Safety Reviews

Navigating the complexities of health, safety and security every day

A safety review can assist in reducing the likelihood of harm to your students/clients, staff and property. It can serve to educate a range of your stakeholders and improve organizational alignment. It can demonstrate a commitment to performing due diligence in regards to safety which may be particularly beneficial when speaking with clients or during any potential future litigation. It can also highlight the things that your organization does particularly well and can serve as a morale booster.

However, safety reviews are not without risk and when they do not go well, it is usually owing to under awareness and inattention to crucial elements early on in the process.

Lodestone Safety International will work through each step of the way with you to ensure that a review will maximize the benefit to your organization:

  • GOALS – Realistically, what do you want to have happen? Equally important is to identify what you do not want to have happen.
  • PROCESS – How are you going to determine the scope of the review? Who will be involved, at what level and what are their roles? How will communication throughout your organization be managed? Who will be the primary liaison with the review team? What will the check in schedule look like? This is about setting expectations.
  • SCOPE – Do you know what you would like reviewed? There are many ways to identify issues to be looked at. Incident histories, student evaluations, staff surveys/interviews, etc. can all help determine the scope of the review. The scope should be consistent with the goals both in determining what should and should not be included.
  • REVIEW TEAM – Once the scope is determined, we will put together a team with the appropriate technical expertise and experience, both field and administrative.
  • PLAN AND REVIEW – Consistent with the goals and the scope, we’ll identify what is to be included in the review. Typical components include overall program documents and reports; staff interviews and program observation.
  • DEBRIEF – This is one of the most sensitive parts of the review process. All observations and analysis will be discussed. All notes leading up to this meeting will be hand written and destroyed when the written report is completed. This is to ensure that the process is frank and robust but minimizes the potential for increased future liability exposure. All parties will agree as to what is useful and productive to include in the written report.
  • REPORT – Includes overview of goals, scope, review team and the specifics of the review. Main content consists of observations, conclusions and recommendations.
  • RESPONSE AND SAFETY PLAN – The organization makes a formal documented response indicating levels of agreement or disagreement with report’s conclusions and recommendations. The content of the report and the organization’s response form the basis for a safety plan which includes the specific strategies, steps, timeframes, review schedule and persons responsible for each aspect of the plan.

Lodestone Safety International’s goal is to help your organization realize the benefits and minimize the risks of a safety review. We’ll provide the expertise and the framework to make a safety review work for you.

“Bill’s review of the health, safety and security aspects of our field-based, faculty-led study abroad programs has not only helped us strengthen operations in these areas but his valuable feedback has also provided us with added confidence in knowing that our approach to risk management is fundamentally sound.”

John Tansey, Executive Director, Off-Campus Programs, Dartmouth College           

“Lodestone conducted a Health, Safety and Security Review for buildOn’s travel program in the summer of 2012. Throughout the process, Lodestone proved to be professional, flexible, a pleasure to work with and offered great experience and insight. They were thorough in their investigation, and aimed to support us with a genuine interest in making our program stronger. They helped us to not only recognize our challenges, but also to identify low-cost and responsible solutions. Lodestone continues to offer advice and feedback as we evolve highlighting their sincere commitment to supporting us to develop healthy, safe, and secure programming beyond the Review.”
 
Chad Zibelman
National Trek Manager
buildOn

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