Introduction to Fire Safety Management

6.5.7 Monitoring, reviewing and revising
To ensure that any safe system of work remains effect-
ive an organisation must establish a management pro-
gramme for monitoring, reviewing and where necessary 
revising the system of work.
Monitoring of the system is often undertaken by fi rst 
line management as part of their job function. It is the 

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Introduction to Fire Safety Management
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role of supervisors to identify the effectiveness of the 
system in controlling the hazards and risks relating to 
the operation. Where there appears to be a shortcom-
ing in the arrangements this should be reported to the 
senior management so that a review of the system can 
be undertaken.
In many organisations formal systems exist to 
undertake periodic reviews of safe systems of work 
regardless of whether shortcomings have been identifi ed. 
This ‘active’ or ‘proactive’ approach has some distinct 
benefi ts such as:
➤
Re-enforcing the organisation’s safety culture
➤
Identifying where technological advances can be 
introduced to the safe system of work, to reduce 
the risk
➤
Assist the organisation to fulfi l its obligation to con-
sult with its workforce
➤
Prevent conditions worsening that could result in 
injury, damage or loss.
Part of the monitoring and review programme should 
also take into account emergency procedures, which 
will not necessarily be tested on a regular basis, such 
as a gearing mechanism breaking down on an industrial 
machine or a tower crane operator suffering an ill-health 
effect that prevents descent via the access ladder. 
Emergency procedures and arrangements are discussed 
later in this chapter.
Systems of work that are out of date, ineffective or 
present an obstacle to production or service delivery 
will be unlikely to be fully implemented. It is therefore 
essential that an organisation ensures that it has a robust 
system for monitoring, reviewing and revising its safe 
systems of work.