How often do managers hang the responsibility for safety problems on workers when the cause may be a lot closer to home? Here’s an answer … all the way from Australia. See if you agree with it.
Never let it be said that Safety Daily Advisor won’t go to the ends of the earth to get you a different take on workplace safety. The proof is today’s article, which details the thoughts of Lewis Stratton, who describes himself as a “newly appointed Principal OHS consultant to a Justice Department” in Australia.
We don’t usually go Down Under to learn about safety management. But Stratton’s writings, originally on the website, progressenterprise.com, made so much sense to us that we felt they deserved exposure on this side of the planet as well.
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Basically, Stratton’s complaint is that when safety-related incidents occur, managers are all too quick to blame the worker for the happening, when that fault should more logically be laid further up the chain of command—say, for instance, at their own doorstep.
He garners this view from a review of accident reports, such as one where a worker received a steam burn from reaching over a boiling kettle, or another where an office employee suffered a foot injury trying to climb on shelving to get a file in a high location rather than using a proper step stool.
In these reports, Stratton finds that managers tend to write comments such as “advised staff member to be more careful in the future” as their solution to the problem. That is emphatically not where Stratton sees the solution to be.
“Questions are not asked about why there was a need to reach over a boiling kettle, and whether a different layout in the kitchen would remove the need for this action,” he writes. “And why does someone feel compelled to climb on shelving rather than get the approved stepping platform? Were time and workload constraints considered? Were the steps a reasonable distance from where the filing task was performed? Was the [area] sufficiently clear of clutter to allow convenient use of the stepping platform?
“Managers cannot rely on the human factor as an excuse to tolerate proven risk in the workplace,” Stratton says. “It is human nature to take risks for convenience and this risk must be addressed in an overall approach to OHS.”
What, then, should these managers have done?
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In all these examples, there were other options … workplace redesign, hazard elimination, alternate work practices,” he concludes, “but … it is much easier for management to subtly blame the worker and let the risk remain unaddressed.”
Stratton sees a multipart solution to the problem:
- Executive management needs to make OHS a priority, to talk it up and to base decision-making on it.
- Managers need to be trained in total hazard analysis … to see as many hazard factors in any given situation as is possible, and to act to eliminate them before the human factor of employee behavior enters the mix.
- Management responses to incidents need to be closely monitored to assure that the true causes of the occurrence are identified and appropriate actions taken.
We’ll deal more with one aspect of Stratton’s recommendation … job hazard analysis … in tomorrow’s Advisor. Meanwhile, what do you think about Stratton’s reasoning? Do you agree that the human factor is often used as an excuse to cover insufficient safety planning? Use the Share Your Comments button below and let us know.
James Reason offered up the Swiss Cheese model as a method of assessing the accident or incident by reviewing what latent and active defects are in the the system. Similar to the domino effect, the swiss cheese model is one tool used in the aviation world and is slowly being accepted in the industrial world. It is now being used in wildfire fighting analysis and other disciplines.
The latent failures involve organizational influences, unsafe supervision and preconditions for unsafe acts. The active failure is the unsafe act itself that created the event for the accident. When the holes in the cheese slices are lined up, there will be an accident or incident.
Wiegmann and Shappell developed the human factors analysis and classification system or HFACS as it is known in many circles. The system uses the James Reason model and defines the practical discussion that further develops what the author (Stratton) is describing.
In the accidents I have investigated, as well as any audits that were found non-compliant to safety processes, rules or regulations, the major factors were the latent failures. Does management [wish] to be the silent contributer to the fatality? I doubt it. But until management truly assesses their own involvement in any event that causes an accident, “zero defects,” “safety first,” “be safe” will be of no value. Just my opinion.