Accountability Based Safety:
A New Solution to an Old Problem

Most organizations care about their people and make great efforts to create a safe environment. Yet, people still get hurt on the job. Not only do people continue to get hurt, but unnecessary personnel costs, including Worker's Compensation, continue to increase.

Up until now, the answer has been three-fold. First, provide employees with OSHA compliant training to make sure that people know how to properly and safely use equipment and maintain a safe work environment. Second, provide employees with behavior based training to develop a safety attitude and related behaviors. Third, initiate safety efforts including teams, programs, prizes and committees in an effort to improve safety.

Despite the best efforts of truly concerned organizations, too many people are getting hurt. For many companies, Worker's Compensation costs continue to rise and the "fight" to improve safety seems like a losing battle.

Addressing the Root Cause

Our experience shows that it doesn't matter how much technical and behavior based training takes place to encourage and develop people to work in a safe manner. Without a commitment to Personal Accountability by each individual, as well as Shared Accountability between management and employees, safety improvements can't be sustained. When safety breaks down, it often turns into a "blame game" of finding fault rather than addressing the issues of accountability and the conditions that created the situation in the first place.

Regardless of the industry or work environment, we have seen the following conditions show up repeatedly:

• Workers frequently know how to work safely, and at times choose to not work safely.
• Workers often see others work in an unsafe manner and choose to say nothing.
• Managers often fail to explore the reasons workers don't work safely and thus don't really understand the problem.
• Most organizations spend time, resources and effort to force compliance with safety rules, regulations and behaviors (thinking this is being accountable) in hopes of reducing Recordable Incident Rates (RIR's) and optimizing success.

Each of these common responses actually supports "victimization" relative to safety, rather than improving accountability. "Victimization" refers to the common stance of, "It wasn't my fault – there wasn't anything I could have done. It is someone else's job to fix things and make work safe." "Accountability" refers to an entirely different mindset, one of: "Safety is up to me and my team; we can and will make better choices, resulting in a safer work environment."

All too often, employees aren't making accountable choices, while managers do not understand the root causes of the problem and therefore don't know how to coach their direct reports to improve safety. The typical organizational response of trying to force compliance only creates increased resistance amongst the workforce.

While typical "behavior based" training attempts to change attitudes and behaviors, without sufficient focus on Personal Accountability, people don't have the foundation for changing their "habits" regarding safety. Without sufficient focus on Shared Accountability, there isn't the "committed" support system among the teams and between managers and direct reports to sustain behavioral changes and improve safety.

Tom Boyer, a recognized expert in the improvement of safe work environments and the only external consultant to be nominated for Weyerhaeuser's annual Corporate Safety Award, has said, "Ultimately, safety is a personal choice supported by one's team and manager. It is a cooperative effort, based on a clear commitment and regard for human life, supported by meaningful tracking and recognition."

Improving Safety – The Accountable Way

Most organizations are clear on their safety goals and have a good history of tracking unsafe incidents. A new opportunity exists to make a meaningful difference, to decrease RIR and Worker's Compensation costs as well as making the workplace safer for all employees.

Tom Boyer has combined his expertise in improving safety along with IMPAQ's expertise in developing accountable organizations to create the following Accountability-Based Safety Process. This three step process has proven successful for improving safety and sustaining those results for years to come.

Three Step Accountability-Based Safety Process

Step 1: Quickly Assess Accountability Breakdowns Related to Safety
This step involves assessing the overall strengths and weaknesses in accountability between managers and individual contributors as well as within teams of individual contributors. We explore such issues as keeping commitments, follow-through, support, holding others accountable and effective coaching related to safety and other key areas of performance and communication. The assessment explores the relationship between behaviors and thinking which drive people's current safety standards and choices.

Step 2: Develop New "Habits" of Performance Execution Related to Safety
While most training programs focus on isolated behaviors that only pertain to safety, addressing the root causes associated with safety requires addressing the "habits" that have been in place for years. This means that automatic thinking and habitual reactions must be addressed so that people are in a position to make new choices related to safety and choosing safe behaviors. Changing "habits" related to thinking, reactions and ultimately behavior is an important key for making meaningful, sustainable changes in safety.

Step 3: Create an Accountable Support System to Sustain Results
In the best of circumstances, habits are difficult to change. We can all make changes for a short time, but sustaining those changes can be quite challenging. Creating sustainable safety improvement requires several key elements:

• Implement and embed Personal and Shared Accountability Agreements within teams and between managers and individual contributors to support the new habits being deployed.
• Establish an agreed upon tracking system for staying focused on those new habits (not just the required tracking of incidents, accidents and injuries).
• Provide supervisors with specific skills in coaching related to safety issues and habit changes.
• Develop Proactive Recovery Plans to get people back on track when they go back to old habits, before an incident or injury takes place.

Benefits of Implementing an Accountable Safety Improvement Program

While improving safety is a key aspect of the benefits achieved, when Personal Accountability and Shared Accountability is improved, others aspects of performance and job satisfaction improve at the same time. Management's relationships with individual contributors are healthier, commitments to project and task goals are realized and overall communication is enhanced. While the focus of this effort is on improving safety, it is not uncommon to experience improved business results in customer satisfaction, increased productivity and higher retention of top performers.

For more information on the specific process IMPAQ uses to improve Safety, please email us at Safety@impaqcorp.com.

IMPAQ
9000 Sunset Blvd, Suite 525
Los Angeles, California
800 332 2251
contactus@impaqcorp.com