Workplace Assessments

Legally required risk assessments and other surveys

It is required by Danish law that all workplaces with employees must work out a written workplace assessment (WPA) every third year as a minimum or whenever changes are implemented that may affect the working environment. The purpose of the WPA is to assess the safety and health risks in the workplace by mapping out all areas of the working environment – both physical and psycho-social conditions – in order to assess whether any actions need to be carried out.

The WPA provides your workplace with the opportunity to take a systematic and efficient approach to your working environment tasks; it enables you to make a plan for how you can improve the working environment in your workplace.

The workplace assessment is required by law and both management and employees must be involved in the process. The WPA can be carried out in various ways: Some businesses use online questionnaires while others use the dialogue-based WPA. Learn more about the different types of workplace assessments and the five steps of the WPA work below.

Online workplace assessment questionnaire

The online questionnaire is an efficient way to get a clear overview of your overall working environment. This approach also provides anonymity to your employees during the process securing that everyone will be able to state their opinion without having to face colleagues and leaders directly.

When we facilitate work assessment questionnaires, we make sure that employees are only asked to answer questions that are relevant to their individual work situation. We also consider it important to adapt the questionnaire to match the working environment in your organisation.

Following the response deadline, we draw up easy-to-read, colour-coded reports. We present and discuss the results with you on your location and consider the further workplace assessment process.

In addition to this, we always offer benchmarking against e.g. the national average provided by the Danish National Research Centre for the Working Environment (NFA) and we can assist you with cross-tabulation and efficiency analyses where it adds value.

Dialogue-based workplace assessment

For smaller workplaces with a significant degree of trust and security in the organisation, the dialogue-based workplace assessment will be a good match. The dialogue-based WPA is an inclusive approach where both employees and management are involved in discussions concerning the physical and psycho-social working environment, priorities, themes, and scope for further development as well as concrete WPA action planning.

It is our experience that this inclusive method prompts commitment and involvement as it gathers management and employees around the safety and health issues in the workplace. This works as a reminder for all of you of the importance of viewing the health and safety work as a joint task.

In addition, the dialogue-based WPA works well as a separate follow-up to the online workplace assessment.

The 5 steps of the workplace assessment task

In close cooperation with e.g. your working environment organisation, we customise the workplace assessment process to fit the exact needs and demands of your organisation. Regarding the legal requirements, there is freedom of choice for working out the WPA, however the WPA must be documented in writing and the following five steps must be covered:

U

Identify and map out all areas of the working environment

l

Describe and asses problematic issues in the working environment

Q

Include your company's sickness absence rate

e

Prioritise solutions and work out action plans

Z

Create guidelines for following up on action plans

Få hjælp til at vælge den rigtige metode, når du laver en APV

We’ll help you and your organisation choose the method that best suits your needs

Regardless of what method you and your workplace decide to apply for your workplace assessment, you can let us do the hard work while you and your colleagues take care of business.

We’ll guide you through the various decisions and considerations that are necessary to look into in order to create the best process – this may concern structure, scope, and content.

What is most important is that you choose the method that creates most value for your organisation.

Let us help you with workplace assessments and other surveys

At Human House, we carry out various types of surveys for all types of companies and organisations – private as well as public.

Do you need a quantitative survey based on questionnaires, or a qualitative, dialogue-based survey – or both? We provide solutions in:

Complete workplace assessments (WPA)
Workplace assessment of the physical working environment
Workplace assessment of the psycho-social working environment
Psycho-social working environment and wellbeing for leaders
Vision Zero
Safety culture and workplace culture

Employee satisfaction survey
Wellbeing evaluation
Social capital
Sexisme
Harassment and bullying
Physical and psycho-social working environment during COVID-19

Why choose Human House?

Human House is the leading consultancy company in leadership and occupational safety and health in Denmark and we bring more than 35 years of experience to the table. We’ll be a valuable partner when you want to identify the potential for further development in your company or organisation.

We’ll help you form a general view of which themes and topics to pay attention to in your workplace, but we can also assist in pointing out existing strengths in your organisation that should be protected and appreciated. We present the results of your workplace assessment in a clear and comprehensible way to create the best foundation for everyone – management as well as employees – to give their contribution to the process in a constructive way.

Contact

Mette Skau Bachhausen

Screenings and surveys
Chief consultant

mesk@humanhouse.com
+45 93 40 22 01

Want to know more about the different approaches to conducting your workplace assessment? Contact Mette today and she will help you find the best solution.