Safety Culture Excellence®

Greetings everyone, this podcast recorded while in Winnipeg, Manitoba. For the podcast this week I’d like to share an article written by Terry Mathis, published in February 2013 in EHS Today Magazine.  It was titled, The Power of Shared Definitions. The published article can be found under Insights at www.ProActSafety.com.

I hope you enjoy the podcast this week. If you would like to download or play on demand our other podcasts, please visit the ProAct Safety’s podcast website at: http://www.safetycultureexcellence.com. If you would like access to archived podcasts (older than 90 days – dating back to January 2008) please visit www.ProActSafety.com/Store. For more detailed strategies to achieve and sustain excellence in performance and culture, pick up a copy of our book, STEPS to Safety Culture Excellence, available through WILEY (publisher), Amazon or Barnes and Noble.

Have a great week!

Shawn M. Galloway ProAct Safety, Inc

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Maslow pointed out that we focus on immediate needs until they are met and then move on to higher goals.  Is your safety program still focused on where the next meal is coming from or looking for enlightenment?  There is no ideal answer to this question; only an honest one.  If you are still struggling to get your workers into basic compliance (i.e.  Knowing and following the rules and procedures), you are trying to survive.  If you are well past that stage and looking for the next step change beyond your already good results, you are trying to thrive.  There is no fault in either case.  You probably inherited the current state and are challenged to take it to the next level.  What is important is that you recognize your current state and respond accordingly.

If you are in survival mode, it is imperative that your supervisors are respected and viewed by workers as friends and not foes.  Position and authority don’t matter as much to workers trying to survive as the distinction between friend and foe.  Friends are trying to help you survive; foes are trying to make you fail.  Workers will follow their friends and not their foes.  It is also critically important that you communicate accident data as stories from which you can learn lessons.  Survivalists view risk taking as necessary to survival and don’t generalize well.  Tell them the story of the accident and let them determine lessons learned from the story.

In thrive mode, you need to focus on the passion and purpose of safety excellence.  To be excellent, it is not enough to convince workers; you must convert them.  Directives will get hands and feet moving.  It takes passion to move hearts and minds.  It is critically important to recognize the difference and to address it intelligently.  Many safety professionals think that more of the same will get them to the next level.  Unfortunately, that is seldom the case.  The tools of excellence are different from the tools of pretty good.  You can be the voice of reason and get the organization from bad to good.  You have to be an inspirational leader to get from good to great.

-Terry L. Mathis

Terry L. Mathis is the founder and CEO of ProAct Safety, an international safety and performance excellence firm. He is known for his dynamic presentations in the fields of behavioral and cultural safety, leadership, and operational performance, and is a regular speaker at ASSE, NSC, and numerous company and industry conferences. EHS Today listed Terry as a Safety Guru in ‘The 50 People Who Most Influenced EHS’ in 2010, 2011 and 2012-2013. He has been a frequent contributor to industry magazines for over 15 years and is the coauthor of STEPS to Safety Culture Excellence, 2013, WILEY.

Greetings everyone, this podcast recorded while in Harlingen, Texas. I’d like to share an article I wrote that was published February 2013 in Occupational Health and Safety Magazine.  It was titled, From Edicts to Discretionary Effort: Maturing Your Safety Culture. The published article can either be found on the magazine’s website or under Insights at www.ProActSafety.com.

I hope you enjoy the podcast this week. If you would like to download or play on demand our other podcasts, please visit the ProAct Safety’s podcast website at: http://www.safetycultureexcellence.com. If you would like access to archived podcasts (older than 90 days – dating back to January 2008) please visit www.ProActSafety.com/Store. For more detailed strategies to achieve and sustain excellence in performance and culture, pick up a copy of our book, STEPS to Safety Culture Excellence, available through WILEY (publisher), Amazon or Barnes and Noble.

Have a great week!

Shawn M. Galloway ProAct Safety, Inc

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Most companies attempt to integrate safety thinking into their business, but forget to integrate sound business thinking into safety. Terry L. Mathis, CEO of ProAct Safety shares an important perspective often ignored in safety. ProAct Safety provides more strategies in the area of safety culture and safety excellence in the public domain than any other firm, organization or association. For access to increased, advanced value in the form of videos, podcasts, public workshops and seminars, please visit www.ProActSafety.com/Store

This video can also be viewed at YouTube: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RYxrAN6SpUs

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I thinned some trees in a thick, forested area on my lot hoping the remaining trees would grow more wide limbs and spread their canopies.  It didn’t happen.  I asked my tree expert why not and he explained that new limbs on a mature tree were only growing out of the bark and not the core of the tree trunk.  They were weak and seldom reached large size without breaking off in the first strong wind.

Many safety programs likewise are add-ons and have no real connection to the core values and strategies of the organization.  We hope they will provide extra coverage and fill the gaps, but they seldom survive for very long.  The strong limbs of our safety programs are connected to a solid strategy and designed to provide specific coverage.  They are not afterthoughts, but the result of solid planning.

It is crucial for organizational leaders to think of the tree and the limbs as one unit.  If safety is a core value of the organization, there are no safety goals; only business goals related to safety.  The strategy of the organization includes safety-related strategies that connect to the core.  Leaders might fertilize the soil and stimulate the roots, but they don’t try to artificially graft on limbs that aren’t firmly connected.

Many safety programs and processes are attempts to compensate for a lack of core strategy and seldom survive the winds of change.

-Terry L. Mathis

Terry L. Mathis is the founder and CEO of ProAct Safety, an international safety and performance excellence firm. He is known for his dynamic presentations in the fields of behavioral and cultural safety, leadership, and operational performance, and is a regular speaker at ASSE, NSC, and numerous company and industry conferences. EHS Today listed Terry as a Safety Guru in ‘The 50 People Who Most Influenced EHS’ in both 2010 and 2011. He has been a frequent contributor to industry magazines for over 15 years and is the coauthor of STEPS to Safety Culture Excellence, 2013, WILEY.

Greetings everyone, this podcast recorded while in Topeka, Kansas. For the podcast this week I’d like to share an article written by Terry Mathis, published in January 2013 in EHS Today Magazine.  It was titled, Zero Accidents Does Not Equal Safety Excellence. The published article can be found under Insights at www.ProActSafety.com.

I hope you enjoy the podcast this week. If you would like to download or play on demand our other podcasts, please visit the ProAct Safety’s podcast website at: http://www.safetycultureexcellence.com. If you would like access to archived podcasts (older than 90 days – dating back to January 2008) please visit www.ProActSafety.com/Store. For more detailed strategies to achieve and sustain excellence in performance and culture, pick up a copy of our book, STEPS to Safety Culture Excellence, available through WILEY (publisher), Amazon or Barnes and Noble.

Have a great week!

Shawn M. Galloway ProAct Safety, Inc

Listen Now:

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Greetings everyone, this podcast recorded while in Dubai, United Arab Emirates. For the podcast this week I’d like to share an article written by Terry Mathis, published in December 2012 in EHS Today Magazine.  It was titled, Is Safety Mandatory or Discretionary? The published article can be found under Insights at www.ProActSafety.com.

I hope you enjoy the podcast this week. If you would like to download or play on demand our other podcasts, please visit the ProAct Safety’s podcast website at: http://www.safetycultureexcellence.com. If you would like access to archived podcasts (older than 90 days – dating back to January 2008) please visit www.ProActSafety.com/Store. For more detailed strategies to achieve and sustain excellence in performance and culture, pick up a copy of our book, STEPS to Safety Culture Excellence, available through WILEY (publisher), Amazon or Barnes and Noble.

Have a great week!

Shawn M. Galloway ProAct Safety, Inc

Listen Now:

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Using incident data to improve safety is nothing new. However, when the goal is attained and your accident data starts to lose its statistical significance, what can be done? Near-miss data can help fill in gaps left by dwindling incident rates, and provide clear information with which to focus. But near-miss data is problematic to gather and often misinterpreted. Learn how to avoid common problems and take an important step toward more proactive safety metrics.

Learn to: • Achieve accurate near-miss reporting • Determine the most effective accident prevention strategies • Use your data to its fullest potential • Develop a standard term and definition for a near-miss • Review examples of the best reporting systems and forms in safety • Enhance motivators and reduce demotivators that impact reporting

For more information contact ProAct Safety at 936.273.8700 or info (at) ProActSafety.com

Shawn M. Galloway ProAct Safety www.ProActSafety.com www.SafetyCultureExcellence.com

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Greetings everyone, this podcast recorded while in Baku, Azerbaijan. I’d like to share an article I wrote that was published December 2012 in Occupational Health & Safety Magazine.  It was titled, Understanding the Roles of Behavior in Safety. The published article can either be found on the magazine’s website or under Insights at www.ProActSafety.com.

I hope you enjoy the podcast this week. If you would like to download or play on demand our other podcasts, please visit the ProAct Safety’s podcast website at: http://www.safetycultureexcellence.com. If you would like access to archived podcasts (older than 90 days – dating back to January 2008) please visit www.ProActSafety.com/Store. For more detailed strategies to achieve and sustain excellence in performance and culture, pick up a copy of our book, STEPS to Safety Culture Excellence, available through WILEY (publisher), Amazon or Barnes and Noble.

Have a great week!

Shawn M. Galloway ProAct Safety, Inc

Listen Now:

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Health, Safety, and Environmental (HSE) professionals face an increasing challenge, one that intensifies with each new hypercompetitive priority. It is little wonder why organizations strive to move safety from a priority to a value. To create these shared values within an organization, they must be reinforced at or near the point of decision. In principle, this always holds true. In practice, accomplishing this grows increasing difficult.

Simply stating that safety is a value at an increasing frequency and passion does not make it so. The successful HSE leader of tomorrow cannot simply work towards value creation; they must become a transformational leader.

Key Issues Addressed During Workshop • The challenges facing future HSE leaders • Redefining safety excellence • Transformational opportunities for further cultural and performance improvement for organizations already leading in safety efforts • Best practices of top performing organizations in safety and operational excellence • Strategies to self-diagnose for transformational opportunities within your organization that will put you onto the path to safety excellence • Proven elements of the safety culture excellence model and behavior of the best companies to sustain this desirable goal • How to engage employees in safety, solicit discretional effort, and create a workplace culture that is committed to sustaining safety excellence • Updated safety models and approaches that have resulted in millions of annualized savings • A review of the better practices of excellence cultures • A review of the elements of Safety Culture Excellence®

For more information contact ProAct Safety at 936.273.8700 or info (at) ProActSafety.com

For more detailed strategies to achieve and sustain excellence in performance and culture, pick up a copy of our book, STEPS to Safety Culture Excellence, available through WILEY (publisher), Amazon or Barnes and Noble.

Shawn M. Galloway ProAct Safety www.ProActSafety.com

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