Making a risk assesment
The Health and Safety Executive is responsible for health and safety regulation in Great Britain. It gives the following advice on risk assessments, and though their material refers to the workplace, many of the principles will apply to your fundraising activities.
"The law does not expect you to eliminate all risk, but you are required to protect people as far as ‘reasonably practicable’. This guide (you can link to their guide here) tells you how to achieve that with a minimum of fuss…
…Step 1
Identify the hazards
Step 2
Decide who might be harmed and how
Step 3
Evaluate the risks and decide on precautions
Step 4
Record your findings and implement them
Step 5
Review your assessment and update if necessary
Don’t overcomplicate the process. In many organisations, the risks are well known and the necessary control measures are easy to apply. You probably already know whether, for example, you have employees who move heavy loads and so could harm their backs, or where people are most likely to slip or trip. If so, check that you have taken reasonable precautions to avoid injury. If you run a small organisation and you are confident you understand what’s involved, you can do the assessment yourself. You don’t have to be a health and safety expert.”
The Institute of Fundraising have a guide entitled “How to sleep at night … a checklist for Events”.
The Charity Finance Directors’ Group (CFDG) and Sayer Vincent have produced a simple guide to risk assessment which is available online. The Dartford Borough website offers good concise advice on risk assessments for public events. They have a separate sheet that covers contingency planning. The Woking Borough website also provides a risk assessment form for events, with guidelines on carrying out the assessment that you may find helpful.
The Health and Safety Executive has published a guide to risk assessments for events which is available to buy online. You need to decide what is relevant to your particular event - as the Health and Safety Executive says, “don’t overcomplicate the process”.
Volunteering England offers a range of great resources for people who manage volunteers, so if you are pulling together a team of volunteers you may want to have a look at what they have on their site:
- Risk assessments, a simple guide to running a risk assessment from the perspective of organisations working with volunteers.
- Risk Tool Kit, “How to take care of risk in volunteering. A guide for organisations”
Disclaimer
This know-how sheet is produced by how2fundraise.org, an on-line service provided by The Institute of Fundraising. It is intended to provide general information only and should not be taken as a full statement of the law. Please bear in mind that the Institute does not give professional legal or accounting advice, and while care has been taken with this information, you should consider whether you need to seek advice before taking any actions or incurring costs.
The information applies to England and Wales only.
The Institute does not endorse or recommend any third party services or products. If any third party services/products are listed on this website, it is for information purposes only. This how2guide/know-how sheet was last updated on date given at the top of this page and is reviewed on an annual basis. If it is some time since you obtained this how2guide/know-how sheet, please check if it is still correct.
Copyright
Copyright © 2007 Institute of Fundraising. Please see our terms and conditions for full details on use of these materials.
