How often should a safety program be evaluated?

A safety program should be evaluated at least once a year or after significant incidents to ensure that it remains effective and up-to-date. Regular evaluations allow organizations to identify any shortcomings, assess compliance with safety standards, and make necessary adjustments to improve safety outcomes. Annual evaluations provide a structured approach to review the program comprehensively, while evaluating after significant incidents ensures that any lessons learned from those events are incorporated into the safety program to prevent future occurrences.

This approach is in line with best practices in occupational health and safety management, which emphasize continuous improvement and responsiveness to changing circumstances. A more frequent or less structured evaluation could lead to oversight or inefficiencies, as can evaluating only after hiring new employees, which would miss the importance of ongoing safety assessments.