Week 9 Flashcards
SMS functions only fulfil promises if a facilitating environment is in place where
All levels of organisation advocate safety
Positive safety culture promoted
Atmosphere of trust created across organisation
The design of nuclear power plants and operations has changed since Chernobyl with law enforcement and inspection systems. Why did Chernobyl happen?
Poor to non existing SMS
Poor design and technical process - inherently unsafe
Chernobyl arguably led to the creation of safety culture. What was the key lesson?
To involve employees in safety through education, information, and participation, with cooperation between employers and operators
Safety culture is a concept with roots in organisational culture and anthropological literature. What five factors influence employee behaviour in an organisation
Values
Norms
Activities
Management
History
Safety culture represents employee attitudes about an organisations approach to
Safety
Risk perception
Responding to and controlling risk
Engagement to safety culture activities
What are the five key elements to safety culture?
Informed culture
Reporting culture
Learning culture
Just culture
Flexible culture
How is an informed culture made?
data from accidents and near misses are collated and combined with data from safety audits and climate surveys
How is a reporting culture created ?
the workforce engage in near miss reporting, safety surveys and safety initiatives
Why is a learning culture needed?
needed to draw appropriate conclusions and implement necessary changes (e.g. to procedures).
How is a flexible safety culture made ?
there must be flexibility to respond in novel ways to system or environmental perturbations or threats
LWhat approaches are there to studying safety culture ?
Psychological approach
Engineering approach
Organisational theory
The psychological approach refers more to the term safety climate than safety culture. What does it focus on?
How workers feel about and perceive safety/safety management
Attitudes and behaviour regarding risk and safety
What is the engineering approach interested in?
Managerial aspects and systems which influence safety like management systems, policies, procedures
Oriented towards improving safety performance
Organisational (culture) theory, anthropology and sociology focuses on…
How safety culture fits within the organisational structure as a way to manage risks
Allows analysis and description on organisational culture influence on safety
How can safety culture be studied ?
Questionnaires, checklists, audits, interviews, workshops, ethnographic research (observing those at work), and accident enquiries
Safety culture is predominantly assessed by questionnaires. What is the aim of these?
To determine employee attitudes to values and work issues within safety, focusing on key themes - determine psychological tendency to agree/disagree with the themes questioned.
What are common questionnaire questions and how are they assessed ?
Questions touch on blame and punishment and incident reporting.
Questions are positive or negative with yes and no options. I.e. ‘we have a just culture’
Why is safety promotion vital?
It ensures safety issues openly discussed at all levels of organisation
Safety recommendations, info, and best practises disseminated to involve all staff
In safety culture, SMSs recognise that human activity is prone to errors and so for an organisation to dedicate a commitment to safety …
The system should support each individual member to accommodate errors without systemic blame
SMS functions can only effectively fulfill their promises if a facilitative environment is in place, where:
All levels of organisation advocate safety
Positive organisational safety culture implemented
Safety promoted with an atmosphere of trust
A non punitive environment needs to ensure that…
Employees are protected from prosecution if they report a safety occurrence or error they’ve been involved in
Employees who come forward can even be rewarded for providing safety information
A line in the sand needs to be drawn for just culture. How is this ensured?
By differentiating between acceptable and unacceptable (wilful violations or gross negligence) behaviour
To make employees feel comfortable about coming forward what type of reporting systems should be available?
Confidential and voluntary reporting systems
What does success of a just culture rely on ?
social, professional, organisational and national cultures, which represent the values, beliefs and behaviours shared between members of any social group, profession, organisation and country respectively.
Safety climate focuses on employee attitudes towards safety and refers to:
How employees perceive the enactment of organisational policies and procedures relating to safety at a given time
Safety climate refers to an employees attitude about how an organisation prioritises …
What does this influence?
Safety compared to other organisational goals
Risk taking and safety related behaviours
Why is the safety climate important?
It predicts safety performance in nuclear, chemical, offshore, and rail industries
Links between safety climate and safety performance
Association between employee perceptions and health and well-being
Safety climate is a good safety performance indicator for occupational accidents but not for
Major accidents
How is safety climate measured ?
With a survey to assess perceptions regarding safety, allowing a statistical construction of organisation wide perceptions
A survey tool to measure safety climate was made by researchers at HSL. What are the main features?
8 main factors are covered
A five point Likert scale used to answer (agree strongly to disagree strongly)
Responses calculate mean scores for each factor assessed
A good safety climate has a score close to 5, a bad one close to one
What factors are assessed in the safety climate?
Accidents and near miss reporting
H+S resources
Peer group attitude
Health and safety engagement
Usability of procedures
Trust
Health and safety behaviour
Organisational commitment
What are benefits of the safety climate tool?
Reduced accidents
Higher productivity
More reported near misses
Better communication across all levels of staff
Safety climate can rapidly change like a mood while safety culture is more
Long lasting like personality
How can safety culture be assessed?
Questionnaire survey for quantitative results
Interviewing staff
What is the idea behind triangulation?
a multi-method and holistic approach should be taken towards safety culture.
What are the key attributes to a safety leader ?
Someone with commitment to safety
Can exist at any level in organisation
Provide direction to staff in planning and supervision
Motivate staff through offering rewards
Set a good example
If safety leaders are consistent they can…
Influence the safety climate, and impact the culture over time leading people to reassess their views towards safety and behaviours
What topics are studied in culture questionnaires?
Incident reporting
Blame and punishment
Organisation
Worker conditions/fatigue
