By Chip Dawson
Rochester Business Alliance Safety Consultant

With standards, OSHA regulations are clearly the focus for most employers on workplace safety issues. "What does OSHA say?" is a frequent question for those of us in the safety business.

However, there is another, much broader, standard that all of us are expected to follow. It's called the standard of care in tort law. Wikipedia defines it as "the degree of prudence and caution required of an individual who is under a duty to care." In simple terms, it's "what would a reasonable person do in the circumstances at hand." The courts apply it broadly to manufacturers, professionals in many fields of work and even to individuals in ordinary situations.

When you lay the standard of care on top of OSHA regulations, the situations that should concern an employer expand greatly. For starters, the OSHA General Duty clause uses Standard of Care as a core element. It may not be in the regulations, but if it's a hazard, issue or solution commonly known by others in your business or field of work, OSHA can easily make the case that it should have been applied or considered.

OSHA is not the only concern, however. When the issue is outside the scope of the workers compensation no-fault provisions, the courts come into play. For example, one in five Fortune 500 companies have instituted a total ban on cell phone use while employees are driving on company business. They have effectively established the standard of care for other employers making it very difficult to defend the actions of your employee if he or she were to run down a child in the street while chatting on a cell phone.

Standards of Care can be found everywhere. They exist in other federal law, state law and local regulations. The hundreds of consensus standards published by ANSI, NFPA, ASTM and other organizations all inform reasonable people and organizations of actions or protections that should be implemented. In my experience, employers frequently are unaware of standards that have been established by consensus organizations or even their industry groups that have specific application to the work they do. Such standards may be considered expensive, but their cost pales in relation to a court judgment.

If you'd like help with identifying standards that might apply to your organization, call or send an e-mail.

If you have HSE questions or column suggestions, or would like to be added to the e-mail HSE Update list, contact Chip Dawson at (585) 461-1549 or chipdawson@aol.com.