We facilitated a fully-remote workshop to identify and classify hazards and risks during the design phase of the project for a highly innovative laboratory.
The Problem
An Architectural firm engaged IGS to assist with the facilitation of an online (or hybrid) workshop for a MedTech Laboratory in their CBD campus. The Hazardous Operations Workshop was to enable the early identification of operational hazards to assist in identifying safety risks and proposed controls.
Consequences
Without early identification of the hazards and safety requirements of the specialised equipment being used within the labs, the risk of insufficient safety measures or costly re-engineering or retrofitting would increase.
Our Approach
Our team facilitated an interactive workshop using a collaborative real-time workshopping tool to conduct workshop activities in a virtual environment. Our team managed the administration as well as pre-reading to prepare workshop attendees leading up to the event.
Participants actively identified and mapped hazards from use of equipment, which were then assessed for risk and proposed safety responses using a “hierarchy of controls”. When “engineering” (or “design”) controls were identified, our team engaged with the architectural or engineering teams to probe for further information to enable updating the design to eliminate these safety risks.
Benefits
Our team enabled discussions across medical experts, project managers and engineers to better understand the end use-cases of the laboratory, in a wholly virtual workshop environment, without impacting the outcomes, raising convenience for medical specialists and other stakeholders.
The collaborative interaction and systematic approach to considering the equipment and labs ensured that all assets and hazards were captured, categorised, and both the design would incorporate safety improvements and that all other risks identified were provided for use by RMIT in safety manuals.