Skip To Content

Structure and management

Assessing risk

Definition

Risk assessment provides the golden thread in your system, connecting the decisions you make, the decisions you enable others to make and your ways of working. It is a process of identifying hazards, evaluating associated risks and implementing measures to remove or reduce them. Involve people who might be affected by the risk and your staff and volunteers who manage it. Deal with the obvious and significant risks as a priority.

Steps 

Step 1 Collate any written risk assessments so they can be found in one place.
Step 2 Agree which activities require a daily risk assessment.
Step 3 Think about who leads sessions, how you give them the authority to make decisions and how you encourage reflective practice.
Step 4 Establish how you recognise when a person’s health, fitness or capabilities might be an issue for ongoing participation.

Guidance

Consider using four different types of risk assessment

  • Pre-activity (written) – a documented, step by step process of identifying hazards, evaluating associated risks and identifying reasonable controls to remove or reduce risk
  • Daily – many things won't be known in advance so will need to be assessed on the day to enable risk-based decisions, including a sail / no sail decision. You are combining the judgements of a competent person with a process that has been agreed by the organisation.
  • Dynamic - A continual monitoring and communication process by all those involved in managing safety during a session, event or activity. It is about keeping your head out of the boat, spotting situations and dealing with them before they become problems.
  • Individual – a process to assess the additional support a person may need to take part that considers new risks arising from the participant, their capabilities and needs.

Checklist 

☐  Can you find pre activity (written) risk assessments in one place?

☐  Have staff and volunteers been involved in the risk assessment process? 

☐  When were your risk assessments last reviewed and updated? 

☐  Is there anything in your risk assessments that hasn’t or can’t be implemented? 

☐  Do you have a process and framework for daily risk assessments? 

☐  Do you check that daily risk assessments are being conducted properly? 

☐  Can you link your risk assessments to decisions made and controls / mitigations in place?

☐  Do you know who is competent and been given authority to carry out daily risk assessments? 

☐  Do you encourage reflective practice so decision makers can look back on their actions as part of continuous learning? 

☐  Do you know when and how you would carry out an individual risk assessment? 

Further resources