Job safety analysis training suits supervisors, safety coordinators, team leads, and experienced workers who help review tasks for hazards. It is especially useful in manufacturing, maintenance, and construction, where jobs involve machinery, chemicals, or heavy materials. Frontline employees also gain from it, since the people who do a task often spot its hazards first.

OSHA has no general rule requiring a job safety analysis by name, but a JSA is a practical way to meet related duties. Under 29 CFR 1910.132(d), employers must assess workplace hazards to select PPE and certify that assessment in writing. A JSA can document that hazard assessment and the controls chosen.

A job safety analysis follows four basic steps. First, choose the job to analyze. Next, break the job into its sequence of individual steps. Then identify the hazards in each step. Finally, decide on controls, such as engineering changes, safer procedures, or PPE, that eliminate or reduce each hazard.

A job safety analysis (JSA) and a job hazard analysis (JHA) are essentially the same process under different names. Both break a task into steps, identify hazards, and set controls. OSHA's guidance publication uses the term job hazard analysis, while many employers and industries prefer JSA on their forms.

Start job safety analysis with jobs that have the highest injury or near-miss rates, then tasks with potential for severe injury. New jobs, recently changed procedures, and complex or rarely performed tasks are also priorities. The 12-minute video, available in English, Spanish and French, shows how to assess and control task-related risks.