Maintenance-related factors account for 27% of serious safety incidents. It’s time to act

In heavy industry, safety is everyone’s business, but right now, it’s not everyone’s practice.

New data from Mainstream’s 2025 State of Asset Management report reveals that 27% of serious workplace incidents within heavy industries such as mining, involve maintenance-related contributing factors. Despite this clear link, only 28% of organisations have achieved substantial integration between their safety and asset management functions.

This disconnect means that the very teams responsible for keeping equipment running - the field technicians, supervisors, and maintenance planners, are often flying blind when it comes to safety. Not because they’re careless, but because the systems meant to keep them safe don’t communicate.

The right information isn’t reaching the right people, at the right time.

Safety should never be separated from the work

Too often, safety is treated as an add-on: a separate checklist, form, or system. In reality, safety isn’t a parallel process, it’s part of how the work gets done.

In high-risk environments, incidents rarely happen because of poor decisions. They happen when highly-experienced people go on autopilot. When routines replace reflection. When frontline teams are so focused on “getting the job done” that they miss the risk right in front of them.

That’s why studies show that simply taking five minutes to stop and consider the task at hand can reduce workplace safety incidents by 70–80%.

Integrating safety and maintenance through technology and automation

By incorporating safety practices into the day-to-day digitally it is easier for frontline teams to improve their safety as well as their risk compliance.

With Obzervr, Take 5s, SLAMs, and pre-starts are completed directly on the Frontline Capture App as a mandatory first step in the work execution process. By completing these digitally at the start of the work, these safety checks are contextually linked to equipment, location, job, and crew.

That data doesn’t disappear into a paper form or a disconnected database. It’s instantly available across your organisation.

Safety data is then accessible in near real-time on Obzervr Safety Analytics Dashboards, allowing you to go beyond just compliance by giving you clarity on what’s actually happening on the ground. Insights include:

• Safety KPIs and trends to see how your near misses and compliance measures are tracking over time.
• Pre-start and Take 5 results to identify when and where safety flags are being raised.
• Incident and hazard reports with real-time alerts, tracking, and escalation.
• Crew, shift, and resource data to drill down by person, team, or asset to understand where risks are emerging and why.

Closing the gap between maintenance and safety

Mainstream’s report highlights the urgency: less than a third of asset-intensive organisations have linked safety and asset management in a meaningful way.

Disconnected systems lead to delays, double-handling, and dangerous blind spots. A pre-start hazard flagged on paper may never make it to the team that can fix it. A near miss logged in one system may never trigger an investigation in another.

Obzervr changes that.

‍When safety and maintenance systems and processes work together as one, you gain:

• Real-time visibility across teams, jobs, and shifts
• Proactive risk mitigation through early trend detection
• Streamlined compliance without paperwork or manual handoffs
• Empowered frontline teams who can act with confidence

Helping maintenance teams work safer, smarter and more efficiently

Obzervr's Digital Work Management Solution is a leading end-to-end fieldwork automation and mobility solution for asset-intensive industries. A web-based platform and mobile app, Obzervr helps transform paper-based processes into digital work execution - ensuring maintenance teams have the right information at the right time to work safer, smarter and more efficiently.

Obzervr has been built with frontline maintenance teams in mind and with the strong belief that safety and maintenance should work together, not in silos. By making safety actions fast, digital, and relevant, we drive change in the field, where it matters most.

Let’s talk about improving safety and reducing risk

SEE US AT:
Join us at the 2025 Mainstream Conference, 28-29 July 2025 in Melbourne, Australia - come and speak to our team on booth P2.

CONTACT US:
Book a 30min Discovery Session, or Contact our team to explore how Obzervr can help improve safety and drive culture change.