How might Leadership Affect Safety Management - Coursework Example

How might Leadership Affect Safety Management Introduction Most leaders understand very well that equipment and substances used in the workplace or industries should be safe and should not have any effect to human health or the surrounding environment. The leaders also need to understand that the employees are to be provided with a working environment that does not put their health in risk. For the above to be attained, the work safety and health law have been provided. The law is whereby the employer provides description, procedure, and training that will help in guiding the employees on how to safely handle and operate certain substances and machines. The employees are also to be provided with the supervisors who are to oversee if the machines and substances are being operated and handled correctly to avoid any dangers on the employees. Limitation of the danger can only be achieved by involving all the persons involved in decision making. That is; including all the stakeholders, management, supervisors and the people providing the workforce in decision making. To enable efficiency in handling and to reduce the risk in a working environment, the flow of communication is crucial. In the where accidents occur or if there is a substance that the employee does not understand well, the employee should find it easy to consult from the relevant authorities. Proper consultation will lead to efficiency in the flow of communication which is very important for growth of the firm. All the raised issues need a good Leadership in the modern organization is not easy, the leader has the mandate to lead and motivate people with a diversified culture and background. Furthermore, the leader needs to work across organization boundaries, improve organizational efficiency and bring growth to the organization. The leader faces some external factors that when not handled carefully can lead to the end of the organization. These external factors include the management of government requirements, meet expectation of other stakeholders and keep up with the competitors. With this globalized environment, leaders are also facing the challenge of many cultural considerations. The leader will have to work across various cultural boundaries. In fact, in many occasions they have to work hand to hand with some people with a totally different culture with a different way of ensuring the completion of the jobs. Cultural difference is the most difficult challenges that the leaders face and most of them are not always prepared to face them. Develop of such leaders is always very tricky as the cultural is very dynamic across various cultural boundaries. Three Key Elements for Addressing Organizational Challenges Effectively For most of the challenges facing organization to be addressed, there should be a clear vision and mission of the organization. This mission and vision describe what the organization is determined to achieve. For an organization to attain certain achievement and progress the leaders and the stakeholders must share a common view, and that is the vision and mission of the organization. This vision and mission are to guide all the stakeholders, managers, supervisors, and the laborers in the organization as all of them are working to achieve a common goal (KACHRU, 2005 p. 36). Secondly, for most of the organization challenges to be addressed, the organization needs to focus on the values instead of the methodology. Most of the organizations are known to articulate their methodology forgetting about their value. For example, a company may advertise itself as the best producer of a certain commodity. Forgetting that what is needed is to determine the effect of that commodity on the clients. Through the use of appropriate methodology, the organization only focuses on the quality and quantity of the commodity. The focus is determination on increasing the amount of the commodity in the market. The direction that the organization should follow is by giving the client a priority. The organization should be focusing on how to attract more clients to buying the commodity by understanding what value addition does the commodity add to the clients. This will build the confidence of the client in the commodity. Focusing on the value will result into creativity, greater opportunity and innovation in the organization (WILSON, 2005 p. 97). Thirdly, way of successfully addressing the organization challenges is by stating both vision and mission on the positive way. Most of the international leaders usually declare their vision and mission in the negative, for example, when the organization is focused in the eradicating problem. The main problem with this approach is that it does not provide what will happen after problem have been solved. When an organization has a vision or mission to eradicate hunger in the whole world, it is a good idea that that will be supported by most people. The problem is that it does not provide what will happen if the said hunger has been eradicated in the world. What the leaders need to know is what will happen after the mission and vision have been achieved. The world hunger project is non-profit organization which is determined to create a world where nobody goes hungry. Its vision statement states clearly how the world will look after the eradication of hunger. The families will be happy; children will be born strong and healthy, and manpower will increase (LEDLOW et al., 2014 p. 77). The challenges are facing organization varies from the simple ones which are easy to solve to the complex once which are hard to solve. Despite all these difficulties, having the right vision and mission that is stated on the positive side or focuses on the outcome makes addressing of such challenges very easy. Other challenges that affect leadership may also include: Inspiring Others Here the leaders need to look for a way of motivating the employees in order to get the best out of them. A well-motivated employee will lead to efficiency on production. Leading a Team Here the major challenge is building a team and its management. The leader should find a way on how he or she is to support the team, ho to lead a large team, and the measures to consider when taking over a new team. Managing Internal Stakeholders and Politics The leader is faced with the challenge of managing politics, stakeholders and the image of the company. The leader will also be faced with the challenge of gaining the support from the managers and managing up. Developing Managerial Effectiveness The leaders face the challenge of developing relevant skills that may help in the prioritization, time management, decision making, strategic thinking, and to be more effective at work. Developing Employees Leaders also face the challenge of training the employees to provide the right services to the organization. Guiding Change The leader faces the challenge of mobilizing, managing, leading change and understanding. Furthermore, they face the challenge to overcome resistance to change, mitigate change consequences and deal with employees reaction to change. Some of the ways in which the above problems can be achieved are through; Delegate more For the leaders to solve some of the problems, allocation of work to various employees can empower the employees. The effect of delegation of will makes the workers in the organization more productive. Gain some role clarity Saying no to the bosses seems to be very difficult but after understanding what our work needs and does not need, a person may find it easy saying “No” to what she or he does not understand. This gives room for the bosses to find the right person for that job Goal-setting is important The leader should be very practical in setting the goals, setting a timeline and deadline for the compilation of certain works. This in turn will increase the productivity as there is no wastage of time. Work on tasks that maximize the unique value-add Among all the activities carried out in an organization, there are specific once that only the leader can do. These are activities/work that the leader needs to focus on hence maximizing the specific value to the organization (WILLIAMS, 2012 p.284-396). Transformational leadership contributes to the success of executive and board, middle management and supervision of the organization. The informal leaders in the organization or the factory are mainly transformational than transactional. This is through challenging the approaches and the perception with directing and monitoring the supervisor and the managers’ work. To bring improvement in the health and safety of an organization, there is a need to ensure that the informal leaders influence workers in a positive way, the leaders are consistent with supporting the organization objective. The only way to achieve wok health and safety in an organization is to ensure the workers understand, trust and identify with the objectives of the organization (ACKERMAN & ANDERSON, 2010 p.313). Both the transformative and transaction approach of leadership sustain health and safety practices and produces an organization culture that is optimum. The transactional leadership is mainly important in providing reliable result when coping with the change. Transformational leadership helps in assisting the organization to adapt to change, help the organization to improve continuously and encouraging work ownership. Both the plans are crucial hence needed in an organization. The organization leaders have a mandate to exercise duty diligence. Duty diligence is aimed at taking part in the duties that will drive and support positive organizational culture and ensure the leaders accountability and provision of resources that support work health and safety. Due diligent requires the leader to take careful steps to; properly understand the work health and quality matters, understand the how the organization runs and identify the possible risks that are associated with certain undertakings. In addition, the leader should ensure the availability of the equipment and certain use of the required process and procedures that may reduce or eradicate the risks involved. It is worth noting that a responsible leader ensures the availability of the equipment for quickly communicating the accidents incurred during the processing. Nevertheless, availability of a quick respond team in place to respond to the risk is an ideal responsibility of a leader. That is; the lead must ensure the verification of resources before they are accessed by any person, ensure the implementation of obligation and duties under the Acts and that all of them are followed (USSC, 1988 p. 118). The leaders are only able to respond to the due diligence requirement if only they are well informed and possess sufficient skills that will allow the proper understanding of the response to the risk. In smaller organization, the leaders work collectively with the employees hence he or she has access to the required information and understanding the risk involved is not always a problem. In organizations that are large, the leader will need to be assisted with the structure and process. The provided structure should identify the individuals at every position who are responsible for obtaining, analyzing, reporting and advising on information. It should also describe the responsibility and the position of each in the organization and should also provide a procedure by which it accurse. The issues that are needed to be advised upon and that are to be reported should be those that give the understanding of the due diligent definition. Each of the due diligence definition is mainly supported by various leadership styles. The first element needs the officer to understand what safety and health in an organization means in a specific organization, and it related legal obligation. The first element is related to the second element as it requires the leader to understand the main risks involved in the day to day activities in the organization and the fourth element involves the receiving of the risks. The three elements involve the reporting culture, learning culture and informed culture. Hence, the trust with the organization is needed. The transformative leadership will help in engaging people in the activities and motivation in flexible thinking while, transactional leadership will help in the process of gathering information. The third requires the leader to point out and identify risk that are incurred in an organization, and develop a way in which it can be minimized or if possible eliminated. The fifth element ensures that the policies and resources of work risk and health are properly applied while the sixth element ensures verification of all the organizational risks. For the processes to be undertaken perfectly, both the transactional leadership and transformative leadership should be applied. For the realization of transactional and transformative leadership, the workers at all levels must be involved. The element of HSE should include some of the statements like; why it is being done, how it is going to be achieved, how to determine when it is achieved. The previous elements define the functions of the managers in making sure that the HSE is implemented and if a gap exists between the employees and the manager in managing of the HSE. The only way to determine whether the manager is focused is how he or she responds to the employee’s identification of the HSE problems (HCIMA, 1980 p.57). It is believed that good health and safety rules are very important in any business operation. However, the increase of the safety rules and regulation is becoming too much hence affecting the growth and innovation in businesses. People should be protected and the unnecessary safety and health rules and regulation in the business should be reduced (US & CCH, 1971 p.763). Lord Young and Professor Lofstedt found that in many occasions business had to go behind the requirement of safety laws and regulation. This was majorly due to the fact that; at well performing and relatively low risk work place, there are numerous inspections. Secondly, businesses are always consulting from safety and health advisers who are not well qualified. And finally, the culture of compensation imposes fear to businesses of being sued for accidents even when the worker is the one to be blamed. To reduce the burden, a number of changes have been introduced in the management of business HSE. HSE has published “Health and Safety Made Simple” to assist small businesses to obtain basic health and safety management level in their work place. HSE has done away with the unnecessary regulations. And finally, the use of only HSE-approved first aid training course has also been removed and a new straightforward guide has been provided. By HFS influencing large employers, there is a possibility of improving the health and safety for a large number of people. The use of large organization is very important has they have a significant influence on the businesses. This influence can easily be used to improve the standards of HFS in various businesses (GREAT BRITAIN, 2007 p.16). A range of information have been used to enable businesses identify various factors they should consider to manage risks that they have created. This includes the web-base tools that entails; image, videos, audio clips, self-assessment aid, case study and presentations. Guidance which includes; explaining the risk involved, explaining the practical way of handling and controlling the risks encountered. Approach Codes of Practice (ACOP) which entails; the practical guide on how to follow the law and description or recommendation on the preferred method to be followed to achieve the compliance. Conclusion Risk management is a critical aspect in an organization. When it is handled the efficiency of the employees and efficiency in running the organization properly is felt. The environment in which per a person is to work should be well defined. That is; the employees should clearly understand the risks involved in the environment he, or she is working. For better understanding of the environment, all the equipment and substances used in the organization should be well defined, and the workers should be conversant with those equipment and substances. The supervisor should also be diploid in every working environment to minimize or completely eradicate the risks involved in the organization. Proper risk management procedures will build the confident in the workers hence providing their best as they know their lives are not endangered and in the run increasing the productivity in the organization. Reference ACKERMAN-ANDERSON, L. S., & ANDERSON, D. (2010). The change leaders roadmap how to navigate your organizations transformation. San Francisco, CA, Pfeiffer. http://www.books24x7.com/marc.asp?bookid=41050. GREAT BRITAIN. (2007). Reducing the cost of complying with regulations: the delivery of the administrive burdens reduction programme, 2007. London, The Stationery Office. HOTEL, CATERING & INSTITUTIONAL MANAGEMENT ASSOCIATION. (1980). Hospitality. London, Hotel, Catering, and Institutional Management Association. KACHRU, U WILSON, A. (2005)... (2005). Strategic Management: Concepts and Cases. Excel Books, India. LEDLOW, G. R., COPPOLA, M. N., BIRTCHER, K., & ODONNELL, M. (2014). Leadership for health professionals: theory, skills, and applications. http://alltitles.ebrary.com/Doc?id=10869895. Building a successful selling organization: the critical path to extraordinary results. New York, iUniverse. UNITED STATES SENTENCING COMMISSION. (1988). Guidelines manual. Washington, D.C., United States Sentencing Commission. UNITED STATES, & COMMERCE CLEARING HOUSE. (1971). Employment safety and health guide. Chicago, Commerce Clearing House. WILLIAMS, C. (2012). Effective management: a multimedia approach. Mason, OH, South-Western/Cengage Learning. Read More