0 Introduction

0.1 General

The adoption of a social management system (SMS) is a strategic decision of an organization that can help improve its overall social performance and provide a sound basis for social development initiatives.

The overriding objective of an SMS is to ensure there are clear roles and responsibilities to promote internal planning, implementation, monitoring, evaluation and learning, and to ensure ongoing progress towards achieving deﬁned social performance.

The potential beneﬁts for an organization implementing an SMS in accordance with this document are the abilities to:

a) consistently provide products and services that meet speciﬁed minimum social requirements and applicable customer and regulatory requirements;
b) address risks and opportunities linked to its context and objectives;
c) facilitate continuous improvement on the social performance of the organization; and
d) demonstrate conformity to speciﬁed social management system requirements.

This document employs the process approach, the Plan-Do-Check-Act (PDCA) cycle and risk-based thinking. The process approach enables an organization to plan its processes and their interactions so that roles are deﬁned, and responsibilities understood across the organization. The PDCA cycle enables an organization to ensure that its processes are adequately resourced and managed, and that opportunities for improvements are identiﬁed and acted upon.

Risk-based thinking enables an organization to determine the factors that could cause its processes and its social management system to deviate from the planned results, to put in place preventive controls, to minimize negative effects and to make maximum use of opportunities as they arise. Consistently meeting requirements and addressing future needs and expectations poses a challenge for organizations in an increasingly dynamic and complex environment. To achieve this objective, the organization might ﬁnd it necessary to implement speciﬁc improvement measures in addition to correction, corrective action and continual improvement, innovation and reorganization.

This document has been prepared using the harmonized structure (i.e. identical clause numbers, clause titles, text and common terms and core deﬁnitions) intended to enhance alignment amongst management system standards and to facilitate their implementation for organizations that need to meet the requirements of two or more of these standards.

0.2 Social management principles

An SMS is a framework of policies, processes and procedures used by an organization to ensure that it can fulﬁl all tasks required to achieve its social objectives. Social objectives need to ensure that workers are treated fairly and are provided with a safe working environment that is not detrimental to their health and is in compliance with relevant statutory and regulatory requirements.

Minimum requirements are deﬁned to ensure a base level of social performance covering labour relationships, human rights, health and safety and work and business ethics. A recommendation is included for the organization to develop a plan to provide at least a living wage for the workers in relation to the compensation of standard working hours if the living wage is higher than the minimum wage set by local legislation. The organization may decide to include additional elements.

NOTE Complete requirements for an occupational health and safety management system are speciﬁed in ISO 45001.

0.3 Success factors

The implementation and maintenance of an SMS, its effectiveness and its ability to achieve its intended outcomes are dependent on a number of key factors, which can include:

a) top management leadership, commitment, responsibilities and accountability;
b) top management developing, leading and promoting a culture in the organization that supports the intended outcomes of the SMS;
c) interactive communication;
d) consultation with and participation of workers and, where they exist, workers’ representatives;
e) allocation of the necessary resources to maintain the social management system;
f) social policies which are compatible with the overall strategic objectives and direction of the organization;
g) social objectives that align with the social policy and take into account the organization’s hazards, risks and opportunities;
h) continual performance evaluation and monitoring of the SMS to improve social performance; and
i) integration of the SMS into the organization’s business processes.

0.4 Process approach

The PDCA cycle is an iterative process used by organizations to achieve continual improvement. It can be applied to a management system and to each of its individual elements, as follows:

a) Plan: determine and assess social risks and social opportunities, and establish social objectives and processes necessary to deliver results in accordance with the organization’s social policy;
b) Do: implement the processes as planned;
c) Check: monitor and measure processes with regard to the social policy, including the organization’s commitments and social objectives, and report the results; and
d) Act: take actions to correct deviations from expected output and continually improve the social performance to achieve the intended outcomes.

This document incorporates the PDCA cycle into a framework, as shown in Figure 1.

Figure 1 — PDCA cycle

PAS 24000:2022

Social management system. Specification

Current

Published:

30 Sep 2022