HSE (Health, Safety, Environment) regulatory monitoring, in particular, is an essential process for companies wishing to maintain compliance with regulations, legal requirements and standards. In a complex and constantly evolving regulatory landscape, effective regulatory monitoring is a priority to ensure compliance and minimize risks to the company. In this article you’ll find the complete procedure to help you set up an effective HSE regulatory watch.
What is HSE regulatory monitoring and why is it important?
HSE regulatory watch involves monitoring and tracking changes in the laws, regulations and standards that impact a company’s activities. Its importance lies in several factors:
- Anticipating change: regulatory watch enables companies to anticipate upcoming changes in the regulatory field and take proactive measures to comply with new requirements.
- Reduce the risk of non-compliance: By identifying and understanding applicable regulatory requirements, companies can avoid the risk of non-compliance. Non-compliance which can result in fines, sanctions or reputational damage.
- Maintaining competitiveness: Regulatory compliance has become an increasingly important criterion for customers, investors and business partners. By maintaining compliance, companies reinforce their credibility and competitiveness in the marketplace.
👉 What’s more, when it comes to certification to ISO or other standards, regulatory watch as a formalized process is mandatory! In order to manage, in particular, conformity assessment. The following chapters illustrate this obligation:
- For ISO 14001: chapters 4.2; 4.3, 6.1.1, 6.1.3, 6.1.4, 9.1.2, 9.3
- For ISO 50001: chapters 4.2; 4.3, 5.2, 6.1.2, 6.2.2, 8.1, 9.1.2, 9.3
- For Norm ISO 45001: chapters 4.2; 4.3, 5.1, 5.2, 6.1.1, 6.1.2.3, 6.1.3, 6.1.4, 7.3, 7.4.1, 8.1.3, 9.1.2, 9.2.1, 9.3
- But also in the MASE (Manuel d’Amélioration Sécurité Entreprise) standard, we find this sentence: One of the essential principles of the “Health, Safety and Environment Policy” must be to : “be aware of regulations, apply them and verify their application.”
The key phases of an effective regulatory watch
An effective regulatory watch requires a methodical, well-structured approach. The different phases of the regulatory watch will be developed according to your needs and objectives. The most important points for an effective approach are, of course, thoroughness and completeness!
Need n°1: Project framing and the right questions to ask
Whether you carry out your regulatory watch project in-house or choose to outsource it (in particular with Novallia, see the steps here), you need to set a framework for your project. Try to answer the following questions: What are the objectives? What are the expected results? What are they for? Is this a requirement of the ISO 14001 or ISO 45001 international standards? Who will be the project manager? And who will be responsible for internal compliance? Who will be the link between the company and the external service provider? Who will be the stakeholders? How much time and budget will you allocate to the project?
Need n°2: Information sources
In the second phase, you need to collect information by selecting sources. Not all sources are worth keeping. Select the most relevant and reliable sources of information for monitoring regulatory developments. These may include government sites, official publications, trade journals, etc. 👉 Caution: Check the completeness of the data! The main difficulty is monitoring and completeness. You need to monitor regularly – at least once a month – for updates and changes in regulations. Make sure you keep track of all the sources of information you use.
Requirement 3: Text selection
This involves identifying the specific areas of regulation that are relevant to your business. These may include national, regional or cantonal (for Switzerland) regulations, sectoral or industrial standards, European environmental laws, as well as international standards such as ISO.
Requirement no. 4: draw up a regulatory register and organize texts.
Organize the data collected systematically: for example, you can organize texts by theme (Environment, Safety, etc.) and/or by sub-theme (Air quality, Transport, etc.) according to the theme required by your organization. * This is what we implement in our web-based NV compliance monitoring tool.
👉 Don’t forget to note the date the text was created and updated, so you’ll always have the latest version!
Need #5: Analyze texts and make requirements understandable
For your regulatory watch to be effective, you need to analyze each text to ensure that the regulatory requirements it sets out are understandable to all company stakeholders. This task calls for legal and technical skills that only specialized regulatory experts possess.
Need n° 6 : Make the regulatory watch project readable and accessible to all
The results of the regulatory or legal watch must be distributed to all those concerned. Make sure you have an organized, up-to-date document that can be consulted by all stakeholders.
The essential steps to bring your company into line with the selected requirements.
Once the regulatory register has been compiled and the requirements highlighted, it’s time to measure your organization’s compliance with these requirements.
To be efficient, you have to be rigorous!
- Conformity assessment: every requirement must be assessed!
- For each non-conformity, you’ll need to set up a corrective action plan. Based on the regulatory requirements identified, draw up an action plan to implement the measures needed to ensure the company’s compliance.
- Breakdown of action plans into tasks
- For each action plan, name a task manager and a date for completion of the action plan.
The role of managers and best practices
HSE or QHSE (Quality, Health, Safety, Environment) managers play a crucial role in supervising and coordinating regulatory monitoring. Here are the best practices for effective regulatory monitoring:
- Commitment and responsibility: the commitment of managers is essential to ensure the implementation and monitoring of regulatory watch.
- Coordination and communication: Ensure that regulatory information is communicated effectively to all those involved in compliance.
- Training and awareness: provide adequate training for employees – who need it – on the regulatory requirements relevant to their field of activity.
- Use of digital tools: Don’t hesitate to convince your management to invest in web-based tools for regulatory monitoring and compliance. These digital applications are specialized to automate and facilitate the regulatory monitoring process.
The contribution of digital tools to regulatory watch
Digital tools, such as web-based regulatory compliance management applications (like NV Compliance), can greatly facilitate the monitoring process. These tools offer several advantages, including
- Automatic text updates in the application & real-time monitoring of regulatory changes
- Centralizing and organizing information
- Generate customized reports
By investing in specialized digital tools, companies can optimize their regulatory monitoring process and guarantee ongoing compliance with current standards and regulations.
Conclusion
Regulatory intelligence is an essential element of risk and compliance management for companies operating in regulated environments. By following a methodical approach and using the right tools, companies can anticipate regulatory changes, reduce the risk of non-compliance and maintain their competitiveness in the marketplace. If they also invest in specialized digital tools, they improve their monitoring processes, and gain in efficiency and time to ensure ongoing compliance with legal and regulatory requirements.