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Create and manage a safety audit › Safety inspections and audits › Use › Health and Safety Risk Management › Health and Safety › Employee Service Management
Release: Australia · Updated: 2026-03-12 · Official documentation · View source

Define an objective for a safety audit

Define an objective to add detailed goal and scope of the safety audit. You can create as many objectives as the audit requires.

Before you begin

  • People who should be assigned objectives are added to the audit's People involved list. The Assigned to field on an objective is filtered to people already added to the audit. For more information, see Add people involved in a safety audit.
  • Any documents or standards to be cited are uploaded and accessible.

Role required: sn_hs_rm.safety_audit_manager or sn_hs_rm.safety_audit_writer

About this task

Before an audit begins, define its scope by creating the audit objectives, the criteria used as benchmarks, and the items to be reviewed.

  • An objective describes a specific area of focus for the audit. Each objective has a method (for example, interview, document review, or inspection), a due date, and can be assigned to a person involved in the audit.
  • Criteria are the benchmarks or standards against which the audit measures compliance. Criteria are associated with one or more objectives.
  • Items for review are the specific records, documents, or assessments that should be examined to meet an objective. Items for review are assigned to a person involved in the audit, who is responsible for conducting that part of the review and raise findings against them.

Note: If you have a previous audit with a similar scope, you can select Import scope to pre-populate the objectives and the related sections rather than entering them manually. For more information, see Import scope from an existing safety audit.

Procedure

  1. Navigate to Workspaces > Health and Safety Workspace.

  2. Select the risk management icon (

Image omitted: icon-risk-assessment.png
Risk assessment icon\).

  1. In the Audits list, select All and open the audit record to add the objective to.

  2. Select the Objectives tab and then select New in the Objectives section.

  3. On the Objective form, fill in the fields.

    For information on field descriptions, see Audit Objective fields.

  4. Add criteria to the audit objective.

    1. Expand the objective card to which you want to add criteria.

    2. In the Criteria section of the objective, select New.

    3. In the Add Criteria dialog box, fill in the fields.

FieldDescription
Criteria type

Type of criteria.- Regulatory list: A regulatory or standards list. - Authority document: An Integrated Risk Management (IRM) authority document.

Note: This option is available only when Integrated Risk Management (IRM) is installed.

  • H&S Document: A document from the Health and Safety document library.
  • Knowledge base article: A knowledge base article, for example, for company's Health and Safety procedures.
  • Text: Free text description of the criteria.
Criteria

Standards that the audit measures compliance against. The items in this list appear based on the selected Criteria type and the available record of that type.

Note: If you use the 3E integration (for example, with Health and Safety Environmental Management), regulatory lists can be populated automatically from 3E when Regulatory list is selected as Criteria type.

TitleLabel that identifies the text-based criterion.This field appears only when Text is selected from Criteria.
ObjectivesObjectives associated with this criterion.You can link this criterion to multiple objectives on this audit.
DescriptionAdditional context for the criterion.
4.  Select **Add**.

5.  If necessary, add more criteria to the objective.

  1. Adding items for review to the audit objective.

    1. Expand the objective card to which you want to add an item for review.

    2. In the Items for review section of the objective, select New.

    3. In the Add Item for review dialog box, fill in the fields.

FieldDescription
Item typeType of item, such as a Health and Safety record type, to be reviewed.
Item for reviewRecord to be reviewed for this audit. The items in this list appear based on the selected Item type.
PriorityPriority level to review this item.
Assigned toUser assigned to this item for review.Only the people added to the People involved list of this audit are available in this field. For more information, see Add people involved in a safety audit.
ObjectivesObjectives associated with this item for review.You can link this item to additional objectives on this audit.
CriteriaCriteria associated with this item for review.You can link this item to multiple criteria on this audit.
InstructionsGuidance for the person assigned to this item, describing what to review or verify during the audit.
4.  Select **Add**.

5.  If necessary, add more items for review to the objective.

  1. Select Save objective.

  2. If necessary, add more objectives for the audit.

Result

  • Each objective defined for the audit appears as a collapsible card on the Objectives tab. The card header shows the objective name, priority, and state.
  • The objective is also listed in the Objectives tab of the assigned person's record on this audit.

What to do next

People assigned to the audit objectives can raise findings against the items for review during the audit. You can create a finding from the audit's Findings tab or directly from within an item for review. For more information, see Add a finding for a safety audit.

Parent Topic:Create and manage a safety audit