As many business uses are learning to apply iPad's groundbreaking technology, use of the device "in the field" may represent one of the largest areas to benefit. Its portability, incredible power and usability are being tested in environmental, health and safety (EHS) auditing use by The Elm Consulting Group International, LLC.

"We use Apple technology as our company platform, so it only makes sense for us," said Lawrence Heim of Elm's Georgia operations. "In the 25 years each of us partners have been in the EHS field, there has never been anything that has the potential to be such a true game-changer. Our field trials are using apps already available for note taking, dictation, capturing handwriting and audio notes, importing and notating scanned documents. This allows us to integrate all of our notes into a single electronic file with bookmarks for immediate access to specifically needed sections. We thinkg this will improve efficiency in report writing and reduce the possibility of errors and omissions as well."

More can be read here:

Elm Trials iPad and Apps for Use in EHS Audits and Risk Assessments Your EHS Connection

We are going to see so much more of this as people come to recognise the iPad's great strengths, portability and instant on.
Shame there are so few details on that site though. Would like to know what apps they are using.

As you might suspect, we view this as a competitive advantage right now, so we don't want to give up too much information right now. However, since we are very experienced auditors, we don't rely on checklists, so our app trials don't support checklist-style frameworks. Commercial audit software companies will be coming out with those soon enough, but even the iPad's power cannot overcome the bulkiness and inherent inefficiencies of those.

So, if you are familiar with auditing processes and know about available iPad apps that have the functionality mentioned in our blog, you could probably figure out the general types of apps we are using.

Very interesting.

I wonder if Elm really are the first? i know CMO COMPLIANCE have a great audit software app that works on iphones and ipads - it supports both the open sheet approach to auditing and the checklist/protocol based approach from what i have heard. It sounds pretty impressive - this page has a few more details but they dont give away too much: CMO COMPLIANCE™ – iPad / iPhone Audit & Compliance Software

The CMO product covers financial auditing and general corporate governance, again mainly around financial matters. As we stated, our protocols apply specifically to environmental compliance - a topic that is far different from financial risk. Environmental matters may be touched upon in governance structures and audits, but not in enough detail to be useful in assisting with management of operational environmental compliance with laws, regulations and applicable site-specific permits. In that regard, I am confident we were the first.

Interestingly enough, we have been contacted by app developers to provide technical subject matter support as they seek to develop their offierings.

Also -as a point of disclosure - I made no attempt to hide my association with Elm. Although your profile shows your email address as "@cmoglobal.com" you tried to make it look like you are not associated with your own company. Nice shillin'...

interesting, wonderful

Hi, Audits are usually performed using a standardized checklist. A health and safety audit may have very specific objectives such as reducing the number of injuries or it may be a compliance audit. Hazards can be anything which has the potential to cause potential harm, injury or death.

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Safety Systems

Interesting and wonderful indeed! I do not have a CMO email address... and i believe that the CMO COMPLIANCE Management Software system also supports Health Safety and Environmental (HSE) and Quality audits on ipads and iphones as well as PDAs and tablet PCs as per the link from this post. Or indeed any audit checklist as per the post above.

Hi,

Good ideal, pls try to keep posting. I like this topic very much and I will digged this one. Tks again.

I work for a huge corporation that is international as well as domestic. We have started to get into more technology and find ways to make safety audits easier. I see that Elm has found some of these apps, what are they? Which apps have work best for you? I see that your international as well. Do you have any problems outside the U.S. with these apps?

Any ideas or apps that are usefull please message me!

Thank you.