Testing and Evaluating the Draft Work Health and Safety (WHS) Indicators and Guidelines

Team

• Dr Sharron O'Neill
• Professor Nonna Martinov-Bennie

Funding

Safe Work Australia (SWA) and ANSTO (in-kind).

Collaboration

Karen Wolfe ANSTO / Safety Institute of Australia (SIA), Safe Work Australia (SWA)

Goals

This research  extends the International Governance and Performance (IGAP) Research Centre's' WHS Indicators' research study. The indicators project focused on identifying key WHS indicators from the literature, describing their appropriate application and developing Guidelines to assist report preparers communicate WHS information to users both internal and external to an organisation.

The aim of this project is to test the practicality of the draft guidelines by seeking detailed feedback on the recommendations contained in the document and user perceptions of their practical implementation and usefulness.

Method

This researchis being conducted in two stages. In Stage 1, the draft WHS Guidelines are pilot tested via a series of case studies. These will permit an in-depth examination of the way users interpret and implement the document's recommendations. They will explore user perceptions as to the quality (relevance, validity, reliability) of recommended indicators and their feedback regarding practical issues, benefits and limitations arising from the implementation of the recommended reporting processes. This feedback will be instrumental in ensuring the WHS Guidelines are clear, relevant and practical.In Stage 2, feedback is sought on the revised WHS Guidelines from a much larger sample of potential users. Data is gathered through a series of workshops and / or webinars, each accompanied by a series of online survey instruments. A secondary aim of stage two is to evaluate the effectiveness of alternate methods for publicly disseminating research outcomes.