A Safety Culture - Case Study Example

Topic: A Safety Culture Student’s Name Course Name 14th September 2012 Table of Contents page 1.0 Purpose……………………………………………………………………………………….3 2.0 Safety culture…………………………………………………………………………………3 3.0 Drivers of excellence in the workplace………………………………………………………4 3.1 The quality of relationships……………………………………………………………....4 3.2 Leadership in the workplace……………………………………………………………...5 3.3 Communication of concise and clear values……………………………………………..6 4.0 Examples from organizations ……………………………………………………………….7 5.0 Demonstration of drivers …………………………………………………………………...8 6.0 Conclusion…………………………………………………………………………………..9 7.0 References…………………………………………………………………………………..10 1.0 Purpose This report aims at enhancing the understanding of safety culture in different organizational settings. The report is intended to reach a wide range of audience particularly those involved in different levels of decision making in organizations. Safety being one of the basic requirements in every workplace, this report seeks to widen the scope of understanding on how safety management should be undertaken in the workstations. 2.0 Safety Culture Safety culture is defined as the way in which management of safety is undertaken in the workplace (Cox and Cox, 1991). Safety culture reflects the beliefs, attitudes, values and perceptions shared by the employees towards safety in the workplace. This definition tend to explain the fact that poor understanding and poor knowledge regarding the safety and risks that face employees in any given organization are the major factors that contribute to disasters in the organization. Additionally, safety culture is also defined as the product of group and individual attitudes, values, competencies, perceptions, and behavioral patterns that reflect the commitment to safety and health management in the organizational setting (Broadbent, 2004). In this regard, an organization is regarded as having a positive culture in relation to safety when it is characterized by mutual trust, enhanced communication, and shared perceptions towards the preventive measures adopted in the organization to enhance the safety of the people (Cooper, 2008). An effective safety culture produces confidence and efficacy on the part of the employees. The above definitions can be summed up in one definition as the way in which things are typically done in the workplace which touches on a wide range of simple to complex actions such as wearing of overall coats, how a toolbox is delivered to another employee, and the level of seriousness depicted by high level managers during discussions concerning safety management in the organization (Cooper, 2008). 3.0 Drivers of excellence in the workplace According to Hull & Reid (2001), several significant factors differentiate between good workplaces from excellent workplaces. In their work entitled “simply the best workplaces in Australia” the authors noted that many organizations in Australia can indeed move from good workplaces to excellent workplaces if several even if not all drivers of excellence are observed. For the purpose of this paper, only three drivers of excellence will be explored. 3.1 The quality of relationships in the workplace According to Hull & Reid (2001), the quality of relationships in the workplace plays an important role in enhancing and promoting a safety culture. In order to ensure the safety of others, people should relate to each other as friends, co-workers, and colleagues. This means that employees should support each other and help each other to ensure that the assigned duties are completed as required (Antonsen, 2009). The quality of relationships in the workplace impacts either negatively or positively on the safety culture. High quality relationships increase respect and mutual trust among different players, for instance, between the employees, between the employees and the supervisors, and between the leaders (Gadd & Collins, 2002). The reason for this is that high quality relationships in the workplace increases the sense of belonging where every employees serves as his colleagues “watchman” by ensuring that safety for the other person is paramount. On the other hand, low quality relationships in the workplace alienate respect and mutual trust between people in the organization. This is because people tend to fear about what might happen to them because no one is trustworthy enough to watch over their back. In this regard, uncertainty and fear are the key elements that characterize an environment with low quality of working relationships between in the organization (Gillen, Baltz & Gassel, 2002). It is therefore evident that high quality relationships in the workplace results into an enhanced safety culture and hence it impacts positively on the safety culture (Gillen, Baltz & Gassel, 2002). On the other hand, an environment with low quality relationships in the workplace impacts negatively on the safety culture due to mistrust and disrespect that characterizes the employees. 3.2 Leadership in the workplace Leadership is another key driver of excellence in the workplace highlighted by Hull & Reid (2001). According to the authors, leadership underpins the quality of relationships that prevail between the team members in the workplace. As stated there above, high quality relationships impacts positively on the safety culture. For example, a positive safety culture is created by a leader that acts as a coach or captain which means that the leaders should be physically available and provide the much needed support where necessary (Fullarton & Stokes, 2005). This assures the employees of their safety because the leader is perceived as all-knowing and thus capable of correcting any errors or mistakes that may cause significant harm to the rest of the team. However, leadership with minimum interaction with the team members and which is never physically present in the workplace impacts negatively on the safety culture (Cooper, 2000). This is because such form/type of leadership depicts a less caring attitude. Employees are never assured of their safety something that demoralizes them and results into a negative safety culture. Hence, in order to create a positive safety culture, leadership must lead by example, play the coach/captain role, help in any minor crisis in the workplace, and be accessible to the people. 3.3 Communication of concise and clear values According to Cox & Cox (1991), a safety culture is reflected through the values that employees share in relation to safety (Cox and Cox, 1991). Hull & Reid (2001) noted that communication of values clearly and concisely is a key driver of excellence in the workplace which impacts positively on the safety culture in the organization. The reason for this is that values adapted and applied in any given work setting reflect the way duties are carried out in the workplace. Values are reflected in the way informal and formal meetings are organized, how sharing of information is done, how performance feedbacks are passed from one person to the other, and how managers organize discussion groups to train and empower their employees in relation to how different duties/responsibilities and issues in the organization should be handled (Cox and Cox, 1991). Communication of values clearly and concisely impacts positively on the safety culture because supervisors and the teams are able to discuss areas of improvements required in the workplace in order to ensure safety of the employees. Additionally, the channels of feedbacks contained in the value statement helps in creating a conducive interactive environment through which any problem, or error that may cause safety hazards to the employees is addressed. Communication of values supports positive relationships in the workplace which goes further to increasing respect and mutual trust among the people. Thus, communication of clear and concise values impacts positively on the safety culture. 4.0 Examples from organizations As stated the above, the quality of relationships in the workplace can impact positively or negatively on safety culture. From the organizational perspective, high quality relationships results into effective communication which makes it possible for team members to hold high level discussions pertaining to their safety (Roughton, 2002). The sense of “us” as opposed to the sense of “them” is created which creates high level of co-operation and collaboration in making workplaces safer for everybody. Through high quality relationships in the workplace, people in the procurement department ensure that the necessary equipments and items required for the safety of people in other departments are purchased in time. For example, the purchasing department ensures that every department in the organization has a fire extinguisher. This increases the safety culture in the organization. From the organizational perspective, leadership is the origin of visions required to streamline processes in different departmental levels. Thus, leadership impacts positively on the safety culture when the leader leads by example (Roughton, 2002). For example, the leader should be the first person to always wear protective gears such as helmets, gloves and overall coats when he enters the factory. The rest of the team members follow by enumerating their leader. In this regard, the leader sets the vision of the safety standards that need to be adopted and implemented in the whole organization. High quality leadership therefore leads to excellence in the working place resulting into a positive impact on the safety culture. Communication of concise and clear values is important because it is through the communication of these values that every team member is empowered to undertake their duties as required. Clear values act as the platform upon which team members draw their guidelines about how to carry out different activities (Clarke, 2003). Clear values also shape the behaviors and the conduct of the people in the workplace. For example, in the manufacturing and construction industries, wearing of protective devices is values that guide how the team members undertake their duties. Hence, values impact positively on the safety culture in the workplace. 5.0 Demonstration of drivers As a manager, I would demonstrate support for high quality relationships, leadership and communication of values in several ways. First, through continuous discussions, workshops, seminars and other interactive forums, I would ensure that excellent working relationships are created between the team members themselves as well as the team members and the supervisors. This will work towards development of high quality relationships because interactive forums bond the employees together to achieve a common goal (Hoivik et al, 2007). Similarly, I would demonstrate the support for leadership in the workplace by being physically available to offer guidelines to the employees where they are not sure about what to do. This will work towards development of a safety culture because when the leader leads from the front line, the team members are confident of achieving their goal (Hoivik et al, 2007). Hence, leading from the front would ensure that the employees feel secure and safe about every process that goes on in the organization. Furthermore, I would demonstrate the support for communication of clear values through continuous discussions with the heads of departments to ensure that employees are reminded more often about the values they should uphold to ensure their safety and the safety of the rest of the team members. This would work because issuing reminders serves as emphasis on what need to be done in the workplace. 6.0 Conclusion From the above sections, it is clear that creation of safe workplaces is important consideration in every organization. Different drivers of excellence such as leadership, communication of clear and concise values and the quality of relationships in the workplace must be absorbed in order to achieve the required levels of safety in the workplace. Physical presence of leaders in the workplace serves as drivers of excellence because it demonstrates a caring attitude towards the safety of the people on the part of the leader. Communication of values empowers people to do what they ought to do to ensure the safety of others. High quality relationships in the workplace bonds the employees together and it creates the sense of belonging where each team player watches over the safety of the other. References Antonsen, S. (2009). Safety Culture: Theory, Method and Improvement. Ashgate. Broadbent, D. (2004). “Maximizing Safety Performance via Leadership Behaviours”, Proceedings of the 28th International Congress of Psychology, Beijing, CHINA, 8 – 14 August 2004 Clarke, S. (2003). Safety Climate in an automobile manufacturing plant: the effects of work environment, job communication and safety attitudes on accidents and unsafe behavior Automobile manufacturing plant 35, 413 - 430. Cooper, M. (2008). 'Risk-Weighted Safety Culture Profiling'. 2008 SPE International Conference on Health, Safety & Environment in Oil & Gas Exploration and Production held in Nice. Cooper, M. (2000). Towards a model of safety culture. Safety Science 36 111- 136 Cox, S., & Cox, T. (1991). The structure of employee attitudes to safety - a European example Work and Stress, 5, 93 - 106. Fullarton, C & Stokes, M. (2005). The utility of a workplace injury instrument in prediction of workplace injury. Accident analysis and prevention 39, 28 – 37 Gadd, S., & Collins, A. (2002). Safety Culture: a review of the literature Health & Safety Laboratory HSL/2002/25. Gillen, M., Baltz, D., & Gassel, M. (2002). Perceived safety climate, job demands and co-worker support among union and non union injured construction workers. Journal of Safety Research, 33, 33 - 51. Hoivik, D. et al. (2007). Associations between self reported working conditions and registered health and safety results. JDEM, 49, 139 - 147. Hull, D. & Reid, V. (2001). Simply the Best - Workplaces in Australia, ACIRRT Published Paper Number 88, www.acirrt.com Roughton, J. (2002). Developing an Effective Safety Culture: A Leadership Approach (1st Edition ed.). 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