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What is risk assessment

• A structured way of thinking about how an activity or situation might cause harm to people or property, helping you to identify measures to prevent or minimize the chances of this happening. 
• A way to ensure your health and safety risks are managed and your controls are in place so your planned work is successful. 

Why risk assess

• It's a smart thing to do: making sure your health and safety risks are controlled so that your plans are successful.
• You have a responsibility to ensure your work is planned and managed so that people are not harmed or hurt.
• Risk Assessing is a legal requirement - The Management of Health and Safety at Work Regulations 1999, plus other regulations that say you must risk assess e.g. Noise, Lifting Equipment, Work at Height. 
• Risk Assessing is a requirement as part of the ÃÛÑ¿´«Ã½ Health, Safety and Wellbeing Policy. 

When to risk assess

• Early in the Planning phase: this makes it easier to co-ordinate and communicate, meaning it will be more accurate and effective. 
• When your planned work has a foreseeable and significant risk of injury or ill-health.

Get trained to risk assess

Make sure you attend training on how to risk assess, and support your teams to do the same.

Go to the y (for ÃÛÑ¿´«Ã½ colleagues) or your Safety Team contact (for Studios and Subsidiaries, Studioworks) to arrange your Safety Risk Assessment Training. 

ÃÛÑ¿´«Ã½ Guidelines for Risk Assessing: 

Do Your Research

Make sure you have a good understanding of the proposed activity and location, so you have a better idea of what could go wrong – do your research by talking to your team members and seek additional expertise where needed.

If in doubt, always seek support from experts e.g., the ÃÛÑ¿´«Ã½ SSR Teams or your Safety Team contact. 

Consult with professionals and experts to ensure you are following the most up-to-date and appropriate practices.

You could use existing risk assessments as a starting point for the same activity, but the final risk assessment must still be suitable and sufficient by accurately describing the activities you are conducting, their location, and any changes.

If it’s a complex activity you may find that one risk assessment may not cover everything and it is easier to break it down into manageable sections e.g., rig-phase, live performance, and de-rig phase. 

Know Your People

Take time to get to know the people you are risk assessing for – for example they may have medical conditions which could predispose them to higher risk of injury or ill-health such as allergies, phobias, pre-existing injuries, or disabilities. This could affect how you assess the risks.

Always involve your teams in risk assessment to give them the opportunity to share their knowledge and contribute.

5-Steps to risk assessing: 

Step 1: Identify the hazards

Think through how the planned activity and note anything that could cause harm.

Consider where people will work, the equipment they will use, work practices, and the general work environment, and who else may be working in the same area. 

Don't forget about long-term health hazards like stress, manual handling, and noise, as well as obvious safety hazards.

For each hazard, think about how employees, contractors, visitors or members of the public might be harmed.

Step 2: Assess the Risks

Involve your colleagues as they will usually have good ideas

Once you have identified the hazards, decide how likely it is that someone could be harmed and how serious it could be. This is assessing the level of risk.

Decide:

• who might be harmed and how
• what you're already doing to control the risks
• what further action you need to take to control the risks
• who needs to carry out the action
• when the action is needed by

Consider who could be affected, including employees, contractors, visitors, and the public.

You will use the 5x5 Matrix to score the risks when you record your risk assessment in Safety Hub. This is a really good method for showing your understanding of the risks, how it will be managed and the level of risk in the work you're planning. 

If you're new to 5x5 Matrix, we explain it in the drop down below and in the risk assessment training courses. 

Step 3: Control the Risks

Look at what you're already doing, and the controls you already have in place. Ask yourself:

• can I get rid of the hazard altogether?
• if not, how can I control the risks so that harm is unlikely?

If you need further controls, consider:

• redesigning the job;
• replacing the materials, machinery or process;
• organising the work to reduce exposure to the hazards;
• identifying and implementing practical measures needed to work safely;
• providing personal protective equipment and making sure colleagues wear it.

Step 4: Record your findings and share the risks and controls

Record your risk assessment using the ÃÛÑ¿´«Ã½ Safety Hub. 

(If Safety Hub is ever unavailable, you can record your risk assessment using the template word document. 

You should ensure that the risks and controls are shared with those affected. 

Step 5: Review and update your assessment

Regularly review your risk assessment to make sure it's still up to date.

Update it if necessary, for example, if there have been changes in the plans or new hazards have been introduced.