What should a safety policy statement include?

A commitment from senior leadership to safety, a statement on reporting and how reports will be treated, the resources being committed, and a signature with a date. It is usually one page, because it is meant to be read rather than filed.

Who signs the safety policy statement?

The accountable executive, personally. The signature is the point: it identifies the individual who has committed to it, rather than presenting the policy as something the organization produced.

Safety policy statement

The safety policy nobody wrote

A safety policy statement is short, signed, and posted where people see it. That makes it the most read document in the program and the one most likely to have been copied from somewhere.

A safety policy statement in RISE with its version history and a tip to review it annually, beside two colleagues reading it at a laptop and a hand typing at another

Why it matters

A policy promising things the operation visibly does not do is worse than silence, because everybody who reads it learns what the safety program is worth. It is also the document most likely to be read by the most people, which makes it the cheapest way to tell an entire operation what will happen when somebody reports something. A statement saying reports are welcome, signed by a leader who then behaves that way, moves reporting rates further than any system will.

What you end up with

A policy statement in your leadership's own voice
Commitments the operation can actually keep
Something worth signing and displaying

Questions

Questions about safety policy statement

What should a safety policy statement include?: A commitment from senior leadership to safety, a statement on reporting and how reports will be treated, the resources being committed, and a signature with a date. It is usually one page, because it is meant to be read rather than filed.
Who signs the safety policy statement?: The accountable executive, personally. The signature is the point: it identifies the individual who has committed to it, rather than presenting the policy as something the organization produced.

Where to start

Tell us about your operation

A call about how your program runs today and the areas where it could be stronger. If this is the service you need, we will talk about what comes next. If it is not, we will point you toward the support that would help. Either way, you come away knowing what to do next. No obligation.