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How to Conduct an Effective Incident Analysis

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Analyze workplace incidents to find the cause and prevent future issues. Then, share a post-incident analysis report with stakeholders so you can make a plan for corrective and preventive actions.

When disaster strikes, you want to "stop the bleeding" as fast as possible. However, putting a temporary fix on an issue leaves your organization at risk of similar incidents in the future, and they could be even worse.

What is Incident Analysis?

Incident analysis is the process of evaluating an incident to identify its root causes, trends, and patterns. It involves collecting data, assessing the circumstances leading to the event, and analyzing responses to improve future incident management. The goal is to enhance safety, prevent recurring issues, and streamline organizational processes. By using tools like incident reporting and tracking software, teams can efficiently create comprehensive reports and implement corrective actions.

Conducting a thorough incident analysis helps you uncover the reasons it happened, remove the root causes and take precautions against repeat incidents. Use these incident investigation methodologies to guide you through the process.

Step-by-Step Process to Conduct Incident Analysis

Are you documenting incidents properly?

Slow or incomplete incident reports make it hard to analyze workplace incidents and take corrective or preventive action. Use our free incident report template (one of the most important incident analysis tools) to ensure you capture all the important information.


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Step 1: Gather Comprehensive Incident Details for Accurate Reporting

The first step to incident analysis is to gather as many facts as you can, as quickly as you can. The capturing of incidents in a timely manner is essential to fast resolutions and reduced risk. Collect evidence by:

  • Gathering physical evidence, photos and videos from the scene of the incident (if possible)
  • Interviewing the subject and victim (if applicable) and witnesses
  • Reviewing records such as emails, training records, computer history, policies and procedures

After gathering information, use the facts to make a timeline of events surrounding the incident. What happened before, during and immediately after the incident? An accurate timeline can help you determine both the cause of the incident and problems with how it was handled. Compile all of this information into a workplace incident report to keep the details in one organized document that's easy to share with team members who need it.

Once you have gathered as much information as you can, conduct a timeline analysis for incident response. This is a detailed account of not only what happened, but when it happened (before, during, and after the incident occurred). A timeline analysis can help you figure out the incident's cause and what you can improve upon in terms of follow-up actions if a similar incident occurs in the future.

Most importantly, when gathering information, don't blame, judge, or make assumptions. Doing so can limit your investigation at best and lead to a wrongful termination lawsuit at worst.

RELATED: How to Improve Safety with Incident Software

Step 2: Perform an Effective Incident Root Cause Analysis for Resolution

Using the timeline of events, you can then start conducting a root cause analysis (RCA). An RCA is the process of identifying the underlying causes that led to an event. A root cause is a fundamental problem with an existing system or process within your organization that, if it wasn't present, the incident wouldn't have occurred.

To conduct a root cause analysis, identify contributing factors to each major timeline event. These are the secondary causes of the incident. Then, ask why each contributing factor occurred. Keep asking "why?" until you get to a flaw in one of your procedures or policies.

There might be multiple root causes if the incident had numerous stages. For example, say Jim tripped, fell, and hit his head. The root cause of the tripping might be that the workspace was too dark and he couldn't see a piece of furniture in his way. But the root cause of him hitting his head could be that a heavy crate of inventory was placed in the middle of a hallway instead of a storage area and he hit his head on those as he went down.

For best results, analyze the incident's root causes with a team. If possible, include employees from different levels and departments. You'll get more diverse points of view and may uncover a problem you weren't aware of.

Not sure where to start? Download our free root cause analysis tools cheat sheet to learn four methods you can use to help you analyze incidents.

Step 3: Identify Patterns in Workplace Incidents to Prevent Recurrence

In many cases, incidents are not unique. If the conditions exist for an incident to happen once, chances are good that it has happened before and can happen again.

As part of your incident analysis, evaluate historical case data, too. Is a certain type of incident happening frequently? Does one office or location have more total incidents, or incidents of one type? Do incidents spike at certain times of year? Is one person involved in a lot of incidents?

To expedite the process and enhance accuracy, utilize incident reporting software and incident tracking software with data analysis tools. These solutions enable you to generate reports that identify areas of risk within your organization. You'll gain insights into the most common types of incidents and pinpoint departments or offices with higher incident rates, allowing you to allocate resources effectively for correction and prevention.

RELATED: The Complete Guide to Workplace Incident Investigations

Step 4: Implement Corrective Actions to Prevent Future Workplace Incidents

After you've identified trends and the root cause of the incident, brainstorm solutions on how to correct the present issues and prevent repeat incidents.

First, determine the corrective actions you need to take after the incident. These eliminate the root cause of the incident so it doesn't happen again. Examples of corrective action include:

  • Updating policies
  • Changing training content and frequency
  • Replacing or recalibrating equipment
  • Installing or increasing security measures (e.g. cameras, locks, cybersecurity)

As the final step of your accident analysis, decide what preventive actions you need to take. A preventive action addresses problems before they happen, rather than reacting to an incident. These should be based on the trends you uncovered, including what you learned by analyzing the incident at hand. Examples of preventive action include:

  • Creating emergency plans
  • Implementing new types of employee training
  • Conducting internal audits
  • Reviewing policies and procedures annually
  • Performing regular maintenance on equipment and data systems

Conducting an analysis after every incident will help your company get a detailed picture of its risks and opportunities for improvement. Over time, this streamlines the process of spotting incident trends, which helps you build an effective prevention program, decreasing the number of incidents and accidents and boosting safety and security throughout your organization.

How Case IQ Can Help With Streamlined Incident Analysis and Reporting

Case IQ's modern case management platform is an all-in-one tool that helps you uncover, triage, manage, investigate, and prevent incidents in the workplace. You can keep all incident data in one place, making it easy for team members to collaborate securely and look back at details of past incidents. Our incident trend analysis tools help you create easy-to-understand graphs and charts from your historic incident data, so you can identify recurring incidents and areas of risk and address them proactively. Learn how Case IQ can help you protect your organization and employees here.

Worried you'll forget this process? Download our free incident analysis checklist to ensure you don't miss an essential step. You can share it with your colleagues, too, to ensure consistency.

Frequently Asked Questions on Workplace Incident Analysis

1. How do you conduct an effective incident investigation?

Conducting an incident analysis involves gathering information by collecting physical evidence, conducting interviews, and reviewing records to create an accurate timeline of events, followed by conducting a root cause analysis to identify underlying flaws in procedures or policies, and finally, identifying patterns and taking corrective and preventive actions to address risks and improve safety.

2. How do you analyze workplace incident data?

Incident data analysis involves evaluating past incident insights to identify trends and recurring incidents. Utilizing incident response case management software enhances efficient data analysis and risk assessment, allowing you to create reports that highlight areas of risk within the organization. To simplify the process of incident ticket analysis, use a tool that generates graphs and charts, saving time and minimizing human error.

3. What is incident analysis (with example)?

Incident analysis involves examining the circumstances surrounding an incident to uncover causes and prevent future occurrences. For example, if an employee slips and falls due to a wet floor, incident analysis would involve determining why the floor was wet (e.g., spilled liquid, leaking pipe) and taking corrective actions (e.g., installing warning signs, improving cleaning procedures) to prevent similar incidents in the future.

4. What are the four steps in the workplace incident investigation process?

The first step of incident analysis is to get the whole story by gathering incident details from involved parties and witnesses. Next is to conduct a root cause analysis to identify what caused the incident so you can remove that hazard. Third, identify patterns in incident cases to inform your corrective and preventive measures. Finally, correct and prevent issues to protect both employees and your organization from risk.

5. How do you assess a workplace incident?

To assess a workplace incident, first ensure the safety of all involved and contain the situation. Gather information by documenting the scene, interviewing witnesses, and reviewing relevant records. Analyze the incident to determine the root cause and contributing factors. Evaluate the impact, both immediate and long-term, and develop corrective actions to prevent recurrence. Finally, document the findings in a detailed investigation report, monitor the implementation of corrective actions, and ensure legal and regulatory compliance.

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