What is a Risk Assessment?

A Risk assessment is a tool that exists to help you focus on risks that might cause harm and allows you to identify whether you have taken appropriate precautions to prevent harm.

In the UK, The Health and Safety Executive (HSE) have produced some extremely simple but highly effective steps that you can follow to help you carry out a risk assessment. These include:

Step 1 – Identify Hazards. This could include looking for slip and trip hazards around the workplace (e.g., uneven floors, trailing cables, areas that are sometimes slippery due to spillages)

Step 2 – Decide who might be harmed and how. Are the people who come into your workplace at risk?

Step 3 – Consider the risks – do you already have precautions to deal with the risks?

Step 4 – Record your findings if you have 5 or more employees and make sure you implement them

Step 5 – Regularly review the assessment. If any changes take place make sure that precautions are in place to deal with the risks

More extensive information on risk assessments including blank templates you can use to carry out your own risk assessment can be found at http://www.hse.gov.uk/risk/fivesteps.htm