A practical walkthrough of building a risk assessment that would stand up to scrutiny. We cover identifying hazards, judging likelihood and severity honestly, selecting proportionate controls, and recording the decision so it demonstrates that a reasoned judgement was made.

By the end of this session you will understand the key principles behind risk management and be able to apply them to your own workplace with confidence. The lecture keeps the theory practical and connects every point back to the relevant EN standards and tools available across SafetyOrbit.

Live sessions are announced on the Training Calendar , and recordings are added to the Lectures library afterwards. To go deeper on the standards referenced here, visit the EN Standards Library .

One that shows hazards were genuinely identified, likelihood and severity were judged honestly rather than minimised, the chosen controls are proportionate to the risk, and the reasoning is recorded clearly enough that another person could follow the same logic.

Full reference: Writing a Defensible Risk Assessment ↗

Pick the hazards, rate likelihood and severity, and get a scored matrix you can print. Nothing is stored — the assessment stays in your browser.

Score is likelihood multiplied by severity. A score of 10 or more means the risk is acted on before work starts, not managed during it.

Work through each step below and check off items as you complete them. This gives you a practical starting structure for a task or workplace risk assessment – use it alongside your organization’s official risk assessment form and record-keeping process.

Use this checklist as a working companion while you complete your organization’s official risk assessment form – it is a structure and memory aid, not a replacement document. Check items off as you go, and treat any unchecked item as an open action before you consider the assessment complete.

Full reference: Risk Assessment Builder ↗

A structured general-purpose risk assessment form that walks you from hazard identification through likelihood, severity and control measures, with space to record residual risk and review dates.

The template is a Word document, free to download and yours to adapt. It is available in three regulatory versions — these are genuine equivalents written to each framework, not translations of one another. Pick the one that matches the rules you work under.

The Risk Assessment Form is designed to be quick to complete and easy to adapt to your own workplace. Start from the template rather than a blank page, tailor the hazards, controls and responsibilities to your site, and keep a completed copy on file as evidence that the right checks were made.

The equipment and controls this template asks you to record are governed by published standards that define what each item must withstand and how it is tested. These are the ones that apply most directly:

Full reference: Risk Assessment Form ↗

A general permit-to-work form for high-risk tasks, with authorisation, isolation, precautions and hand-back sections.

The template is a Word document, free to download and yours to adapt. Replace the headings and fields with your own project detail and issue it under your own document control.

The Permit to Work is designed to be quick to complete and easy to adapt to your own workplace. Start from the template rather than a blank page, tailor the hazards, controls and responsibilities to your site, and keep a completed copy on file as evidence that the right checks were made.

Where this template names protective equipment or a control measure, the equipment itself is governed by a published standard that defines what it must withstand and how it is tested. The full EN standards library covers each one in plain language so you can confirm you are specifying the right level of protection.

Full reference: Permit to Work ↗

A safe system of work template that documents the sequence of a task, the hazards at each step, and the controls and PPE required, ready to brief to your team.

The template is a Word document, free to download and yours to adapt. It is available in three regulatory versions — these are genuine equivalents written to each framework, not translations of one another. Pick the one that matches the rules you work under.

The Method Statement Template is designed to be quick to complete and easy to adapt to your own workplace. Start from the template rather than a blank page, tailor the hazards, controls and responsibilities to your site, and keep a completed copy on file as evidence that the right checks were made.

Where this template names protective equipment or a control measure, the equipment itself is governed by a published standard that defines what it must withstand and how it is tested. The full EN standards library covers each one in plain language so you can confirm you are specifying the right level of protection.

Full reference: Method Statement Template ↗

A hot work permit template covering fire watch, extinguisher provision and post-work checks for welding, cutting and grinding.

The template is a Word document, free to download and yours to adapt. It is available in three regulatory versions — these are genuine equivalents written to each framework, not translations of one another. Pick the one that matches the rules you work under.

The Hot Work Permit is designed to be quick to complete and easy to adapt to your own workplace. Start from the template rather than a blank page, tailor the hazards, controls and responsibilities to your site, and keep a completed copy on file as evidence that the right checks were made.

The equipment and controls this template asks you to record are governed by published standards that define what each item must withstand and how it is tested. These are the ones that apply most directly:

Full reference: Hot Work Permit ↗

A one-page toolbox talk record capturing the topic, date, presenter and attendee signatures so you can prove the briefing happened.

The template is a Word document, free to download and yours to adapt. It is available in three regulatory versions — these are genuine equivalents written to each framework, not translations of one another. Pick the one that matches the rules you work under.

The Toolbox Talk Record is designed to be quick to complete and easy to adapt to your own workplace. Start from the template rather than a blank page, tailor the hazards, controls and responsibilities to your site, and keep a completed copy on file as evidence that the right checks were made.

Where this template names protective equipment or a control measure, the equipment itself is governed by a published standard that defines what it must withstand and how it is tested. The full EN standards library covers each one in plain language so you can confirm you are specifying the right level of protection.

Full reference: Toolbox Talk Record ↗

An incident and injury report form capturing what happened, immediate actions and contributing factors.

The template is a Word document, free to download and yours to adapt. It is available in three regulatory versions — these are genuine equivalents written to each framework, not translations of one another. Pick the one that matches the rules you work under.

The Incident Report Form is designed to be quick to complete and easy to adapt to your own workplace. Start from the template rather than a blank page, tailor the hazards, controls and responsibilities to your site, and keep a completed copy on file as evidence that the right checks were made.

Where this template names protective equipment or a control measure, the equipment itself is governed by a published standard that defines what it must withstand and how it is tested. The full EN standards library covers each one in plain language so you can confirm you are specifying the right level of protection.

Full reference: Incident Report Form ↗

A distribution warehouse worker walked beneath a loaded storage rack during a routine restock. Seconds later, a shifted pallet dropped a carton from height. He walked away with a headache and a story instead of a serious injury – because he was wearing his hard hat that morning, unlike some of his coworkers on other shifts. This is a composite case study built from common warehouse near-miss patterns, used here to illustrate a real and recurring gap in head protection compliance.

It was the last hour of a busy receiving shift. A forklift operator was repositioning a pallet on the third level of a storage rack when the load shifted slightly during the lift. A cardboard carton, sitting slightly over the edge of the pallet, slid off and fell roughly four metres, landing directly on a picker walking the aisle below. The picker was wearing an EN 397 industrial safety helmet with the chin strap properly fastened. The carton struck the helmet shell off-centre, and the impact was absorbed by the harness and shock-absorbing liner. He was checked by the on-site first aider, cleared with no serious injury, and was back on shift the next day.

The investigation found three contributing factors. First, the rack bay involved was loaded slightly beyond the picking face it was rated for, leaving cartons proud of the pallet edge. Second, the aisle beneath active racking work was not marked as an overhead-hazard exclusion zone, so foot traffic continued underneath during the lift. Third, and most relevant to this site, helmet use on that shift was inconsistent: workers doing "quick" tasks in what they considered low-risk zones often skipped their hard hats, and supervisors had stopped enforcing the rule in practice even though it remained written policy.

Had the picker not been wearing his helmet that day, a four-metre drop of a loaded carton onto an unprotected head could easily have caused a serious traumatic injury rather than a bruise. The near-miss was as much about helmet compliance culture as it was about racking safety.

Full reference: The Falling Pallet That Nearly Changed Everything – Field Story ↗