Monitoring, Auditing and Performance Measurement
What this domain tests
This domain tests whether you can distinguish monitoring, inspection and audit, and choose indicators that drive improvement. Monitoring checks ongoing conditions or exposure; inspections examine physical conditions and behaviours; audits systematically evaluate conformity with a standard or management system.
Core rules
- Use leading indicators, such as inspection completion, training, corrective-action closure and near-miss reporting, alongside lagging indicators such as injuries and lost-time rates.
- Calculate rates consistently using exposure hours; do not compare raw counts between sites of different size.
- Audits should have scope, criteria, trained auditors, evidence sampling and findings graded by risk.
- Findings need owners, deadlines and verification of closure.
- Management review should act on trends, not just individual metrics.
Worked example
A site’s lost-time injury rate falls, but near-miss reporting also falls sharply and inspection closure is overdue. The reasoned interpretation is that the injury rate alone may be misleading; declining near-miss reports can signal underreporting or fear. The auditor should examine reporting culture, interview workers, check corrective-action records and recommend actions to restore reporting before declaring improvement.
Traps
Using only lagging indicators; comparing injury counts without exposure hours; calling an inspection an audit; using auditors without competence or independence; leaving findings open without verification.