ISO 45001:2018 is a standard for an occupational health and safety (OHS) management system that follows the same high level structure (Annex SL) as other ISO standards. It is however relatively unique in its focus on workforce participation, which is consistent with the OSHA VPP requirements. The workforce, through safety committees and also empowerment to file near miss reports, is often in the best position to identify unsafe and potentially unsafe conditions for corrective and preventive action (CAPA).

 Additional supporting techniques include job safety analysis, which is synergistic with the job breakdown worksheet from Training Within Industry, and also standard work. The 1920s Ford Motor Company's "Can't rather than don't" principle underscores the need to make incidents impossible ("Can't") as opposed to reliance on worker vigilance and compliance with administrative controls ("Don't," as in "Don't put your hand in the machine while it is running"). Lockout-tagout, which was used by Ford 90 or more years ago, is another example of "Can't rather than don't," as in "You can't energize the machine when somebody else is working on it."

Henry Ford, whose workplace was more than a full order of magnitude safer than its contemporaries, enumerated twelve factors—still valid today—that are the root causes of most safety incidents. ISO 9001's clauses on environment and infrastructure for processes, the 5S workplace organization program, and "Can't rather than don't" eliminate eleven of them, with "unsuitable clothing" being the only remaining one that relies on compliance (administrative controls).

 The hiyari hatto ("Experience of almost accident situation") empowers workers and other relevant interested parties, including suppliers (e.g. truck drivers who encounter unsafe conditions) to initiate CAPA to eliminate the unsafe condition before it can cause trouble.

(Disclaimer; no part of this presentation constitutes formal engineering advice.)

While employers already have legal and ethical obligations to provide safe workplaces, ISO 45001:2018 provides a management system for achieving this while also supporting OSHA's Voluntary Protection Program.[1] "VPP participants are exempt from OSHA programmed inspections while they maintain their VPP status." In addition, "The average VPP worksite has a Days Away Restricted or Transferred (DART) case rate of 52% below the average for its industry."

In addition, safe workplaces pay half as much for worker's compensation insurance as unsafe ones, as reflected by experience modification ratings (EMRs) of 0.75 and 1.50 respectively. Indirect costs of incidents can be three to seven times as great as direct costs in terms of OSHA penalties and interruptions to production[2] while, on the other hand, safe workplaces generally have better morale.

ISO 45001 is synergistic with other management systems like ISO 9001 (quality), and can even be integrated with them. Many proven off the shelf techniques and programs are available—and maybe already in place at your company—to make it work.