|
Original Date: 03/17/1997
Revision Date: 01/18/2007
Information : Corporate Safety Instructions
In the 1950s, Polaroid developed its first set of safety policies which presented a traditional approach to safety issues and focused primarily on U.S. manufacturing plants. Polaroid’s safety policies were based on national consensus standards and were above average for the time period. In the late 1970s, Polaroid’s safety policies were updated and transformed into formal instructions to comply with the newly-instituted OSHA standards. These updated safety policies were then incorporated into a document entitled Corporate Safety Instructions. Known as the Green Book, the document was used by employees as a safety bible and reflected the U.S. laws and cultures as opposed to worldwide concerns.
Polaroid’s current set of corporate safety instructions is divided into 11 sections including general instructions; environmental safety and health; fire protection; and technical area safety instructions. Each instruction contains several parts (e.g., scope, background, policy, definitions, responsibilities and procedures, appendices) which provide guidelines for the user. The key statement for each instruction can be found in the policy section.
The Green Book provides valuable, consistent health and safety standards to Polaroid’s 40 operating divisions and eliminates the need for each division to develop its own standards. The document also serves as a standard for compliance audits. The Corporate safety team and division safety leaders meet monthly to discuss issues, problems, and concerns. Since the Polaroid facilities are located within a 60-mile radius of one another, these meetings provide an excellent opportunity for information exchange and keep all divisions updated.
Corporate safety instructions are not generally changed. However, the organization is constantly changing, and recent re-engineering efforts have resulted in the need to update the “who” portion of the policy. Polaroid also intends to globalize its policies and incorporate international standards and requirements for its non-U.S. plants. The document may be revised to comply with ISO-14000 standards.
For more information see the
Point of Contact for this survey.
|
