In our work with EHS software systems, these are the top ten EHS software problems we hear from our clients:
1) Invested in an EHS enterprise system and are only using part of the functionality – for some companies, the investment in an EHS software package can exceed $10M just to get started. It is not unheard of to have an annual total maintenance cost over $2M a year. That is a lot of money, even for big oil. Are companies getting the full benefit when the processes reflected in the software were accurate 4 years ago, but no longer are?
2) Need a master Action Item Interface – A lot of companies have action items coming from multiple systems. Any person will have problems determining what is really important to do when they have 17 High Alerts from 17 sources.
3) How to deal with multiple sub systems (MOC, Investigation, observation, BBS, JSA, etc.) – We see that even the Big Oil companies still have manual processes run on spreadsheets and email attachments. Even more common is a company has multiple “EHSish” software sub-systems that run part of the functionality.
4) How to analyze the data, data overload – on the heels of multiple sub systems, one system may have 3 degrees of granularity while another may have 20. How does one do an effective of the data to reduce accidents?
5) Still have manual processes – when the biggest companies in the world still have track 50% of their incidents and root-cause-analysis with spreadsheets attached to email – how effective can the risk analysis be?
6) Cannot explain trends – We had a client saw an uptick in H2S alerts at a plant. They started the investigation. Turns out all the alerts came from maintenance people who worked all over the facility, but logged the events in the maintenance department. The maintenance shed was
not the culprit. They had a trend they could not explain and no data to find out more.
7) How do the notifications work, what are the notification procedures – If someone gets seriously hurt on the job. We call 911. That one is easy. Who else needs to know and when? It is not always obvious. With multiple systems, how current is this data.
8) No reminders for compliance – Your company may fall under the guidance of API, EPA, IFAS or FDA. Who is monitoring their recommendations? We still see majors in 2017 discussing how to implement API 754 / Loss of Primary Containment.
9) Not connected with you Master Data – Where are the lists of employees, site, phone numbers, chemicals, products, trucks, etc.. Are there held in an HR or Operations database and in all 17 of the HSE systems? What is the procedure when people leave or change jobs?
10) Determining what to measure– So many options, so little time.
Read More: EHS Software Problem #4 – That’s not how we do it Anymore >>
Read More: Getting IT to buy in to your EHS software project >>
Read More: The ROI on EHS Systems is Better Than You Think >>
Read More: Agile EHS – Creating a Safety Culture through Continuous Improvement >>
The trend we see in EHS software is most companies do not just have a single EHS / Risk Management software system. They often invest heavily in one tool, but only have 40-60% of their processes recorded in it. That is quite a bit of risk management information not captured.
We have helped our clients with all of the above. If you have something you want to add to the list we want to hear it. We at Decide Consulting have a practice dedicated to EHS software.