Safety Culture in OSH Management: Target Level
The ILO theme for World Day for Safety & Health at Work 2022 is:
‘’Act together to build a posi tive safety and health culture.’’
With a sub-theme of focus on enhancing social dialogue towards a culture of Safety & Health.
As such my talk will focus on safety culture and how it has been applied in the OSH Management.
What is Safety Culture:
Definition of this term has come from public enquiries investigating serious accidents or disasters and from research bodies. These definitions cite poor management controls as key factor leading directly to these serious accidents or disasters.
In the nuclear reactor disaster at Chernobyl in 1986, lack of a safety culture is said to have played a major part. The enquiry found that the team in control of the reactor, removed layer after layer of the safety controls to complete an unusual test quickly. Because of this, the reactor become unstable resulting in the disaster.
The enquiry concluded that for the control team to be able to do what it did, the managerial culture at the reactor did not discourage taking of risks where other priorities intervened.
Therefore, effective OSH management require development of a positive safety culture based on proactive management of safety issues. Proactive here referring to the values, attitudes, perceptions, competencies and behaviors that acknowledge existence of workplaces hazards and consistent application of control measures.
What is safety & health concerned with:
This brings us to ask ourselves what safety & health is concerned with.
Safety and health is concerned with four things.
1. Hazards.
2. Incidents & accidents
3. Harm – injuries and ill-health.
4. Risk
Most of you may know how the four are related.
Incidents & accidents are caused by hazards. Harm is the result of accidents.
While the likelihood of incidents/accidents occurring and causing harm is risk.
Where do we expect to find these hazards?
Hazards are found in all places where human activities are taking place. These include workplaces, homes, public places and social places.
What then causes accidents?
The answer to that simple question determines our attitude, response and behavior towards hazards within our environment.
The responses will differ from one person to another, one workplace to another, one organization to another. These differing responses is what makes the Safety Culture.
There are those who believe accidents have no causes. They just happen and there is nothing we can do about it. It is the will of God. It is some kind of witch craft.
Organizations, workplaces and individuals that recognize the existence of hazards within their workplaces and believe that accidents are caused by hazards, will seek to systematically identify them and ensure they remain under control to prevent them causing harm to people(Risk Assessment).
It therefore means that a positive safety culture begins with the believe that accidents that cause harm to people are themselves caused by hazards. What then are Safety Culture Maturity Models?
There are various safety culture maturity models in use currently in OSH management.
These safety culture maturity models provide organizations with means of knowing where they are in terms of safety management and thereby be able to start their performance improvement journey.
The most used performance measurement in safety is injury rates. These are basically ratios of number of injuries in a workplace over the total number of employees multiplied by a factor, mostly 200,000. Organization with high injury rates are believed to have a very poor safety culture. In these organizations, a management system that identifies and controls hazards is not in place.
Types of Safety Culture Maturity Models:
Programs that form the safety management systems are now well established.
The adoption and how effectively they have been implemented by an
organization, determine its safety culture level.
Therefore, all safety culture maturity models measure which programmes are in place and how effective they are.
We will briefly look at three of these models and one of them in slightly more details. The three models are: –
1. HSE safety culture maturity model
2. OGP HSE Culture Tools
3. DuPont Bradley Curve.
1. HSE Safety Culture Maturity Model
Organizations progress sequentially through 5 levels.
i) Level 1: Emerging
Many accidents are seen as unavoidable and as part of the job.
ii) Level 2: Managing
Safety is solely defined in terms of adherence to rules and procedures
and engineering controls. Accidents are seen as preventable.
iii) Level 3: Involving
The organization is convinced that the involvement of the frontline
employees in health and safety is critical. The majority of staff accept
personal responsibility for their own health and safety.
iv) Level 4: Cooperating
Frontline staff accept personal responsibility for their own and others
health and safety.
v) Level 5: Continuous Improvement
All employees share the belief that health and safety is a critical
aspect of their job and accept that prevention of non-work injuries is
important.
2. OGP HSE Culture Tools
The HSE Culture ladder describe five levels of HSE culture
i) Pathological:
Respond to clear regulatory requirements, if enforced and
implement HSE programs only as needed to avoid prosecution.
Believe individuals at lower levels cause accidents.
ii) Reactive:
Address problems obvious to both management and the workforce.
iii) Calculative:
Believe in the value of systems in managing HSE performance and
the use of a large number of tools and training.
iv) Proactive:
HSE is a fundamental (Core) value and leaders at all levels genuinely
care for the health and well-being of the staff and contractors.
v) Generative:
Everyone feels free to highlight both real and potential issues. Workers
feel empowered to resolve HSE issues, and leaders provide the
support needed.
3. The Bradley Curve
The Bradley Curve was developed in 1994 by DuPont, a company recognized globally as having an exemplary record in safety.
Based on the believe that an organization’s safety performance can be
improved to Approach Zero Incidents.
Organizations progress is in two phases: Traditional and Improvement Phase.
During traditional phase, there are no controls and performance is random.
Achieving zero is impossible.
The Improvement Phase is also divided into two levels.
• Implementation & Maintenance of critical Technical Control Processes.
o Individuals and team’s performance should never sacrifice them.
• EHS Culture Improvement Process (Bradley Curve).
o Driving towards Zero Incidents.
EHS Culture Improvement Process (Bradley Curve)
Organization progress in three stages:
i) Stage 1: Dependent Phase
• Supervisor Driven
o Management Commitment
o Condition of Employment
o Rules
o Compliance is focus
o Fear/Discipline
• Zero is Unrealistic
ii) Stage 2: Independent Phase
• Self-interest driven
o Personal Commitment
o Self-Managing
o Self-Discipline
o Self-Responsibility
o Personal Goals
• Zero by Chance
iii) Stage 3: Interdependent Phase
• Team driven
o EH&S is a Value
o Team Commitment
o Help Others Conform
o Concern for all
o Team Goals
• Zero by Choice
Characteristics of each phase:
Dependent:
•Safety Meetings run by Management
• Mandatory Compliance Safety Training
• Management Driven Incident Investigations
• Site and Unit Focus on Rules and Procedures
• Compliance Inspections and Audits
• Fear of Discipline is the Motivator
• Management Defined Goals and Reviews
Independent:
• Employees Facilitate Safety Meetings
• Training on Best Practices
• Employees in Incident Investigations
• Behavior Based Safety Programs
• Employees Complete Area Self-Inspections
• Reward and Recognition Programs
• EH&S Component in All Goals and Reviews
Interdependent:
• Teams Run Safety Meeting Process
• Teams Define Training Required
• Teams Lead Investigations
• Team Defines and Runs BBS Programs
• Teams Define and Complete Inspections
• Team Reward and Recognition Focus
• Teams Define EH&S Goals, 360° Feedback
Conclusion:
Most organization target their safety culture to be at least at the mid-point maturity models. At this level, safety standards have been established and enforced while all workers understand the importance of safety rules and procedures and follow them voluntarily.
