Overview
ISO 45004:2024 - "Occupational health and safety management - Guidelines on performance evaluation" provides practical guidance for establishing and operating processes to monitor, measure, analyse and evaluate occupational health and safety (OH&S) performance. Applicable to organizations of any size, sector or risk level, the standard helps determine whether intended OH&S results are being achieved and supports continual improvement. ISO 45004:2024 can be used independently or alongside OH&S management systems such as ISO 45001:2018.
Key topics and technical requirements
ISO 45004 focuses on performance evaluation as a systematic set of processes. Key technical topics include:
- Performance evaluation process (clause 5): guidance on designing evaluation processes and selecting diverse information sources to avoid incomplete assessments.
- Sources and tools (clause 5.3): inspections, pre‑ and post‑activity reviews, exposure assessments, occupational health surveillance, meetings, focus groups, surveys, interviews, injury/ill‑health tracking, incident investigations and audits.
- Performance indicators (clause 6): selection, life cycle, characteristics and types of indicators - including leading and lagging, quantitative and qualitative, and the value and limitations of benchmarking.
- Monitoring, measurement, analysis and evaluation (clause 8): methods to collect data, address uncertainty, analyse results and make evaluations that inform decision‑making.
- Communication and action (clauses 9–10): presenting results to stakeholders and acting on findings to drive improvement.
- Review of evaluation processes (clause 11): periodic reassessment to ensure processes remain effective and relevant.
- Risk of unintended consequences: guidance to avoid data distortion, under‑/over‑reporting and blaming individuals for systemic deficiencies.
- Normative reference to ISO 45001:2018 and alignment with ISO 45002 guidance where relevant.
Practical applications and users
ISO 45004 is intended for:
- OH&S managers, safety professionals and occupational health practitioners
- Senior management using KPIs for governance and continual improvement
- Internal and external auditors, consultants and compliance teams
- Small, medium and large organizations across industries seeking to design or improve OH&S performance measurement
Typical uses:
- Designing balanced OH&S dashboards combining leading and lagging indicators
- Integrating performance evaluation into management review and business processes
- Improving incident investigation, surveillance and audit programs through better data use
- Avoiding unintended incentive effects (e.g., under‑reporting) by selecting robust indicators
- Supporting regulatory compliance and demonstrable continual improvement
Related standards
- ISO 45001:2018 - Occupational health and safety management systems (normative reference)
- ISO 45002 - Guidance for implementation of ISO 45001 (complementary guidance)
Keywords: ISO 45004:2024, occupational health and safety, OH&S performance evaluation, performance indicators, monitoring and measurement, ISO 45001, leading indicators, lagging indicators, KPIs, continual improvement.