Among the job responsibilities of a safety professional, conducting incident investigations are of utmost importance to maintain the safety of a worksite.
During safety investigations, biases often allow for a quick resolution without launching a full-scale investigation. Still, a quick resolution can lead to missing key details, according to Georg Fischer Central Plastic's Health, Safety and Environmental (HSE) Manager Lewis Chambers. Giving examples from his career at the recent 2022 EHS Seminar & Tradeshow held in Galveston, Texas, Chambers found out an injured worker failed his drug screen.
"Halfway through our investigation, I get a call that he failed his drug screen," Chambers said. "We don't need to investigate anymore. He failed his drug screen. Three weeks later on the same machine, the exact same incident occurs. This time it cuts a ligament and requires surgery. The kicker? He passed his drug screen."
Unconscious biases lead to poor decisions that could impact the safety of a worksite, according to Chambers. Two of the most common examples are confirmation bias, where we look for information that is consistent with our expectation, and availability bias, where we rely on the most vivid or memorable information. Chambers discussed what biases influenced the first investigation.
"So what's some of the biases we experienced on that first investigation? Well, you have confirmation bias. We blame the incident on the impairment due to the drug screen. We also had a procedure bias. We had an inflated view of the effectiveness that the procedure had in managing the risk," Chambers said.
The second injury could have been prevented if the investigation had continued as planned instead of blaming the drug screen. For this reason, safety investigators should conduct a thorough, unbiased investigation every time.
"Blaming the drug screen is a true bias out there," Chambers said. "If we would have continued with our investigation and spoke with the employees we would have found out why [the incident] happened."
According to Chambers, another bias to be aware of is siding with the person who reported the incident first.
"I had an employee come into my office, he was panicked because he was almost hit by a forklift. He claimed the driver was speeding and did not honk," Chambers said. "I just believed the pedestrian that reported the incident. Then witnesses come forward and tell me the guy was on his cell phone and walked right in front of the forklift."
This bias can not only hurt a safety professional's credibility and reputation, but he/she could also be accused of showing favoritism, explained Chambers.
"If I'd had a friendship with that pedestrian, I could have been accused of showing favoritism," Chambers said. "It's very important in a forklift incident - don't just blame the driver. There may be more to it."
Safety professionals continuously seek ways to improve worksite and worker safety issues. Even so, it is easy to overlook hazards when there have not been any previously reported problems.
Safety professionals continuously seek ways to improve worksite and worker safety issues. Even so, it is easy to overlook hazards when there have not been any previously reported problems.
"Especially when doing hazard assessments, you will hear the phrase 'we've never had an incident here.' This is a dangerous bias," Chambers said. "You can dismiss a potential hazard because you've never had an incident or near miss before."
The reason for conducting incident investigations is to find the root cause of an incident and to prevent it from happening again, which is why being aware of unconscious biases during an investigation is so important.
"A strong hazard assessment and thorough incident investigations are important to a strong safety culture," Chambers said. "Know your hazards and be aware of any bias that can influence your hazard assessment and investigations."
