organizational accident and laxity and it proved costly to the person of Raymond during the fall.
The response to the fifth question is a confirmatory test that there was human error, by the person who was issuing instructions to the victim Raymond and the crane driver. How could he issue instructions to people who were high above him on the fifth floor, while he was on a lower floor? This perspective brings to the fore questions of psychological awareness of the instructor. A clear case of human error and a wrong judgement call on his part
On the other hand, there are traces and chances of technical malfunctioning. During filling up of the crane, the system should be automatically interchangeable, and the crane driver ought not to have presented them to him in that manner. The company should have bought standard canes and then trained all the handlers on how to behave in those circumstances. On the contrary, the company left the labourers and the dogman on their whims, to learn through trial and error (Goetsch, 2011).
Psychological and sociological awareness, rather the judgement call and decisions that were made by the people at that place of work were also contributory. For instance, the psychological preparedness of Raymond to handle a task on which he was not prepared and ready to handle was a blunder on his part.
The poor coordination and reading of signals between the crane driver and the victim of the fall presented a disjointed sociological network between the colleagues. By personal admittance of guilt of the victim Raymond that some of those actions and works that they did on that particular day were not procedural and normal, confirmed that there was lack of standardized routine practice on that particular day and culture by extension.
I believe that the models, namely; organizational accidents and human error models run concurrently and collapse into different analytical perspectives. It is evidently clear that human errors are classified and find their meanings with the origin or causation of injuries. For instance the mistake by the crane driver to assume and drive the crane without confirmation from a third party indeed set Raymond in an awkward position. This was an obvious human error on the part of the driver, and consequently a cause for the accident (Schulte, 2007, p. 71).
Conclusion
In the above essay, I have discussed some of the models and major perspectives under which accidents and injuries are caused in the places of work. They can be classified into two major models, namely the organizational accidents and human error, as discussed above. There are three main analytical perspectives used to ascertain the level and type of mistake that might have occurred. However, there is the ACC workplace safety, which ought to be the benchmark of ascertaining the accident or incident. ACC work place safety requires that the workplace in terms of the workers should be adequately prepared to deal with any eventuality. For instance, it is the ability of identifying possible hazardous situations, emergency preparedness, and how to behave thereafter (Taylor, 2006). ACC workplace safety standards also give the worker the necessary information to know his or her rights. This means that the worker can decline work and duties that the worker could perceive to be dangerous or risky.
There should be proper routine and culture of work so that nothing is done out of the ordinary which could jeopardize the safety of a person or a worker. It is also important for the worker to undertake the requisite training programs on how to handle some of the machines and procedures involved thereafter. This move would ensure that the workers have the right impetus to and right psychological state to act during the work process.
References
Janicak, C. A. (2007). Applied statistics in occupational safety and health. Lanham, MD: Scarecrow Press.
International Labour Office., & International Labour Conference. (2009). ILO standards on occupational safety and health: Promoting a safe and healthy working environment. Geneva: ILO.
Chaturvedi, P., Institution of Engineers (India)., & Quality Council of India. (2007). Occupational safety, health & environment and sustainable economic development: Proceedings of the Safety Convention - 2006. New Delhi, India: Concept Publishing.
Rabinowitz, R., Dunham, S. H., & American Bar Association. (2008). Occupational safety and health law. Arlington, VA: BNA Books.
Goetsch, D. L. (2011). Occupational Safety and Health for Technologists, Engineers, and.
Vilkman, E. (2004). Occupational safety and health aspects of voice and speech professions. Folia Phoniatrica et Logopaedica, 56(4), 220-253.
Taylor, A. K., & Murray, L. R. (2006). Occupational safety and health. Social injustice and public health, 337.
Schulte, P. A., Wagner, G. R., Blanciforti, L. A., Cutlip, R. G., Krajnak, K. M., Luster, M., & Ostry, A. (2007). Work, obesity, and occupational safety and health. American journal of public health, 97(3).
