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How to build safety culture



Introduction

"Culture is not what we inherit, but what we build." - Ralph Ellison

In my last article on the foundations of safety culture, I included a lot of theory on safety culture. In this article, I want to present how to build a safety culture in practice. Many of the things I will write about are probably obvious, but I feel that sometimes they just need to be articulated.

I would like to mention at the outset that I strongly believe that safety culture is the final link, alongside technology (our hardware) and systems (our software), to achieving a truly world-class level in safety management and accident reduction.

Developing a safety culture helps our user (employee) use hardware and software more safely.

However, we must remember that these three elements are interconnected and without investment in hardware and software we will not achieve a high level of security culture maturity.

Elements of safety culture:

Having studied many safety culture models contained in various publications and having practiced occupational health and safety for many years, I have identified several components that are repeated and whose development, in my opinion, has the greatest impact on building a safety culture.

Some of them require a lot of time, some are so-called quick wins. Here is the list :

  • Value
  • Organizational Science
  • Communication
  • Engagement employees
  • Competencies
  • Leadership

Building Steps culture safety :

Here we follow one of the standard approaches to change management, so I will not elaborate on some points.

1. Assessment of the current situation

The goal is to establish a baseline of our safety culture and identify areas that require improvement. As a baseline, you can use one of the safety culture maturity models that I wrote about in my previous article.

Examining safety culture requires analyzing policies, OHS strategies, goals, accident data, conducting employee surveys, interviews, and focus groups. It is best to use external consultants who have experience in analyzing safety culture and will approach the subject independently.

We can also measure the safety climate, which is usually done by conducting an employee survey and an honest conversation with several people from different levels of the organization. Sometimes measuring the climate alone can give us a lot of information about where we are and what we should focus on. I have created such surveys successfully on my own, without involving external consultants, based on the literature on the subject and what I wanted to confirm or refute based on my own observations.

2. Defining goals

Based on the results of the assessment of the current situation, we should determine what we want to achieve. The goals should be clear, specific, measurable, achievable, realistic and with specific deadlines.

For example, we want to move from safety culture level 1 to level 3 (depending on the maturity model I wrote about) within 2 years.

3. Developing a plan

The next step is to develop a plan that will allow us to achieve the above goals. Here, support from top management is necessary, because our plan will absorb some resources and require changes at all levels of the organization.

4. Implementation of the plan

To implement the plan, people responsible for individual activities are required.

5. Monitoring and evaluation

Progress against the plan should be regularly monitored and evaluated, and appropriate adjustments should be made.

Building a culture of safety

Values

Value, or, in simple terms, what is important to the organization. It could be the customer, philanthropy, quality, etc. It could also be safety and health.

In simple terms, values influence attitudes, and attitudes influence behavior. Strong safety values promote shared responsibility, which creates self-regulation, i.e. employees look out for each other. Shared values are the foundation on which a strong safety culture is built, creating a cohesive environment in which employees prioritize health and safety.

Practical advice :

  • Incorporate the words safety and health into your organizational values if you have them written down and communicated to your stakeholders. Show formally , that health and safety is one of those values .
  • Repeat often that OHS is important. This creates a positive narrative around safety. As bad as it may sound, use the ideas of marketing in OHS. Just a small note from me. I avoid statements like "safety as a priority", because priorities change. Additionally, for organizations that are not non-profit, the most important thing is the financial result. It is often not their fault, because they are under enormous pressure from investors to achieve financial results. Saying that OHS is a priority and then proving in practice that it is not, e.g. by limiting resources for OHS, will be very cynical in the eyes of employees.
  • Create a clear set of desired employee behaviors within OHS. This is showing them how you want them to manifest OHS as a value in the organization.
  • Create cultural artifacts. In this context, these refer to visible elements of an organization’s culture that reflect an approach to safety. These can include visible symbols such as safety boards, posted policies, health and safety posters, signage, etc.

Organizational Science

Organizational learning is important for building a safety culture because it helps understand how the structures and processes in an organization affect safety. Just look at aviation or the nuclear industry, the so-called High Reliability Organizations, where high reliability results, among other things, from effective organizational learning. 

Practical advice:

  • Establish a Just Culture. Employees must feel comfortable reporting safety issues. 
  • Investigate incidents with an eye to understanding the human factors that contributed to errors or risky behaviors, because investigating human factors can help uncover deep systemic problems;
  • Learn from regular work - introduce the concept of learning teams or observations. 

Communication

Communication plays a key role in building a safety culture, enabling two-way communication between management and employees about risks, ideas and safety rules. Effective communication increases employee awareness, strengthens commitment to compliance and minimizes potential threats. Jointly developed communication also allows for quick response to emergency situations and creates an atmosphere in which employees feel comfortable to report potential threats, near misses and their ideas.

Practical advice :

  • Ensure you have an effectively implemented system for reporting threats, incidents and issues;
  • When creating campaigns, make sure you understand the purpose of each one and what you want to achieve with it. Information overload will trivialize security. Focus on the right risks. Campaigns about risks that employees don't recognize will not achieve the intended goals and are a waste of time;
  • Leave everyday risks alone. Taking away knives, or introducing signs that water is hot, or health and safety instructions on how to use a kettle, trivializes health and safety, alienates people, and introduces cynicism;
  • Integrate a safety moment into meetings at all organizational levels. Although it may seem artificial at first, over time it activates truly constructive safety conversations. A safety moment shows Too the importance of health and safety for organization ;
  • Approach so-called reactive communication unemotionally. If you see employees not following the rules or engaging in risky behavior, do not shout or discipline employees. Give employees constructive feedback and try to understand what caused such behavior;
  • Conduct regular Toolbox Talks with employees to review the rules and discuss risks. Remember that the topics of these conversations should be relevant to what the employees are doing. A Toolbox Talk about shoveling snow off roofs in the middle of summer is pointless (unfortunately, a true case).

Employee engagement

Build a safety partnership. Employee engagement is key to building a safety culture because employees who are engaged are more likely to follow safety practices. This creates a greater level of ownership, which promotes accountability and collaboration.

Practical advice :

  • Engage employees in risk assessments or work permits. Their knowledge is invaluable in calibrating theory with operational reality;
  • Engage employees in creating new processes. What is better - a perfect process that no one follows, or a solid operational process that is followed by most because employees have had the opportunity to express how it should look. Don't be afraid to give some central control to employees. It is a paradox that those who have to deal directly with threats sometimes have the least say in how they should do it;
  • Use your employees to solve problems. The wisdom of crowds is a really powerful tool. Ask especially those who speak the least because they tend to have the most useful insights;
  • Build psychological safety among employees so they are not afraid to report and get involved. This is a fairly broad topic, about which I want to write a separate article.

Competencies

Building competences is important for a safety culture, because employees who are well-equipped with knowledge and skills are more aware of potential threats and better prepared to cope with a dynamic work environment and situations for which we do not have procedures, instructions or rules. Such employees recognize when to stop working. An increase in competences also translates into increased responsibility.

Practical advice :

  • Create training programs based on the organization’s risk profile, because these are the competencies that employees will need most often;
  • The more practical training, the more employee involvement in this training and its impact on the development of their competences;
  • Train managers in the basics of safety culture and the practical elements of building it, because they will be able to implement many of the concepts themselves at the operational level.

Leadership

If I had to pick one element that has the greatest impact on building a safety culture, it would be leadership. It plays a key role in building a safety culture by setting standards, promoting accountability, and inspiring compliance. Leaders are role models, which increases employee engagement in safety practices, positively influencing the atmosphere and effectiveness of safety activities. What is important to the leader becomes important to the team.

Practical advice :

  • Make strategic decisions with health and safety in mind;
  • Never compromise on safety. You will create precedents that employees will use;
  • Provide the hardware and software resources I mentioned earlier, including tools, equipment, personal protective equipment, etc.
  • Implement a formal management system that helps identify and control security risks. Security procedures should be clear, understandable, easy to follow, and have a specific purpose. Procedures they have to to have real influence on safety ;
  • Make sure you have clearly expressed and communicated the roles and responsibilities for OSH within the organisation, ideally with practical examples. Everyone in the organisation should know what the organisation expects of them;
  • Be visible and active. You can't manage and influence health and safety from behind a desk. Talk to employees about safety regularly, understand where problems occur and what employees' ideas are for improving safety;
  • It goes without saying, but follow the rules, always and uncompromisingly wear the required personal protective equipment;
  • Avoid bureaucracy in OHS. For me, the most harmful symptom of bureaucracy is when the measure of success becomes adherence to the process, not the purpose of the process. This happens when we chase numbers, not quality, e.g. the number of reported observations or threats;
  • Measure OSH using lagging and leading indicators, but be careful with OSH targets. Targets like “0 accidents” will drive accidents underground and you will lose the opportunity for organizational learning because people will deliver the required 0 but will also beat the system. Specific targets for reporting hazards and near misses will deliver quantity but not quality;
  • Reinforce positive behaviors, don’t be afraid to praise people for consistent and desirable behaviors;
  • Reduce the authority gradient, be available and make employees feel that they can come to you with any problem;
  • Give employees the authority to stop unsafe work. Let employees feel they can stop their work, their colleagues, and their subcontractors if they believe it is unsafe, without any consequences.

Summary:

Safety culture is not just a theory, but a practical approach to building a work environment where health and safety are very important. Ralph Ellison rightly noted that culture is not only what we inherit, but what we actively create. Implementing elements of safety culture, such as values, organizational learning, communication, employee engagement, competence and leadership, is a key step towards a safe future for the organization.

Remember that the steps to building a safety culture are not a one-time task, but an ongoing process of monitoring, evaluation, and improvement. The values we adopt affect attitudes, and attitudes shape behaviors. That is why it is important to fully engage employees, recognizing their role as partners in safety.

To quote Ellison once again, safety culture is not only a legacy, but also our active construction. So let a practical approach to building a safe culture become an inseparable element of the organization's life, creating conditions for healthy development and lasting success.

Bibliography

 

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