Here at AltairStrickland, an EMCOR company, we believe every injury is preventable, and it all starts with a robust reporting culture. Because one of the most important and consistent things we do to effectuate safety is to continually reinforce a culture where reporting safety incidents is encouraged, because we can’t fix what we don’t know about, and we can’t address problems we don’t see or hear about. Safety has to be a team effort that permeates every facet of the organization, and every AltairStrickland employee has to do his or her part to ensure we’re doing all we can.
Even in proactive cultures dedicated to safety, “fear of retribution for reporting” is still one of the primary reasons employees don’t report minor injuries and near misses. It’s hard to be the one who raises his or her hand and says something is wrong or some unsafe practice needs to be addressed. So we handle this fear of reporting in two ways: leadership visibility and the continuous encouragement of reporting. Company leadership understands they are not the keepers of all of the great ideas; everyone has a voice and venue to provide ways to improve safety. The key is action. It is much worse to encourage people to report, and take no action when they do, than to not encourage reporting at all. Our management teams constantly reassure our people they can report both positive and negative behaviors, so we can see not just what we’re doing wrong but what we’re doing right as well.
But of course it takes time to develop a culture of “no recourse” reporting. People need to see you use reporting as a tool for learning and improvement, not as a punishment for doing something wrong. Once people understand that, the level of reporting begins to trend upward. And that upward trend means a culture of safety is taking hold in the organization. That’s a great thing. However, we need to be mindful safety initiatives should not be static; they’re in need of constant observation, management, review and adjustment. We should never be satisfied with low levels of reporting and we should never assume no news is good news, especially in our industry where an unreported incident can lead to a catastrophic event.
Developing a safety execution plan
We all know jobsite conditions are never static. A refinery is a working facility; a change in wind direction can change the plan. Safety execution plans need to anticipate and adapt at the same rate. They must be dynamic and practical because new hazards enter and exit the picture continuously, depending on what phase of work is being completed. This means you must establish best-case policies and procedures and then refine those procedures in con-junction with the customer’s procedures in order to build what we refer to as a “bridging document,” a collaborative safety document that aligns the best safety processes of both parties. This bridging document is the basis for a Site Safety Execution Plan — a course of action developed specifically for the scope of work being performed. This approach to safety demands a dynamic and innovative environment. This, along with daily safety meetings, review of leading indicators, jobsite safety analyses and personal engagement with people, is how cultures get safety right.
There are two things you can do right now to assess the overall effectiveness of your safety culture. Begin by having a number of small crew-level discussions that focus first on what the crew believes is done well and second on what they believe you could do better. Be careful not to include assumptions; stick to the facts.
Once you’ve done that, spend 10 percent of your time analyzing the first part and 90 percent of the time analyzing and fixing the second. When your analysis is complete, use the information to start to build a bridge — from where you are to where you want to be. Involve everyone in the bridge building because when it comes down to it, everyone owns safety. Build your bridge on a foundation of effective reporting and action. Make sure your bridge is on your chosen path and it supports your goals of an injury-free workplace.
For more information, call Jeffrey Webber at (281) 478-6200 or email him at jwebber@altairstrickland.com.
