Moral Reasons for managing health and safety in any organisation or a workplace? | Why we should manage health and safety? | 25+ Moral reasons with explanation.
Introduction:
Managing health and safety is not only a legal or business requirement, but also a moral responsibility of every human being. Every human being has a moral obligation of not to harm anyone. Its the most important duty of every human being that if there is any potential danger at any place, he should take necessary precaution to avoid harm. These moral obligations are not only for employers but also for employees who work in an organisation. However, employers have some strict obligation as they have to encourage the moral of employees to increase their commitment towards health and safety. Employers should must provide a safe working environment to employees. If the employees feel safe while working, their morale will be up as they will think that the organisation is taking care of there lives. They will do better for their organisation resulting in many benefits.
In this article we are going to know 40+
moral reasons about (Why we should manage health and safety?)
So lets get started!
Moral Reasons for managing health and safety:
There many moral reasons to manage health and safety at the workplace, I am going to discuss few of them.
- Respect for human life
- Prevention of suffering
- Protection of well-being
- Basic human rights
- Care for employees
- Social responsibility
- Ethical business practices
- Reduction of injuries
- Elimination of fatalities
- Promotion of health
- Dignity of work
- Employee empowerment
- Community trust
- Reputation and brand image
- Compliance with laws
- Reduction of pain
- Preservation of quality of life
- Support for families
- Business continuity
- Prevention of disabilities
- Protection of the environment
- Human dignity
- Employee morale
- Reduction of stress
- Promotion of wellness
- Corporate social responsibility
- Ethical leadership
- Human rights protection
- Community benefit
- Reduction of medical costs
- Increased productivity
- Improved reputation
- Compliance with international standards
- Protection of young workers
- Support for vulnerable groups
- Reduction of absenteeism
- Improved employee retention
- Enhanced business performance.
- Better quality of work
- Demonstration of care and compassion
In this article I will explain:
10+ of the above mentioned moral reasons:
[Declaimer/Note: You can use this knowledge of moral reasons in your NEBOSH IGC exam, but make sure that you apply this knowledge in your scenario. Do not just copy and paste in your exam.]
To Prevent Suffering:
Suffering: It is a state of pain, stress of any other harm of human being. It could be physical, mental or emotional naturally. I can be referred to many terms such as pain, fear, stress, anxiety, loss, trauma, illness or injury.
It is a moral reason of every single human to avoid causing harm to other, therefore it is important to prevent others from suffering. Because suffering causes harm to people (humans), resulting in damage to their well-being and quality of their lives. it's a great good to prevent other's from suffering. By this action we promote goodness in our society. If you protects someone from harm, he will also protect you when you will be in danger and that's how the society will become a great place for living in. Therefore, we have to keep health and safety as priority to avoid suffering of human,
Respect for human life:
This moral reason depends on your belief that every human beings is owns dignity and respect, therefore he deserve's to be treated as most valuable asset. This belief tells us that people lives are precious therefore, every human has a right to live with dignity without any kind of harm. Human lives are respectable because humans are precious. This is why we should manage health and safety to respect the lives of humans.
Protection of well-being:
Its the most important moral reason for why should manage workplace safety and health. Its the duty of every person to protect others from pain, illness and suffering of any kind. We should make sure that the employees are safe, live and able to work safely.
Hazrat Muhammad PBUH once said:
"If a man saves the life a person, it means that he saved the whole humanity"
This said of Hazrat Muhammad PBUH demonstrates the cost of human life.
Basic human rights:
Every human being owns that right of being safe while working. They must have a working environment that do not harm and exploit them. Therefore, its morally important to make sure their safety at workplace by managing health and safety.
By creating the safety as a priority, we respect this basic human right.
Care of employees:
Workers and employees are most valuable assets. It's our duty to protect them and send them to their families safe and free from illness or injury. We have a moral duty to protect them and provide them a safe working environment so that we support them physically, mentally and emotionally. By doing this we ensure our commitment and care to the safety of employees.
Social responsibility:
As we all live in societies, we all do different types of businesses and activities on regular basis. It is our moral responsibility to make sure that our activities do not cause harm to others. We all should priorities the safety of everyone including employees, visitors, clients, contractor or even the general public.
Human dignity:
Human dignity is an important moral reason for managing health and safety at the workplace. It is essential to recognize that every employee has inherent dignity and worth, and that their work should not compromise their dignity in any way. A safe and healthy work environment is essential for proving human dignity, as it allows everyone to work without fear of harm or injury.
By prioritizing health and safety management, we demonstrate our commitment of valuing and respecting the inherent worth and dignity of every human being in the world/workplace.
Reduction of injuries:
We have a moral obligation that we protect physical and mental state of employees. We should priorities the physical and mental state of employees and ensure that they are free from any kind of injury. By managing health and safety at the workplace the rate of injury of workforce will be reduced. This the the most important benefit of managing health and safety.
Elimination of fatalities:
Life is the most important and precious thing. Although, everyone has the right to live a better life without the fear of harm. Its important not to put anyone in high risk works and all kind of reasonable efforts should be made to avoid the loss of precious lives. Elimination of fatalities is the moral reason why we should take health and safety as a priority over all else, to ensure all proactive measures to be done to avoid fatalities. By doing actions to prevent fatalities we fulfil our moral obligations of why we should manage health and safety.
Compliance with laws:
Laws and regulations are created to protect us. It's our moral responsibility to obey laws and regulations to avoid violations. Managing health and safety at workplace is the most important legal requirement. That we should obey laws. Different regulatory authorities ie ILO (international Labour Organisation) requires to provide safer work environment to all the employees so that can go home safely.
Support for families:
Every worker in the world works to support his family financially. If they got harmed during working or left this world due to accident, or become disable for whole life, their families will get effected a lot. They loss a family member. Therefore its our moral duty to make sure that they go home safely. We should provide them safe working environment and not to put them in hard or high risk activities so that they can earn their livings and support their families safely.
Employee Morale:
Managing health and safety at workplace also links with employee's morale and emotional well-being. If employers do not provide safe working environment to their employees, the moral of employees will be down. But if employers takes care of their safety and health and take it as a priority, It will demonstrate his commitment towards the welfare of employees. Taking health and safety as a priority will boost the morale of employees and show that they are valuable assets for employers (Organisation).
Increased productivity:
Management of health and safety also links with increase in productivity of employees. When a good healthy and safe working environment is provided to workers by taking all the necessary precautions, workers start performing their best without the fear of injury and illness. This decrease absenteeism, illness and downtime in the organisation.
Compliance with international standards:
It is the moral reason of managing health and safety by following the globally recognized principle of protecting employee's well being. By complying with international standards, we fulfil our moral duty to protect employees life, prevent harm, and promote a safe and healthy work environment.
Reduction of Pain:
Reduction of pain is a moral obligation for managing health and safety at the workplace. No one wants and deserve to go through pain of suffering because of his work. Pain can effect physical as well as mental well-being of anyone. By managing health and safety at the workplace we can reduce the rate of injuries and illness that causes pain and ensure that the worker go back to home as he came from home.
Conclusion:
40+ moral reasons discussed and mentioned above says the ethical, legal and social importance of prioritising health and safety at the workplace. Keeping these reasons as a lesson organisation can create a positive safety culture that value the human life, dignity and well- being. You should remember that safety is not just a policy or procedure but a moral responsibilities of us as a human.
By taking safety as a moral priority we can create a safe future for our families, colleagues and communities.
Note: You can use this information when your Open Book Exam contains the question related to morals. Make sure you do not just copy and paste. If you did it you will get the plagiarism, resulting in REFER (TBA).
Thanks for visiting HSE-WALA.
Regards: Rehan Waseem.
