In the summer of 1979 I started my first
job as ‘muck man’ on a building site,
mixing and shovelling cement, chucking
bricks to precariously balanced ‘brickies’
hanging over scaffolding bars, shifting
pallets of breeze blocks on tippers with
no brakes, and yup, not a sniff of Health
and Safety! Just the sun on your back and
the occasional cut or bruise, and plenty of
banter. But nothing that didn’t toughen up
a young lad just out of school. That was
life. No safety equipment, no harnesses,
no fencing or guarding. Just a dodgy
rope-operated external platform lifting
the barrow of ‘muck’ to where it was
needed, open scaffolding and a series of
untethered ladders and boards that were
old, splintered and not fit for purpose.
The list could go on…
Fast forward almost half a century, to
2020 and what’s changed? Rules and
regulations, safety awareness, PPE,
systems, processes and procedures,
paperwork, toolbox talks, training,
signage, qualifications, published
company values, health and safety
standards and shared learning. All good
stuff with lots of admin and box ticking!
Evolution of a sort.
But we still have injuries, some serious,
and unfortunately for others, fatal. The
numbers may have altered, we talk about
Leading & Lagging, safety performance,
statistics and Lost Time Indicators, but
lives are still being affected, changed,
and sometimes lost forever.
All of us will have had the experience
in our business of near misses and
minor injuries such as sprains, cuts and
abrasions, with maybe, at worst, only a
short-term impact. Some of you may have
witnessed more serious injuries such as
broken or lost limbs, loss of sight and the
like, temporary or sometimes permanent,
that have had a more significant short
or long term effect on the quality of the
lives of those who have suffered. And
sadly, some of you will have experienced
a fatality, the ultimate sacrifice for an
unsafe environment? All of these events
of course cost our business in lost time,
productivity, performance, reputation
etc. But they also affect the lives of our
workforce, and, the people who are close
to them, their families, not to forget their
colleagues.
But for most of us these more serious
incidents are still just numbers, a statistic,
something that happens to someone
else, not our problem, and doesn’t affect
us or our business. This is because there
is no personal, emotional connection.
Until of course, it happens on our watch,
when an incident is close to us, affects us
personally, someone we know, one of our
employees. Then it can change our life
for ever.
So what will it take for us all to be active
and vocal champions and leaders of
safety in our places of work? What is still
going wrong? What is still not happening?
Yes, we are generally doing safety better,
with systems, near miss reporting, safety
conversations and safety moments to
name but a few, but accidents are still
happening.
The general accepted safety statistics
used to indicate that for every 2 million
unsafe acts, there will be 240,000 near
misses, 20,000 minor injuries, 400 loss
time injuries, and 1 fatality.
The HUMAN Factor
So according to the figures the chance of a
serious incident or fatality is relatively small.
This encourages and promotes a culture of
complacency where out of sight is out of mind.
But it is also generally accepted that 90%,
arguably 100%, of these accidents and near
misses (which are categorised as accidents
waiting to happen) are as a result of human
behaviour and therefore preventable. That is
positive news.
But how we effect the change in attitudes
and behaviour to safety is the challenge, and
the key to saving lives, preventing injuries
and improving our business performance. But
whatever the stats, the empirical evidence,
actual incidences, still stand. Accidents are
happening, people’s lives are being affected.
And one day it might be ours.
So, do we leave it to chance, the roll of a dice,
gambling with safety, our businesses, with
people’s lives, hoping it’s not going to happen
to us? That’s an option and we may get lucky.
But statistics are exactly what they are, based
on numbers and averages. It may never happen
to us, or we could be really unlucky and have
three fatalities in a short space of time. If we
ignore safety, or at best, pay lip service to it, we
are playing with people’s lives, the people we
employ, who work for us, let alone the statutory,
corporate and morale responsibilities we are
accountable for.
“ Lives matter. So what
still needs to change?
The answer is, we do! Our
mindsets, our behaviours
and our attitudes to safety.
So, whose responsibility
is safety? Technically it is
everybody’s. Everybody
should be empowered to
be leaders of safety. But
that will depend on the
emphasis we place on safety
and willingness we have
to pass the ownership for
safety to our workforce by
making safety personal.
Understanding our leadership
role in this is critical. ”
FEATURE BEHAVIOURAL SAFETY
Heinrich’s Triangle Theory
Take the right path and the benefits are not just
lives but improved performance, productivity,
retention, customer satisfaction, employee
morale, motivation, and more. Take the wrong
path and nothing changes at best, and the
chances of accidents, potentially serious and
life changing, still more likely.
Bearing in mind Demolition is one the high-risk
industries in terms of working environment, how
do we make this work? How do we effectively
combine business performance with safety? In
other words, how do we get our people to buy
into safety at work in an inherently high risk and
potentially dangerous environment? Something
clearly needs to change.
My father used to say to me; “Life’s no joke,
and death’s a serious matter!” He was a
comedian, of sorts! I’m not and no after dinner
speaker either – but maybe that unintended
message had an impact. I have developed a
passion for safety, because of the sad and often
horrific stories I have been told. All avoidable.
And yet sometimes caused by apparent wilful
neglect, ignorance or on occasions just a lack
of clear and definite leadership. But that is
not to understand the psychology of human
behaviour, our pre-programmed instincts if you
like. What makes us do what we do, respond
the way we do, in what sometimes appears to
be ways that are irrational, illogical and lacking
in any common sense.
Well, safety responses are primarily driven
by our reward system. In other words, our
response to risk is driven by our more dominant
emotional reactions, rather than the smaller
rational and logical part of our brain. Immediate
gratification or satisfaction overrides our
common sense and we end up breaking
rules, making bad decisions, and each time
we get away with it, it justifies our actions and
reinforces the message that it won’t happen to
me! But therein lies the opportunity.
The reality is we all take risks in our everyday
lives; when travelling to work, going about our
daily tasks at home, our DIY projects small or
large, or taking shortcuts to get the job done at
work, and sometimes unaware of the risks we
are taking, and either not considering, or just
ignoring the potential serious consequences of
our actions.
“But at work we have
responsibilities, and with
those come a conundrum,
The Safety Leadership
Challenge, how to get
our people to take care of
themselves by making safety
a priority! The weakness in
any proposition is usually
confusing, ambiguous or
contradicting messages from
the business and a lack of
consistency and leadership.
Whatever it is, it takes senior
management to make the
decision to put safety first,
at the top of the agenda,
make it a priority. Not at the
expense of performance, but
alongside performance as
though they are one, safe
performance, safe production,
safe operations. And its only
our mindsets and attitudes
that will be a barrier to
success.”
“To make safety work, we have
to make safety personal, care about
our people, because there is a direct
relationship between people and
performance; People = Performance.
Get the people right and the
performance comes. So investing in
safety is investing in our business
because people make our business.
If you ever catch yourself thinking; “it’s
not going to happen to me”, that’s the
time to STOP! THINK! What if? How
would it effect my life and the lives of
the people who matter most to me!?
And then, take the lead and make the
change.”
As leaders we are the difference that makes
the difference. We create the culture and
environment that affects and drives the
behaviours of our people. Like it or not, their
actions and behaviours are a mirror of our
leadership approach.