Creating a wish list of features for your ideal health and safety management tool
As part of selecting and implementing H&S software, once you’ve defined your success criteria and clearly identified the problems you need to solve, the next step is to create a wish list of features for your ideal solution.
This isn’t about listing everything that could exist. It’s about identifying the tools that will genuinely support safer working, reduce risk, and make health and safety management easier across your organisation.
A simple and effective way to approach this is by using the Plan–Do–Check–Act (PDCA) cycle.
Using the Plan–Do–Check–Act framework to guide your wish list
PDCA is a well-established framework designed to help organisations manage risk and continuously improve. It underpins ISO 45001, which is why it’s such a useful lens when evaluating health and safety management software. Using PDCA to assess health and safety software ensures the system supports your safety processes end to end – not just reporting after something goes wrong.
Here’s how each stage translates into software requirements.
Plan
This is where risks are identified, objectives are set, and policies are developed. Software should help you plan effectively by making information easy to create, access, and keep up to date.
Do
This stage focuses on putting plans into action, e.g., training people, implementing controls, and engaging workers on the frontline. Your software should make it simple for people to do the right thing, every day.
Check
Here, you’re verifying that controls are working through inspections, audits, and incident reviews. Visibility and consistency are critical at this stage.
Act
Finally, you take corrective and preventive action, update processes, and drive continuous improvement. Software should help close the loop, not just highlight problems.
When reviewing software solutions, ask yourself: how well does this system support each stage of PDCA?
Example: using PDCA to assess the fit of H&S software
Plan
A construction company manages safety using paper forms and spreadsheets, which limits visibility of risk across sites and makes it difficult to act proactively. The business wants to understand whether safety software is a good fit before investing time and money.
Success is defined as:
- Alignment with construction workflows
- Ability to support proactive risk management
- Ease of use on site
- Clear value for supervisors and managers
Do
The company:
- Maps current safety processes (risk assessments, inspections, permits, incident reporting)
- Identifies pain points and high-risk activities (e.g. working at height, plant movement)
- Shortlists a small number of H&S software providers
- Uses demos and walkthroughs to test how well each solution supports real construction use cases
- Reviews implementation effort, training needs, and internal resources required
Check
They assess each option against agreed criteria:
- Can it replace paper and spreadsheets without adding complexity?
- Does it help surface leading indicators (hazards, near misses, repeat risks)?
- Is it practical for site teams to use in live environments?
- Does reporting provide meaningful insight for management?
- Does the solution scale across multiple sites and projects?
Act
The assessment shows Software Option A is the best fit. It matches construction workflows, is simple enough for site teams to use, and provides the visibility needed to manage leading indicators proactively.
Core functionality to include on your wish list
At a minimum, most organisations should look for core features that make safety management more structured, consistent, and efficient.
These often include:
- Centralised document management – A single place to store policies, procedures, and safety documentation, with clear version control so people always access the latest information.
- Risk assessments – Tools for creating, assigning, distributing, and tracking risk assessments across sites and teams.
- Safe systems of work – Digital method statements, SOPs, and RAMS that are easy to create, share, and update.
- Audits and inspections – The ability to schedule and complete inspections on site, helping identify issues before they escalate.
- Incident reporting and investigation – Mobile-friendly reporting for observations, near misses, and incidents, supported by structured investigations and root cause analysis.
- Dashboards and reporting – Real-time visibility of safety performance, trends, and emerging risks across the business.
- Action management – Assigning, tracking, and closing out corrective and preventive actions, with clear accountability.
Together, these features form the backbone of a system that genuinely supports safer work.
Features that can make a real day-to-day difference
Beyond the basics, some features can dramatically improve usability and adoption.
For example:
- Offline functionality – Essential if your teams work in environments with limited connectivity, such as tunnels, remote sites, or offshore locations.
- Multilingual support – Particularly important for organisations with diverse workforces, helping ensure everyone understands and engages with safety processes.
- Customisation and flexibility – Consider whether an off-the-shelf solution will work, or whether you need tailored workflows, incident types, or reporting structures to reflect how your organisation actually operates.
Nice-to-haves that may become valuable over time
Some features might not need to be prioritised immediately but could become important as your safety maturity grows.
These may include:
- Asset management for tracking vehicles, plant, and equipment
- Competency management for managing safety training and certifications
- Control to work systems for issuing and managing permits for high-risk activities
These can often be added later, depending on your needs and the flexibility of the platform.
Considering emerging technologies like AI
It’s also worth thinking about how newer technologies could support your organisation now or in the future.
AI is already transforming health and safety software. Imagine being able to generate reports, summaries or safety briefings at the click of a button – or automatically uncover patterns in incident data that would otherwise go unnoticed.
AI can significantly reduce manual effort, improve visibility across large datasets, and help safety teams focus on prevention rather than administration. Many providers are now incorporating AI into their platforms, making it an important consideration when building your wish list.
Choosing the right platform approach
Your wish list should also consider how the software is delivered.
Do you want:
- A single all-in-one platform that covers everything in one place?
- Or a best-of-breed approach, using separate specialist tools for different functions?
While specialist tools can be powerful, they often don’t integrate well, which can make data analysis more complex, time-consuming and costly. For many organisations, a unified platform provides better visibility and long-term value.
Build your wish list collaboratively
Finally, and critically, don’t build your wish list in isolation.
Engage stakeholders early to ensure the solution works for the whole organisation and to reduce resistance to change later on.
You should involve:
- Frontline workers, who report incidents and observations
- Site or branch managers, overseeing daily operations
- Regional or divisional managers, comparing performance across sites
- Health and safety teams, analysing data and driving improvement
- Executives, who shape policy and investment decisions
The earlier you involve people – especially those who may be resistant to change – the more successful your implementation will be.
If you’re thinking about moving from paper and spreadsheets to a more efficient digital approach to safety, but don’t know where to begin, we’ve created a short digital course made up of simple, bite-sized lessons to guide you through it.
Final thoughts
Creating a wish list of features for your ideal health and safety software is about clarity, not complexity.
By grounding your requirements in the Plan–Do–Check–Act framework, you ensure that every feature you prioritise supports real-world safety outcomes – from identifying risks to driving continuous improvement. Focusing on core functionality first gives you a strong foundation, while considering usability, flexibility and emerging technologies helps future-proof your decision.
Equally important is how you build that wish list. Involving stakeholders early, especially frontline workers and operational managers, ensures the solution works in practice, not just on paper. It also increases buy-in, improves adoption, and reduces resistance to change.
The right software won’t just help you manage health and safety more efficiently. It will give you better visibility, stronger accountability, and the insight you need to prevent incidents before they happen.
The insight from this article comes straight from Lesson 4 of our digital course. Want more practical guidance? Get started.