Talking About Compliance

Send an email telling me why you appreciate this issue and/or where it fell short, and also how we can make it better next year.

Perhaps you've noticed something is different about this issue of Occupational Health & Safety. If you were expecting our annual buyer's guide, which was the chief focus of our July issues for many years, you'll quickly discover there is no buyer's guide here. We decided a printed buyer's guide no longer makes sense in this digital era, when our online Industry Directory -- http://buyersguide.ohsonline.com/listing/ -- is much faster and easier to use.

This decision caused us to choose another focus for this issue: compliance. Compliance connects the information and articles we publish, the new products featured in our pages and our digital offerings, our popular webinars, and the many products and services offered by our advertisers and sponsors. Compliance with regulations and standards is essential and often required, but it's not the goal, to our audience or to me, as I said to co-workers while we were planning this issue.

Safety and health compliance should mean no penalties, no injuries, and no illnesses. However, it's not the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow or what you want printed at the top of your resume or on your tombstone. Going beyond basic compliance is something that our articles preach routinely, I told them.

With that in mind, we've prepared a compliance section for this issue starting on page 47 that's less about specific hazards or regulations and more about achieving success through culture, communication, and even a new mindset for tackling persistent problems (fall hazards, in this case).

I'm eager to hear your feedback about this section. Send an email telling me why you appreciate this issue and/or where it fell short, and also how we can make it better next year. Tell me about the compliance challenges you're encountering and how you're solving them.

Jerry Laws ([email protected]) is the editor of Occupational Health & Safety.

This article originally appeared in the July 2013 OHS issue of Occupational Health & Safety.

About the Author

Jerry Laws is Editor of Occupational Health & Safety magazine, which is owned by 1105 Media Inc.

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