The pre-task plan is where the crew thinks the work through before touching it: what are the steps, what can hurt us at each one, and what are we doing about it. This one-page PTP/JHA breaks the task into steps with hazards and controls, then locks it in with crew sign-off.
Or skip the spreadsheet
Gradelog keeps PTPs, toolbox talks, and observations in one searchable place — with your real crew roster, not a signature page that lives in a truck.
They are near-synonyms with different scopes in practice: a JHA/JSA (job hazard/safety analysis) is often a formal, reusable analysis of a job type, while a pre-task plan is the daily, task- and site-specific version the crew completes each shift. The structure is identical — steps, hazards, controls — and this template serves all three uses.
Many GCs and owners contractually require a PTP for every crew every shift, and OSHA’s general duty and training requirements are commonly satisfied in part through documented hazard analysis. Regardless of mandate, the tasks that hurt people — trenching, hot work, critical lifts, energized work — should never start without one.
The foreman leads it, but the crew builds it together at the work area. The operators and laborers doing the task know hazards the foreman can’t see from the truck. Participation is also what makes the plan stick — a form filled out solo and passed around for signatures is compliance theater.
Stop and revise the plan. A changed condition — different depth, new utility exposed, weather, added equipment — means the hazard analysis no longer matches the work. Amend the steps and controls, brief the crew, and have them initial the change. Most serious incidents happen during undocumented mid-shift task changes.