Placing the right people on your bus

Last month in this column I discussed five factors that determine how much effort employees will put into safety (or any part of their jobs): 1) their opinion of the value of the rewards; 2) the connection they see between their effort and those rewards; 3) effort expended; 4) abilities and traits; and, 5) role perception.

Dear Employee:
I’m writing this article for you, because your employer is worried that if they bring up the subject, their comments may be taken all wrong and the problem may get worse. The problem is that your employer can’t find any workplace cause for your health problems.

If safety pros want to step up and assume leadership positions in their organizations (and why shouldn’t they?), maybe it’s time to play a little hardball. What the heck, baseball season is in full swing.

Last month I reviewed five basic principles of the behavioral approach to occupational safety. Each of those fundamentals, including the use of behavioral language to define accountability systems and provide constructive feedback, is relevant for problem-solving beyond the workplace and for more than injury prevention

Last month I scrutinized the apparent focus on positive reinforcement in behavior-based safety (BBS). I specified critical distinctions between positive reinforcers and rewards, and pointed out flaws in the standard training protocol for teaching employees how to give interpersonal recognition.

The president and CEO of International Coal emphasized this point this past January when he said the owners and management of Sago Mine “...will report all findings in the hope that lessons learned here may help prevent similar problems at other mines.”

What an employee, supervisor or manager does — for safety or anything else — is determined by his or her perception of “what’s in it for me?”

Jim is a safety professional with 12 years of experience. He’s technically very competent, probably the best in the whole corporation. Jim tends to be low-key, private and introverted, a bit hard to “read.” He doesn’t initiate a lot of contact with the folks in the plant unless he is doing a safety audit, and spends a lot of time in his office alone.

After the dust-up over the hexavalent chromium standard in late February, OSHA lifers on Pennsylvania Avenue must feel like Bill Murray in Groundhog Day. You remember, the 1993 movie with the tagline, “He’s having the worst day of his life... over and over…” No matter what the standards-writers try, the same damn thing happens… over and over.