Examination of the work environment

More perspectives lead to higher quality in work environment efforts

As the person responsible for the work environment, you need to get a sufficiently good overview of all work environment conditions to know what to examine and how. The best approach is to gather this understanding together with employees and safety representatives, and, if needed involve HR and occupational health services. A tip is to collect everything related to the work environment for your department or team in the same document. This makes follow-up easier and creates an overview. The amount of information should be reasonable – start with a few risks and ensure that measures are actually taking place. You can then supplement with more details as needed.

Template for Risk Assessment and Action Plan (Mall för riskbedömning och handlingsplan) - in Swedish

The manager’s responsibility

Your role as a manager is both to encourage employees to take active part in examining the work environment and to examine when you see a need. It is your responsibility to complete the form for investigation, risk assessment, actions, and control. Employees are responsible for supporting you in implementing actions. Safety representatives are responsible for ensuring that work environment efforts are functioning.

5 examples of how to examine the work environment

1. Examine the physical work environment once a year through safety rounds (in Swedish)  
2. Examine the organizational and social work environment using Employee Pulse Survey . 
3. Address individual employees' work environments during development dialogues . 
4. Examine chemical and biological risks continuously. Conduct a risk assessment in the chemical management system KLARA  before each new laboratory session involving chemicals. 
5.  Use the guide for inclusive hybrid meetings  as a checklist.