Ergonomics – Using Good Work Practices

Companies should establish safe work practices/safe job procedures for addressing significant hazards or for dealing with circumstances that may present other significant risks/liabilities for the company. They should reflect your company’s approach to controlling hazards.

Some regulations require employers to have written procedures/instructions for specific activities/conditions. The number of practices/procedures and the degree of detail will depend on the range of work activities your company performs. It is important that management and supervision are involved in the development of safe work practices and that they provide adequate training for workers likely to follow these practices.

Safe work practices are generally written methods outlining how to perform a task with minimum risk to people, equipment, materials, environment, and processes.

Safe work practices should be developed as a result of completing a job safety analysis (JSA) or a hazard risk assessment (HRA) and should closely reflect the activities most common in the company’s type or sector of construction.

All safe work practices should be kept in a location central to the work being performed and readily available to the workforce. Some safe work practices will require specific job procedures, which clearly set out in a chronological order each step in a process.

Consider building your collection of safe practices/procedures incrementally—start with a few major items and add to them as needed. Avoid simply repeating clear regulatory requirements. Rather, if needed, provide direction on how your company will implement/apply those requirements. Some examples of Good Work Practice Procedure are below.

• Manual and mechanical lifting
• Housekeeping and material storage
• Lifting and hoisting
• Equipment and machinery Use