Occupational safety and health management systems (OSH MSs) have been implemented in numerous
enterprises worldwide since the mid-1980s. While stakeholders still have expectations on better prevention
of occupational injuries and diseases, and on improving the working conditions, it suggest that new
approaches are now needed to ensure OSH MS effectiveness, including development of new methods that
would facilitate measurement of OHS MS operational status aimed at the genuine improvement of OSH
management practices. A review of literature on leading pro-active safety performance indicators (PPIs)
provided a rationale for a concept to elaborate a relatively small number of key performance indicators
(KPIs) for measuring OSH MS operational performance. As a basis for this process an initial set of 109 PPIs
was developed, composed of 20 sub-sets assigned respectively to individual OSH MS components. Next,
for the selection of KPIs the method of the Analytic Hierarchy Process (AHP) was employed. The ranking
and prioritization of leading performance indicators was made in relation to a set of SMART (Specific,
Measurable, Achievable, Relevant and Time-bound) criteria.
The objective of this paper is to demonstrate the application of the AHP method for the selection of
leading KPIs for measuring OSH MS operational performance. The proposed set of KPIs should be tailored
to specific conditions of an enterprise, such as the size, industry sector, types of occurring hazards, or the
maturity of OSH management processes.
2014 The Author. Published by Elsevier Ltd. This is an open access article under the CC BY-NC-ND license