Health and Safety - What's New in the November 2024 Release

[Claire Russell]

This blog is a deep dive into the new features for the November, 2024, release of Health and Safety.

For additional details, refer to the product documentation and release notes on the ServiceNow Store listings. 

New Features:

• Critical Event Management
• Audit Management
• Health and Safety Case Management: Claims
• Health and Safety Contractor Management
• Additional Features

Critical Event Management

Plugin: Critical Event Management (sn_critical)

Persona: Safety and Security Teams

Roles: 

Role Name [name]	Description	Contains
Critical Event Admin [sn_critical.admin]	-   Administrator role for the Critical Event Management application. -   Configures the Critical Event Management application properties	-   sn_critical.agent  -   sn_critical.responder  -  sn_comm_management.comm_plan_admin  -   sn_critical.user  -   sn_critical.manager
Critical Event Manager [sn_critical.manager]	-   Oversee all critical events and guide to resolve them	-   sn_critical.agent
Critical Event Agent [sn_critical.agent]	-   Works on the critical event records from initiation to resolution	-   sn_comm_management.comm_plan_manager  -   task_editor  -   canvas_user  -   sn_ohs_im.workspace_user  -   sn_critical.read
Critical Event Reader [sn_critical.read]	-   Has read-only access to critical event records	-   sn_comm_management.comm_plan_viewer
Critical Event Responder [sn_critical.responder]	-   Volunteers or assists on-site personnel during critical events	-   sn_critical.read
Critical Event User [sn_critical.user]	-   Employees that can report critical events	-

As a new application, Critical Event Management will be integrated into the Health and Safety Workspace, enabling teams to capture, triage, and manage emergencies that could affect employee well-being at the workplace. With Critical Event Management, companies are equipped with the essential tools to communicate effectively with employees during emergencies and provide timely assistance to those in need.

Employees can quickly report potential emergencies to safety teams using Employee Center and Now Mobile, offering intuitive submission tools. Additionally, employees have access to a rich library of self-service capabilities designed to enhance workplace safety and provide peace of mind.

On-ground responders are empowered with a streamlined digital experience to help them manage emergencies efficiently. They can conduct roll calls at muster points to ensure the safety and accountability of employees impacted by an emergency.

How to Use:

Employee:

• Log in to employee center with the [sn_critical.user] role
• Navigate to the Health and Safety Taxonomy
• Report an emergency

The record producer has been designed to enable employees to quickly report emergencies.

Additional fields can be configured but for ease of use and efficiency in completing, the record producer is simple to allow employees to report critical events within seconds.

Critical Event Dispatcher:

• Log in to Health and Safety workspace with the [sn_critical.agent] or [sn_critical.manager] roles
• Navigate to Critical Event Workspace icon. 
• Create New Critical Event or navigate to the list view of reported critical events

Critical Event Dispatchers can choose to either be guided through the playbook experience or for those more comfortable in the workspace complete as information comes in dispatchers can navigate across the related lists to work through the response.  

The playbook is configurable, out of the box one example is provided but customers can build their own tailored playbook experience that follows their emergency response procedure. Different playbooks can be created for different types of critical events.

For more information on how to configure the playbook, please refer to docs.

• Create a new Critical Event
• Populate: short description, assignment group, and assigned to
• Optional: category, severity, affected location, on-site responder group*

Note: *can be added later as the dispatcher receives more information on the critical event

• Save

Note: Responder group mappings can be created by navigating to the Critical Event Management icon > On-site Responder Mapping > All

Responder groups can be created to manage the coordination of onsite response for office/workplace locations.

Users and roles can be added to the responder group to easily manage those who are onsite responders and their roles.

Note: During the creation of a Critical Event, responder groups are added to provide onsite status check ins for employees at that location.

Within the Critical Event record, dispatchers can view the responder team from the right hand navigation at any point of the critical event response.

Once the dispatcher receives the report of the Critical Event, they can move the state to “work in progress” using the UI Action.

Note: At any time customers can walk through a guided experience using the playbook tab.

The playbook experience ensures that dispatchers follow a consistent response experience. Customers can input emergency action plans within the playbook steps.

Once the dispatcher has determined the critical event needs response and notification, the dispatcher can activate the critical event.

To ensure confirmation in activating the critical event, a verification window will appear.

Once the critical event has been activated, dispatchers can navigate between tabs in the record to collect information and respond to the critical event.

Notification Center:

Notification Center allows dispatchers to easily coordinate mass communications. For each communication templates can be created to follow a consistent and approved communication.

Each communication type can have an associated SLA with a countdown to ensure communications are being sent quickly. To meet employees where they are and ensure maximum covered, communications can be sent to employees through email and SMS.

Note: SMS notifications would require a Twilio or WhatsApp integration and additional licensing

The communications are bidirectional and allow employees to receive communication and check in with their status to communicate if they are safe or need additional help.

Impacted People:

Impacted people provides a singular view to track the number of impacted people and their status check-in. Impacted people is determined by the location of employees in the sys_user table.

The dashboard provides quick analytics that are drill-able.

Status check ins can be either from employees responding to email or SMS notifications or reported by the onsite responder role.

Additional impacted people can be added via the “add person” ui action.

The status information  of impacted people is also available under the critical event overview to provide insight into employee status at a glance.

Related Records:

From the related records tab, dispatchers can relate health and safety incidents to begin an investigation on root cause analysis or track injured people. Child critical events if many employees reported the safe critical event at once.

Onsite Responder

Onsite responders are employees that are either full time employees or volunteers that are dedicated to responding and helping employees during a critical event. Within Critical Event Management a dedicated portal experience has been designed for that role.

Users with the Critical Event Responder [sn_critical.responder] role can access the critical event portal from their mobile device or tablet by searching https://[insert instance name].service-now.com/cem

From this view, responders will be able to see all employees at that location and indicate if they are safe or need assistance.

Once accounted for, the listed employees will be sorted into “Need help” or “Accounted for.” If additional employees are on site and not listed, the responder can select the add button to add new employees from the sys_user list.

Setting Up Critical Event Management:

Critical Event Management [sn_critical] will need to be downloaded from the store into your instance.

Release Compatibility: Xanadu Patch 3

Audit Management

Plugin: Health and Safety Risk Management (sn_hs_rm)

Persona: Employee, Manager, Health and Safety Manager

Roles: 

Role Name [name]	Description	Contains
Safety Audit Schedule Reader [sn_hs_rm.audit_schedule_reader]	-   Can view audit schedule
Safety Audit Schedule Writer [sn_hs_rm.audit_schedule_writer]	-   Can write audit schedule	-   sn_hs_rm.audit_schedule_reader
Safety Audit Manager [sn_hs_rm.safety_audit_manager]	Audit Manager who can: -   Build audit surveys within Survey Designer -   Create and manager safety audits in Health and Safety Workspace -   Schedule safety audits in Health and Safety Workspace -   Complete audit surveys -   Create, update, and delete audit findings, RCA, observations, risk assessments, and actions	-   sn_ohs_im.action_manager -   sn_hs_rm.safety_audit_writer -   sn_ohs_im.observation_writer -   survey_creator -   sn_ohs_im.observation_reader -   sn_hs_rm.audit_schedule_writer
Safety Audit Reader [sn_hs_rm.safety_audit_reader]	-   Can view safety audits	-   sn_imt_core.reader -   sn_hs_rm.hazard_reader -   sn_hs_rm.risk_matrix_reader -   sn_wsd_core.location_reader -   sn_ohs_im.incident_reader -   sn_hs_rm.risk_assessment_reader -   sn_ohs_im.action_reader
Safety Audit Writer [sn_hs_rm.safety_audit_writer]	-   Can write (create/edit) safety audits	-   sn_ohs_im.document_writer -   sn_ohs_im.workspace_user -   canvas_user -   sn_hs_rm.risk_assessment_writer -   sn_ohs_im.action_writer -   sn_ohs_im.observation_writer_restricted -   survey_reader -   sn_hs_rm.safety_audit_reader -   sn_ohs_im.document_reader -   survey_creator -   sn_ohs_im.observation_reader

With Health and Safety Audits, Health and Safety Teams can easily create, schedule, and assign safety audits to verify adherence to policies and procedures specific to their organization’s internal audit process.

Roles and assignments empower multiple teams to be working on the same audit with the correct visibility. The platform’s Survey and Assessments feature empowers safety teams to easily build and update their audit surveys and checklists with any changes.

Health and Safety teams will then be able to assess findings, conduct risk assessments, maintain audit documents, and assign actions to remediate audit results. The audit record will serve as a complete record for all information collected during the internal audit.

Employee Experience:

Using the omnichannel experience, users can easily compete assigned audit surveys (checklists) from their desktop, tablet, or mobile device. For users that work in areas of low or no connectivity, audit surveys can be taken offline on their mobile device using the Agent Mobile app. Once the user has connectivity, the completed audit surveys will automatically sync and be submitted for review or approval.

Audit surveys are built using the platform Survey and Assessments feature. Refer to docs for additional information and how to set up and maintain your surveys.

Now Mobile App:

• Log in to agent mobile with the [sn_hs_rm.safety_audit_writer] role
• Navigate to home
• Select your audit survey
• Complete the survey

Agent Mobile App:

Note: Offline functionality is only available on agent mobile  

Once an audit survey has been assigned to a user:

• Log in to agent mobile with the [sn_hs_rm.safety_audit_writer] role
• Navigate to home
• Select your audit survey
• Complete the survey

Health and Safety Workspace:

Health and Safety teams can manage the end-to-end process in the Health and Safety Workspace.

Note: the “Inspections: icon has been renamed “Audits and Inspections”

• Log in to the Health and Safety Workspace with the  [sn_hs_rm.safety_audit_manager]role
• Navigate to Audits and Inspections
• Select New
• Populate the details of the audit: Short description, assignment group, assigned to, audit start date, etc

• Save

The audit record enables Health and Safety Teams to collect all information on the audit on one record.

Multiple stakeholders can be assigned and complete different steps of the audit process. ACLs can be created to create visibility and edit access for different users as part of the ACL process.

People Involved [sn_ohs_im_involved_party]:

The people involved record enables Health and Safety teams to track all people involved as part of the process.

People involved can be employees, contractors, or public.

Out of the box, responsibilities are provided but can be configured.

Documents [sn_ohs_im_document]:

For any audit documentation, Health and Safety teams can add or create new documents to the audit record.

Documents can either be attachments, hyperlinks, or knowledge articles. Out of the box subtypes are delivered but can be configured.

Customers can use ServiceNow’s Knowledge capability to maintain policies and procedures. The document type “knowledge articles” will reference those knowledge articles.

Documents can be assigned to a person, a location, and have an expiry date set. Notifications can be configured for reminders when the document is close to expiring.

Audit Surveys [sn_hs_rm_audit_survey]:

Audit Surveys can be created to task out multiple users to complete audit questionnaires/checklists.This functionality would act as the questionnaire/survey/checklist section of the audit process.

Audit survey templates can be created using the Platform’s Survey and Assessment Feature. Please refer to docs for more information.

Note:

Once your survey is created

• search “survey” > “view survey in the filter nav
• open the survey you created
• important: under “source table” select “sn_hs_rm_audits”

Each audit survey is assigned to one user.

Due dates are assigned to ensure audit surveys are being completed in a timely manner. Once the record is created, the audit survey would automatically be assigned to the user to complete in employee center, Now Mobile, or Agent mobile.

Once the audit survey has been completed, Audit Managers can then view results on the audit survey record.

Findings [sn_hs_rm_finding]:

Once the audit survey has been completed,  audit findings can be logged.

To associate the specific audit survey to the finding, use the “audit survey” reference field. ‘

Once the survey has added, categories and audit survey questions can be selected to pull in the audit survey answer.

Hazards and risk assessments can also be added to the finding for additional reporting capabilities.

Once the record is saved, Health and Safety teams can then perform root cause analysis (5 Whys or ICAM) and assign audit actions to remediate the finding.

Risk Assessments [sn_hs_rm_risk_assessment]:

Customers using Health and Safety Risk Assessments can conduct risk assessments on the audit. These risk assessments are part of the Health and Safety Risk Assessment feature.  

For more information on Risk Assessments, please refer to the February blog.

Observations [sn_ohs_im_observation]:

New observation records can be created and associated to the audit record. Previously submitted observations by employees can also be added and associated to the audit.

Audit Actions { sn_ohs_im_action]:                                                   

Audit actions uses the same Health and Safety actions table that is used across all of the applications. Actions can be assigned to users or groups to perform corrective, preventive, learning, or additional tasks in relation to the audit.

Note* Health and Safety Action types of learning and tasks were added in the November release

Setting Up Health and Safety Risk Management- Audits:

Health and Safety Risk Management [sn_hs_rm] will need to be downloaded or updated to (4.0.0)  from the store into your instance.

Release Compatibility: Xanadu, Washington DC, Vancouver

Health and Safety Case Management: Claims

Plugin: Health and Safety Case Management (sn_hs_cm)

Personas: Claims managers

Roles:  Updated

Role Name [name]	Description	Contains
Claim Case Writer [sn_hs_cm.claim_case_writer	Safety case writer who can create and update Claims cases	-   sn_hs_cm.case_writer -   sn_hs_cm.claim_case_reader
Claim Case Reader [sn_hs_cm.claim_case_reader	-   Can view Health and Safety claim cases in the Health and Safety Workspace	-   sn_hs_cm_case_reader

With Health and Safety’s Compensation Claims feature, organizations can ensure that employees are compensated for their workplace injuries. Using the omnichannel experience that is accessible from Now Mobile and Employee Center, employees can self-serve with knowledge articles on compensation claims and submit claims cases related to workplace injuries.

Health and Safety teams can document and track claim amounts, medical documentation, leaves, and additional information. Utilizing, Performance Analytics, Health and Safety teams can report on claim information to determine trends in submitted claim amounts.

Health and Safety Claims Management is a feature update to the Health and Safety Case Management application that was released in the August 2024 release.

For more information refer to the August blog.

How to Use:

Employee Experience:

From the Employee Center or the Now Mobile application, employees can report claims related to Health and Safety injuries.

• Log in to the Employee Center with the Safety Case Reporter role [sn_hs_cm.case_reporter]
• Navigate to the Health and Safety Taxonomy
• Select Report a Health and Safety Claim

From the dedicated case type, employees can submit claim information.

To give safety teams context on the claim, employees can relate previously submitted incidents with the related incident field.

For privacy, the incidents that appear in the list are only incidents that the employee has submitted.

Note: This record producer can be configured to collect additional information.

Submitted Health and Safety cases will appear in My Requests for the employee to receive notifications, status updates, and communicate with the Health and Safety team.

For employees that work from their mobile device, Health and Safety Case Management is also available on the Now Mobile app.

Health and Safety Workspace:

After an injury occurs, Health and Safety teams often maintain multiple records of injury documentation.  Using the Compensation Claims feature within Health and Safety Case Management,  Health and Safety teams can maintain a single record to manage a complete summary of an employee’s injury leave, medical documents, and claim information. The case creates a complete summary  that can be reviewed and maintained as a historical record for documentation purposes.

Using the power of the platform, Health and Safety Case Management will reduce administrative burden with automatic routing to case workers based on qualifiers like location and employee position and increase visibility with streamlined tasks and approvals.

Out of the box roles empower teams with security, ensuring complete control over user’s visibility. Information on the case can be easily reported on for Health and Safety teams to create reports and identify trends in employee claims and injury leaves.

• Log in and navigate to the Health and Safety Workspace
• From the left-hand navigation, select the Health and Safety Case Icon.

Within this area, users can create new cases or previously view cases submitted that have been assigned to themselves or their team.  

Compensation claims cases can be created from the injury record or from the Health and Safety Case Management application in the Workspace.

Helpful tip: Refer to the August blog for how to create a case from an injury record

How to Create a Case

• Select new
• Populate details of the case: short description, category, etc

To indicate the case is a compensation claim case select Yes from the drop down.

Once Yes is selected, employee claim detail fields will appear  

Within these fields, claim managers can keep track of claim amounts, statements, and additional documentation for a complete summary of claim information. On the same case, additional information can be stored from a RTW case perspective.

Setting Up Health and Safety Case Management Compensation Claims:

Health and Safety Case Management [sn_hs_cm] will need to be downloaded or updated to (2.0.0)  from the store into your instance.

Release Compatibility: Xanadu, Washington DC, Vancouver

Health and Safety Contractor Management

Plugin: Contractor Management (sn_hs_crm)

Persona: Health and Safety

Roles: 

Role Name [name]	Description	Contains
Safety Contractor Coordinator [sn_hs_crm.contractor_coordinator	Coordinator for contractor companies and workers who can -        View contractor companies and their related records in Health and Safety Workspace -        Add, update, and delete these from Health and Safety Workspace Contractor companies for health and safety Contractor workers for health and safety profiles -        Assign safety related tasks and actions to contractor workers -        Collect safety related documents from contractor companies and workers -        Grant site access to contractor workers	-   sn_imt_core.user_writer -   sn_ohs_im.workspace_user -   sn_hs_crm.reporter -   sn_ohs_im.document_admin -   canvas_user -   sn_ohs_im.action_writer -   sn_ohs_im.action_reader
Safety Contractor Reporter [sn_hs_crm.reporter]	-   View and create contractor companies for health and safety from employee center	-   sn_imt_core.reader -   sn_hs_crm.company_writer -   sn_hs_crm.comapny_reader
Safety Contractor Company Writer [sn_hs_crm.company_writer]	-   Can write information into the contractor management company table and tables related to it
Safety Contractor Company Reader [sn_hs_crm.company_reader]	-   Can view information from the contractor management company table and tables related to i

For many organizations, contract workers are often performing the most hazardous activities. These activities pose a higher risk of injury or incident, as they are less controlled than that of employees. Contract worker populations create a threat to employee safety as less process is put in place. The Health and Safety Contractor Management application empowers organization to manage the health and safety of contract workers while on site.

This application is a multi-release investment. In the November release, we have released functionality around creating contractors, contract worker profiles, and assigning prequalification tasks. 

Note:  In this release, contractors will not have self service access to ServiceNow. 

How to Use:

In the Health and Safety Workspace, navigate to the Contractor Management  icon

• Select New
• Select the Company
• Select the Primary Contact
• Save

Note: The sn_hs_crm_company table refrences the core_company table for companies. Before creating contractor companies, add the company to the core_company table.

The “Primary Contact” field references the sn_imt_core_health_and_safety_user table if the type of user is a contractor.

If the primary contact is not in the health and safety user list, add the user to the sys_user table with the role [snc.external] and then add them to the Health and Safety User profile table with the type “contractor”

Once the contractor company has been created, Health and Safety teams can then add workers to the company.

• Select the Workers tab
• New or Add
• If adding, add select contract workers from the Health and Safety Profile table. If adding new, create a new user with the type: contractor and the Company as the contractor worker company

• Add any documents to the contractor worker company that have been created within the Health and Safety Configuration section
• Within Site Access, Health and Safety Contractor Coordinators can track the site access of the contract worker. With ServiceNow’s open API framework, customers can integrate their badge readers for a seamless experience

How to send pre-qualification tasks to Contract Workers:

 Within the November release of Health and Safety, contract workers can be tasked pre-qualification tasks before coming on site. Note, contract workers do not have self-service to the Health and Safety application.

To assign pre-qualification tasks navigate to the Health and Safety profile of the contractor worker. Open the “actions” tab. Create a Health and Safety action and assign to the contract worker. When assigning to a worker, the task will be delivered as an email.

Email notifications can be configured for a more tailored experience. For more information on email view docs.

Note: to view the out of the box email template navigate to all> System Notification > Email> Templates > Example contractor email template

Setting Up Health and Safety Contractor Management:

Health and Safety Contractor Management [sn_hs_crml] will need to be downloaded from the store into your instance.

Release Compatibility: Xanadu, Washington DC, Vancouver

Additional Enhancements:

Date/Time:

Date/time picker on the injury record has been updated from a string field to the platform date/time picker.

Because of the platform’s date/time conversion, the default list view will have 4 times to show if a conversion has been applied from the location of the submitter to the time zone of the location of the h&s team member.

Establishment Updates:

On the establishment record [sn_ohs_im_establishment], there is now a reference to cmn_location that a script will autofill the rest of the establishment information.

Note: all establishments will need to be added to the cmn_location table.

This will allow establishments to be more easily reported on.

Health and Safety Profile:

Uses can now be added to a dedicated Health and Safety profile to act as a complete Health and Safety record for the employee. Within this record, Health and Safety teams can view employee information, documents, and any Health and Safety records they have created or been assigned to (ex. Incidents, risk assessments, etc)

From the Configuration section of the Health and Safety Workspace,

Users can be added to the Health and Safety profile. Users first need to be added to the sys_user table.

Both contract workers and employees can be maintained in this table.

Health and Safety Documents:

Within the Configuration section of the Health and Safety Workspace, users with the can manage Health and Safety documents.

Documents can be knowledge articles, urls, or attachments. Documents additionally have sub categories that can be configured.

Expiry date can be added to the document and additional notifications can be configured to proactively remind Health and Safety teams of the upcoming notification.

Health and Safety Teams can use the documents capability for employee documents, contractor documents, and storing additional Health and Safety documents not associated to an employee.