GG-7-03 Completing a Risk Assessment
| File Reference : | GG-7-03 Completing a Risk Assessment |
A step by step guide to completing a risk assessment, from identifying hazards and who might be harmed to recording the findings and reviewing them.
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Further guidance on risk assessment:
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Completing a Risk Assessment Guidance
A general guidance document on completing risk assessments, for managers, supervisors and anyone asked to carry one out. It explains hazard and risk, then works through identifying hazards, deciding who might be harmed, evaluating risks and choosing precautions, recording the findings and keeping the assessment under review.
Topics Covered
- Hazard and risk - the difference between a hazard that may harm physical or mental health and the chance and seriousness of that harm
- Identifying the hazards - a walk around the workplace, talking to people, manufacturer's instructions, safety data sheets, accident records and non-routine work
- Who might be harmed - employees, contractors and visitors, workers with particular requirements, shared workplaces and people working from home
- Evaluating risks and precautions - likelihood and consequence, inherent and residual risk ratings, what is reasonably practicable and the hierarchy of controls
- Hazard and safety symbols - hazard symbols, and PPE and safety instruction symbols, that can be added to an assessment to show hazards visually
- Recording the findings - recording on the general risk assessment form, what the assessment should show, and dealing with the most serious risks first
- Reviewing the assessment - keeping it up to date, with a review after significant changes in the workplace and after any accident or near miss
Who Is It For?
Managers, supervisors and anyone who carries out or contributes to risk assessments, including employees or their representatives involved in the process.
Included in the ISO 45001 Toolkit
This guidance is supplied with the TT-7-03 Completing a Risk Assessment training talk, which is part of the ISO 45001 Toolkit and the integrated toolkits that include it.
Using the Guidance
Give it to anyone asked to carry out or review a risk assessment, and use it alongside your risk assessment form as a reference. Record who has received it, for example on the training matrix.
Risk Ratings and the Hierarchy of Controls
Each risk is rated on likelihood and consequence as tolerable, moderate or substantial, first without controls as the inherent rating and then with controls as the residual rating. A substantial residual rating calls for further action. A table then sets out the hierarchy of controls, starting with removing the hazard altogether and working down to PPE as the last line of defence.
Adapting the Guidance
Edit the guidance to match your own arrangements - the risk assessment form you use, your risk rating scale and action levels, who acts as a competent person, and where to go for competent advice.
Related Documents
Other documents that work alongside this guidance:
Would you rather we prepared it for you?
A day of remote support can take the risk assessments you already have, move them into one consistent format with the same scoring throughout, and build your hazard register from them, so the hazards this guidance covers are backed by a current assessment.
Risk Assessment Reformatting and Hazard Register