Job Safety Analysis
The JSA is a useful tool for Occupational Health and Safety professionals to document hazards that exist within the workplace and plan for controlling such hazards. JSAs are useful to management and human resources because they provide evidence of work activities that pose risk to workers. Further, JSAs may be used as solid evidence to OSHA or other auditing agencies that the employer has performed their due diligence in controlling against harmful workplace exposures.
The JSA is typically completed in a table format. The procedure for completing a JSA table includes:
- listing the specific steps of the task that is being performed,
- identifying specific hazards that are posed in each step,
- estimating the severity of exposure to the hazard,
- estimating the probability that the exposure could occur,
- judging whether the risk posed is acceptable or unacceptable,
- recommending protective actions using the hierarchy of controls as a guideline
For this assignment complete two (2) JSA tables for tasks that you may be familiar with either from your work or personal life. Please choose tasks that pose a variety safety risks and are appropriate for JSA consideration.
Example Jobs
Landscaping around your house (e.g. mowing the lawn/trimming the hedges)
Performing Maintenance on your Car (e.g. oil change with tire rotation)
Remodeling a room in your house (e.g. paint and re-tile your bathroom)
…Or use a job from your own work experience that poses a variety of hazards
1) Sequence of Steps (20 points)
Create a task description that breaks the job into different steps of appropriate detail. (Usually, a task can be broken down into 5-10 specific steps that can be evaluated accurately.)
2) Potential Hazards (20 points)
Once you have broken the task down into an appropriate number of steps, identify potential safety or health hazards for each step. The hazard identification should also have an indication of the potential adverse health outcome associated with exposure to the hazard. NOTE: The purpose of this assignment is to gain experience in identifying different types of hazards. For this assignment, it is not acceptable to identify the same hazard for every step. Each step should have a new hazard not already identified in the JSA.
3) Estimate Severity and Probability (20 points)
In this part, judge what the severity of hazards and estimate the probability that this outcome could occur. Using the potential health effects, grade the severity of the hazard using a risk matrix. Estimating the probability of the exposure is judgment that must be made by the person completing the JSA. Often the frequency of the job task may be used as a surrogate measure of probability (i.e., if a job task is completed very frequently, the probability of exposure increases). For both severity and probability, indicate the your reasons for choosing the severity and probability scores.
4) Risk Acceptable (10 points)
Using the scores from severity and probability, calculate a total risk score. Judge whether or not the risk posed to workers performing the task is acceptable or unacceptable. An example risk matrix was provided in class, however, any adequate risk characterization technique may be applied in this assignment.
5) Recommend Controls (30 points)
Finally, make control measure recommendations for hazard that poses more than minimal risk. The hierarchy of controls should be used as the guideline in which recommendations are given. Identify one control measure from the engineering, administrative, and PPE hierarchy levels that could be implemented to control the hazard under question.(Note: You may be creative when recommending controls.)
| Task: | |||||
| Sequence of steps | Potential Hazard | Severity Score | Probability Score | Risk Acceptable (Y/N) | Recommended Controls |
