What goes on a JHA
Every usable JHA we have ever seen has the same six things in a row, one row per hazard. Fancy forms add columns. They don't add safety.
- Job step. One piece of the work with a clear start and end. "Set the trench box," not "Dig."
- Hazard. What could go wrong on that step, in plain words. "Cave-in while inside." "Struck by the bucket." "Bad air."
- Risk before controls. How likely and how bad, as if none of your controls were in place. This is the number that tells you what deserves attention.
- Controls. What you are doing about it, specific enough that a new hire could check it. "Trench box 18 inches above the vertical wall," not "use protective system."
- Who makes sure. A name. "Everyone" is fine for things like hard hats. For the trench box, it's the competent person.
- Risk after controls. Rate it again with the controls in place. If it is still high, you are not done.
The top of the form holds the job facts: where, when, who is in charge, who the competent person is, the PPE and permits, the training the crew needs, and the stop-work triggers. The bottom is signatures: whoever prepared it, whoever approved it, and every person on the crew.
Stop-work triggers belong on page one. Water in the trench. Wind over the limit for the crane. A missing guardrail. Write the three or four things that mean everyone stops and the foreman gets called. Crews remember those long after they forget the rest.
How to fill it out in 20 minutes
- Walk the job first. Not from the truck. Stand where the work happens, look up for lines, look down for the edge of the cut, look at what is already stored or parked there.
- Break it into 5 to 12 steps. Fewer than five and you are hiding hazards inside steps. More than twelve and nobody reads it. Write them in the order the crew will actually do them.
- Ask the four questions on every step. What could go wrong? How bad could it be? How could it happen? What makes it worse: heat, rushing, a new worker, the end of a long shift? These come straight out of OSHA's own guide (publication 3071).
- Rate the risk before controls. Likelihood 1 to 5 times severity 1 to 5. Don't argue over a 12 versus a 15. The point is to find the 20s and 25s.
- Pick controls from the top of the list down. Can you remove the hazard? Swap for something safer? Put a barrier, guard or box between people and it? Then rules, permits, spotters and training. PPE last. More on this below.
- Rate it again with the controls in place. Most of the time the likelihood drops and the severity doesn't. A cave-in with a trench box is still a cave-in; it's just much less likely. That hazard stays at least Medium, and that is honest.
- Put a name on each row. Who makes sure the control is actually there at 7 a.m.? If you can't name someone, it won't be.
- Read it with the crew and sign it. Out loud, at the work, in the language each person actually speaks. Then they sign. A JHA in a binder in the trailer protects nobody.
Rating risk before and after controls
The grid below is the one on the template and in the app. Rows are likelihood, columns are severity, and the number in the box is the risk score. Color tells you how to react.
First aid
Medical treatment
Lost time
Major injury
Fatal
Likelihood: 1 rare, 2 unlikely, 3 possible, 4 likely, 5 almost certain. Severity: 1 first aid, 2 medical treatment, 3 lost time, 4 major injury, 5 fatal.
Three examples from the filled-out trench JHA:
Before: likely (4) and fatal (5). After the shield is set and nobody enters a trench deeper than 5 feet without it: rare (1) but still fatal (5). It stays Medium. That is the right answer, and it is why every control has to hold all day.
Before: 4 × 5. After: eye contact with the operator before approaching, nobody in the swing radius, a spotter for backing: 1 × 5.
Before: 4 × 3. After mechanical lifting and team lifts over 50 pounds: 2 × 3.
Two rules of thumb. Controls usually lower likelihood, not severity; lower the severity only if the hazard itself changed, like a shorter fall or a lower voltage. And a hazard that is still High (10 or more) after controls needs a stronger control or the competent person's review before the work starts. It should not quietly stay on the form.
Controls that count
NIOSH's hierarchy of controls is the order to think in. The higher on the list, the less the control depends on a tired person remembering to do something.
Eliminate the hazard. Substitute something safer. Engineering: separate people from the hazard with a box, a guard, a barricade, ventilation. Administrative: change how the work is done with permits, inspections, spotters, training. PPE protects the worker after everything else has failed.
What a weak control looks like: "Be careful." "Use caution around equipment." "Wear PPE." None of those tell anyone what to do. What a real control looks like: "Spoils and equipment at least 2 feet back from the edge." "Ladder within 25 feet of every worker, 3 feet above the edge, tied off." "811 ticket confirmed and marks visible before the first bucket." A new hire can check each of those with their eyes.
PPE is still on every JHA. It is just never the only line. If gloves are the only thing between a hand and a pinch point, you have a hazard without a control.
Mistakes we see on almost every jobsite
- Last job's JHA with the date changed. Same steps, different site, different crew, overhead line nobody noticed. If nothing on the form is specific to this job, it's not a JHA for this job.
- One step called "Perform work." That is where the injuries live. Break it up.
- Controls copied from the standard. "Comply with 1926.652." The rule is the reference, not the control. Write what the crew does.
- No stop-work triggers. The crew is left to decide in the moment, with the schedule pushing on them.
- Nobody assigned. A control with no owner is a suggestion.
- English only, for a crew that works in Spanish. OSHA's position since 2010 is that training has to be in a language and vocabulary workers understand. A signature under a page they couldn't read proves the opposite of what you want it to.
- Signed once in March. The job changed in April. See "When to redo it."
What OSHA actually requires
Honest answer: for most work, no federal standard says the words "job hazard analysis." What the rules do say gets you to the same place.
- 29 CFR 1926.21(b)(2) (construction): the employer has to instruct each employee in recognizing and avoiding unsafe conditions and the regulations that apply to their work. A JHA read with the crew is the cleanest record of that instruction we know of.
- 29 CFR 1926.20(b): an accident prevention program with frequent and regular inspections by a competent person. The JHA is where the competent person's findings for this job get written down.
- 29 CFR 1910.132(d) (general industry): a hazard assessment to decide what PPE is needed, with a written certification of that assessment. A JHA can be that certification as long as it names the workplace, who did the assessment and the date, and says on its face that it is the PPE hazard assessment.
- OSH Act section 5(a)(1), the general duty clause, covers recognized hazards no specific standard addresses. A JHA shows you recognized them and did something.
- Some standards do require their own written analysis for specific work: lockout/tagout procedures (1910.147), permit-required confined spaces (1910.146 and 1926 Subpart AA), and excavation inspections by a competent person before each shift (1926.651(k)). The JHA sits on top of those; it doesn't replace them.
Outside OSHA, most general contractors, owners and prequalification systems require a JHA or AHA for every task before you start, and the Army Corps of Engineers requires an Activity Hazard Analysis on its jobs (EM 385-1-1). If you bid that work, you need this habit anyway.
JHA, JSA, AHA, pre-task plan: what's the difference
| Name | Who uses it | What it is |
|---|---|---|
| JHA | OSHA's term (publication 3071) | Steps, hazards, controls for a job. The document on this page. |
| JSA | Oil and gas, utilities, many GCs | Same thing. "Job safety analysis." The columns match. |
| AHA | Army Corps of Engineers, federal work | Same idea with more required fields: equipment, inspections, training, named competent and qualified persons. |
| Pre-task plan | Daily, by the crew | Today's short version: what we're doing, what can hurt us, what we're doing about it, signed every morning. Built from the JHA, not instead of it. |
When to redo it
A JHA is a plan, and plans go stale. Stop and go over it again with the crew when the work changes, the equipment changes, the crew changes, or the weather changes. After rain or a freeze in a trench. After a near miss. When a step you didn't write about shows up. Add a revision number, don't overwrite the old one; you may need to show what you knew and when.
Build it on a phone instead of a clipboard
29Safety has this template built in: pick the kind of work, check the usual steps, pick hazards and controls from a vetted library or write your own, rate each one on the same 5×5 grid, and the crew signs by one QR code. Harli fills in the Spanish. The printout is the one you just downloaded.
See exactly what you'd get
The JHA plus a toolbox talk record, an inspection and more, in one PDF: five documents for a jobsite crew, or three for a plant. No watermark.
Plans from $199 a month. No per-person fees. 14 days free.
Rather have us write it? Two written programs ($295)
Questions we get
Is a JHA required by OSHA?
Not by that name for most work. Construction employers have to instruct workers in recognizing and avoiding the hazards of their work (29 CFR 1926.21(b)(2)), general-industry employers have to assess the workplace for PPE hazards and certify it in writing (29 CFR 1910.132(d)), and the general duty clause covers recognized hazards nobody wrote a standard for. A JHA is the practical way to meet all three and to prove you did. Some specific standards, like lockout/tagout and confined spaces, require their own written procedures on top of it.
Who should write the JHA?
The person who knows the work and will be there: usually the foreman or the superintendent, with the crew. A safety manager can coach it, review it and keep the library of good ones. A JHA written by someone who has never seen the site is a worksheet, not a plan.
How often does a JHA need to be updated?
Whenever the job, the equipment, the crew or the conditions change, and after any near miss or incident on that task. Many companies review every JHA at least yearly and before each new project. Daily changes go on a pre-task plan that points back to the JHA.
Does the JHA have to be in Spanish?
If people on the crew work in Spanish, yes in practice. OSHA's training standards policy (2010) says instruction has to be in a language and vocabulary workers understand, and a JHA read to the crew is hazard instruction. The template above comes in both languages, and the examples are side by side.
What's the difference between the risk before and after controls?
Before is the hazard with none of your controls in place; it tells you what deserves the most attention. After is the hazard with your controls working; it tells you whether the controls are enough. If after is still High, add a stronger control or have the competent person decide whether the work starts.
Not sure how this applies to your work? in the chat, or email safetyteam@29safety.com.