Safety Culture - International Atomic Energy Agency - Literature review Example

SAFETY CULTURE Name Course Tutor University Department What is Safety Culture? International Atomic Energy Agency was the first group to introduce the idea of safety culture in the workplace. Safety culture occurs as a result of employees attitudes, values, behavioral norms, and skills determine their level of commitment to the firm's health and safety management. However, different scholars have come up with different definitions. Safety culture may also be defined as the basic rules and principles that workers in a firm hold in relation to safety issues (Clarke 2003). This is shown by managers, supervisors, as well as workers values, beliefs, and behaviors. However, safety culture should also be evident in organization safety policy, rules and procedures. In other words, Clarke wanted to emphasize that safety culture results from sharing common principles and values where safety is given the ultimate concern. Effective safety culture can only be achieved if the organization ensures that interaction between people and technological systems is properly handled. In most cases, accidents occur in the workplace when people disregard safety procedures or fail to differentiate between safe and unsafe behaviors. The primary role of safety culture within an organization is that management to recognize that employee attitude and behaviors play a significant role on their safety behavior in the workplace. Research has shown that the management must instill safety behavior to their employees to enhance positive safety culture and performance (Cooper & Phillips 1995). This relationship is a reflection of the whole organization including work itself and the workforce to enhance the accomplishment of a strong and positive culture. A recent study has also indicated that a strong safety culture necessary to ensure that both the management and staffs uphold a high level of safety in the workplace (Beckmerhagen et al. 2003). Safety culture should be maintained both internal and external. An organization is said to have a strong culture when the principles supported by the management are similar with its workforce behaviors (Vredenburgh 2002). On the contrary, a weak culture is brought when values supported by the management are not similar to those of employees. A firm with such weak culture would lead to a working condition where people do not follow safety working practices, thus making it difficult for a firm to implement a solution to solve health and safety problems. Weak culture in an organization may be as a result of its weak structures and procedure, which can also hinder the improvement of workers health and safety. For this reason, the management can instill a positive and strong culture by employing various management practices in the organization. In this case, Soprano Smallgoods will incorporate various human resource management functions such as training, rewards, recruitment, performance management and job designs to show how they can be effectively applied to instill safety culture and prevent workers injuries. Training and Development Training is conducted to fill gaps in knowledge, to target a high-risk group or to change the perception of risk. This knowledge can also apply to people both at and way from the workplace. To instill positive attitudes and behaviors toward health and safety practices, training programs are conducted to fill knowledge gaps after staffs need analysis. Safe practices training is conducted to raise employees' awareness of values of maintaining health and safety at work. Workers at Soprano Smallgoods have been engaging in dangerous practice, for example, a plant operator would reach out into a mincer to remove blockages when the machines are still running, employees did not wear PPE while performing their work, and they removed safety barriers to ensure that operating equipment are running at a faster rate. In this case, the workers may hold the belief that reaching out to remove blockage without first stop the mincer or removing safety barriers on the machine will ensure that the work is completed fast because they have not consciously considered their more long-term values. The workers should be educated on the long-term such as avoiding accidents so that they can continue to cater for their families. Workers should receive occupational safety training to participate actively in a safety program. A properly designed training program should focus on safe working practices, which are derived after training need analysis in the organization. Need analysis help us to determine the goal of the program, as well as performance feedback. Training is conducted to authenticate that safe working practices are effective and continue even after termination of performance feedback. Training provides a way of ensuring injuries is more predictable. Safety training provides the means for making accidents more predictable. Positive safety culture Soprano factory floor would help employees to recognize accidents and hazardous actions and understand their repercussions. To minimize the probability of accident occurrence, the company should introduce comprehensive safety training program to all new recruits and provide mentors to guide employees, and unsure new workers receive orientation on safety and health systems. However, safety training should not only be offered to new employees but also, the organization should introduce regular training program on current issues concerning safety and health issues. The management should also consider issues that may affect the perception of risk levels when training the workers on safety work practices. Pidgeon (1991) argued that most people do not use risk probability in their judgment on product safety, but rather the harm an accident can cause is applied as the foremost role in their decision to read warning or act safely. This practice is not followed by the whole organization as these precautions are perceived by employees rather than management (Ali & Subramaniam 2009). Clarke (1999) indicated that safety culture should be a common view of both managers and staff on the significance of safety. In the case of Soprano Smallgoods, the auditors noted that despite the top management effort on the safety of workers, it has not been translated in the workplace. A Recent research study has indicated that level of perceived injury increases compliance to warning and procedures, and thus it is important that all workers receive adequate training in identifying accidents in the workplace (Beckmerhagen et al. 2003). Therefore, the whole organization workforce should be trained on how to identify and react against accidents in the workplace. The training program can assist in goal setting, innovation as well as improve employees' technical and professional skills. Through proper training, Soprano can prevent its employees from accidents and injuries through adherence to safety rules and procedures while assessing training needs and changing job procedures to ensure safe work practices are maintained (Pidgeon 1991). Rewards The organization may also use different kinds of reward systems to encourage particular performance behaviors. Rewards motivate the employees to keep away from hazards in their workplace. When employees are motivated to behave in a particular way to achieve desired consequences, they will adjust their behavior to fit in organizational cultural norm if they think that compliance will lead to a desirable outcome. In the case of Soprano, if the workers are if they fail to put on their personal protective equipment they may lose bonus, they will change their behavior to ensure that they do not lose the bonuses. Motivation depends on how workers behaviors result into the desired consequences. Employees' values should thus be aligned with the organizations behaviors norm in order to achieve the desired outcomes. Rewards system should include behaviors and consequences. Culture in an organization is learned after linking behaviors and consequences. An organization culture is established after numerous reinforcement within an organization, therefore, changing the way it engages would involve identifying reinforcing agents to determine their impacts in the change process (Cooper & Phillips 1995). If Soprano workers are reinforced to follow safe work practices, it will impact the change process. Similarly, properly designed rewards and incentive programs can be used to reinforce reporting accidents or unsafe act that may cause an injury while giving a reward when fewer cases are reported. If the Soprano workers fully participate in ensuring the workplace is safe, the number of accidents will also reduce. However, these rewards and incentive programs must be aligned with education and training to be effective. To ensure that they are effective, a reward system should clearly indicate the type of behavior that will be rewarded by the company (Beckmerhagen et al. 2003). Also, the organization must include how accidents will be prevented. Safe behaviors in an organization may be reinforced by making compensation depending on safe performance. Cox & Flin (1998) argued that integrating nontangible privileges such as feedback, praise, and recognition for safe performance in a firm, safe working behaviors will be encouraged and prioritized. Nevertheless, other reward factors such as praise recognition as well as tangible rewards such as bonus, trading stamps and so on can also be employed to motivate employees. Studies have shown that safety culture can be only effective when an organization reinforces the desired behaviors. Thus, a properly designed reward system offers recognition that can help modify employees' behaviors. A significant feature of a successful reward system is its visibility in the workplace. Workers should be able to understand its purpose and how it will be used to measure performance (Clarke, 2003). In other words, rewards and incentive should be paired with contingencies to ensure that the desired outcomes are achieved. Simply giving rewards without indicating consequences can result in undesired behavior and increase cases of accidents (Ali & Subramaniam 2009). References List Ali, HA, & Subramaniam, C 2009, 'Management practice in safety culture and its influence on workplace injury an industrial study in Malaysia', Disaster Prevention and Management, vol.18, no.5, pp. 470-477. Beckmerhagen, IA, Berg, HP, Karapetrovic, SV & Willborn, WO 2003, 'Integration of management systems: focus on safety in the nuclear industry', International Journal of Quality & Reliability Management, vol. 20, pp. 210-28. Clarke, S 1999, ‘Perceptions of organizational safety: Implications for the development of safety culture’. Journal of Organizational Behaviour, vol. 20, no.2, pp. 185. Clarke, S 2003, “The contemporary workforce: implications for organizational safety culture”, Personnel Review, vol. 32, pp. 40-57. Cooper, MD & Phillips, RA 1995, 'Killing two birds with one stone: achieving quality via total safety management', Leadership & Organizational Development Journal, vol. 16, pp. 3-9 Cox, S & Flin, R 1998, ‘Safety culture: Philosopher’s stone or man of straw?’ Work and Stress, vol.12, no. 3, pp. 189-201. Pidgeon, NF 1991, Safety culture and risk management in organizations, Journal of Cross-Cultural Psychology, vol.22, no.1, pp.129– 140. Vredenburgh, AG 2002, 'Organizational safety: which management practices are most effective in reducing employee injury rates?', Journal of Safety Research, vol. 33, pp. 259-76 Read More