Product Safety Management
What Every CEO Should Ask (Or Be Asked) About Corporate Safety Policies
- Does the company have a written corporate safety policy?
- Does the policy state a goal of preventing unreasonable risks of injury and using technically feasible and economically practical safety measures to do so?
- Do the company’s products meet and exceed worldwide safety standards?
- Does the policy create a multidisciplinary safety review board, including employees from engineering, marketing and sales, human factors, technical documents, legal and communications?
- Does the company’s safety officer report to top management?
- Does the company collect and maintain safety-related data throughout its products’ life cycles?
- Does the company review national injury statistics?
- Does the company have a system to evaluate severity of injury?
- Does the company study injuries to evaluate product hazards, the environment in which the product is used, and foreseeable consumer uses?
- Have the intended use and reasonably foreseeable uses of the product been clearly documented through studies and focus-group testing?
- Does the company evaluate the operator capabilities of its target market, considering demographics, anthropometric factors, and educational levels?
- Do product instructions clearly and simply inform operators of proper use and of the safety consequences of unintended actions?
- Does the company analyze consumer data and conduct focus groups and behavioral testing to evaluate product risks?
- Does the company review promotional literature and advertising to evaluate whether product safety is clearly identified and to ensure that unsafe behaviors are not illustrated?
- Does the company analyze consumer perceptions of possible hazards, including the severity and likelihood of injury, and the magnitude and consequences of the danger?
- Does the company first attempt to eliminate hazards, then to guard against them, and ultimately to warn consumers of dangers and motivate them to avoid injury?
- Does the company have a program to monitor safety performance of its products in actual use and to systematically collect and retain safety data?
- Does the company have a system to recall products if it identifies a potential substantial product hazard?
- Does the company have a system to notify consumers through direct mail, service bulletins, public media, paid advertising, point-of-sale posters, and Web sites?
- Are employees routinely trained and educated about product safety issues?