Environmental, Health and Safety (EHS) risks exist in every organisation. Good EHS management can reduce these risks, lower operating costs and enhance reputation; conversely, when things go wrong, EHS risks can have such severe impacts that they can threaten the viability of the organisation. 

 

In the event of an EHS incident there is the possibility of immediate damage to the environment or harm to the workforce, public and customers, as well as longer-term, sustained effects. Poor environmental control can result in emissions or contamination that, over-time, harms natural resources and biodiversity. Inadequate health and safety management can result in injuries and fatalities, as well as impaired quality of life.

 

It is rare to find an organisation that has poor EHS policies and procedures in developed economies. There are numerous resources to help organisations prepare good EHS policies and procedures, as well as excellent standards and well-designed regulations to support and guide their development. Staff EHS training is available via certificated courses and university graduates with relevant degrees can be recruited. Yet failures still happen and incidents occur. Time and again, the root cause of this is organisations failing to comply with and follow their own EHS system principles and protocols.

 

Effective EHS management needs policies and procedures to be backed up with robust management arrangements, support and sponsorship to create a culture that ensures they are followed, is sustained and continuously improves. Leading practice is risk intelligent and integrates EHS management with the day-to-day business processes of the organisation - it is not an afterthought that can be ignored; the management culture must value EHS performance as highly as any other business target and be clearly accountable for it; and EHS risks must be reassessed regularly, leveraging the data environment and, if necessary, policies and procedures be updated to reflect the changing risk landscape.

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How do we help?

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MERC & CO’s have previously supported clients with a range of EHS solutions across many business sectors. We focus on helping our clients put management arrangements in place that ensure EHS policies and procedures are appropriate, effective and consistently implemented. We assess EHS culture and help clients address any shortcomings with:
 

• EHS effectiveness and culture reviews and maturity assessment

• EHS framework design including integration with other business processes

• Risk and impact tolerance articulation 

• Key Risk Indicator (KRI) suite development

• EHS analytics including risk assessment, root cause analyses, stress testing and scenario analysis, correlation analysis etc.

• Enhanced EHS reporting design and population

• Manager and EHS practitioner development coaching, training and advice

• Assurance over EHS performance and compliance