Safety Culture Excellence®

As more and more leaders and safety professionals realize the limitations of reactive safety, they search for leading indicators to help them manage safety more proactively.  This thinking fueled the concept that lagging indicators alone, are not truly representative of safety performance, nor are they predictive or prescriptive.

 The first round of so-called “leading indicators” was little more than a measurement of safety-related activities: hours of safety training, attendance at safety meetings, participation in safety programs, etc.  OSHA’s crackdown on incentives that could potentially suppress reporting of accidents drove many organizations to base their incentives on these activity metrics rather than simply not having an accident.  

When behavior-based safety became the rage, the measurement of behaviors from observations came to be thought of as a leading indicator. As safety culture became a buzz phrase, perception surveys gained in popularity and came to be considered another potential leading indicator.  The search for meaningful leading indicators goes on because no one of these has proven adequate in predicting and preventing injuries.

Where none of these alone succeed, all of them together potentially can.  A balanced-scorecard approach in which the metrics not only complement, but predict each other has proven quite effective in proactively predicting how to prevent accidents.  When you measure how much activity it takes to change perceptions, how much of a change in perceptions it takes to change behaviors, and how much behavior change it takes to change the lagging indicators, you begin to truly measure the effectiveness of safety efforts.  Just as balanced scorecards have revolutionized strategic management, with our most successful clients, balanced scorecards for safety have proven to have a transformational impact on safety management.  

-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 Decatur, AL. I’d like to share an article I wrote, published September 2013 in OH&S Magazine. 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 - http://proactsafety.com/insights/steps-to-safety-culture-excellence

Have a great week!

Shawn M. Galloway
ProAct Safety

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I heard a good analogy recently about the difference between hazards and risks. “Hazards are the sharks you spot in ocean while standing on the shore. They become Risks when you get in the water.” How well do you help those you lead, understand, identify, and respond to the differences?

With good intentions, many organizations prompt activities to purposefully and proactively identify potential hazards in the workplace. While this is admirable, it becomes a complex issue when there isn’t a shared understanding of what a hazard is and isn’t, and how some turn into risk. But, not all risk will turn into incidents and injuries. Further, if there is a shared belief that “safe means zero risk and safety first”, or “safety is our number one priority”; might there be mixed signals sent?

Consider how this might be interpreted, “They say our goal is zero injuries and zero risks and that ‘safety first’ means we are controlling all the risks, yet we have brought several to management’s attention with no action!” This isn’t just hyperbole, this misunderstanding was the result of a conversation with a key union official within a client organization.   

Let’s provide some further context on hazards and risk. Wikipedia provides a good definition of hazard. “A hazard is a situation that poses a level of threat to life, health, property, or environment. Most hazards are dormant or potential, with only a theoretical risk of harm; however, once a hazard becomes "active", it can create an emergency situation. A hazardous situation that has come to pass is called an incident. Hazard and possibility interact together to create risk.” Note the key points in this, “most hazards are… only a theoretical risk of harm; however, once a hazard becomes ‘active’…”

A further search in Wikipedia provides another good explanation of risk. “Risk is the potential of loss (an undesirable outcome, however not necessarily so) resulting from a given action, activity and/or inaction. The notion implies that a choice having an influence on the outcome sometimes exists (or existed). Potential losses themselves may also be called "risks". Any human endeavor carries some risk, but some are much riskier than others.” Again, some key points to tease out: “Risk is the potential of loss… resulting from a given action”. Moreover, it points out “Any human endeavor carries some risk…”

Some safety advocates propose there is little point in debating terminology. I strongly disagree. How common language is used influences beliefs and behaviors within the culture. The English language has many different meanings for the same word. Have you ever used a word or phrase that was interpreted incorrectly? Of course you have. You know how important it is to use the correct words when communicating with your family. Why should our dialogue within safety be less important? After all, isn’t it our number one priority? Or wait, is it a core value?

- Shawn M. Galloway

Here is a short video on this topic: http://youtu.be/_BrpiL4rxgk

Shawn M. Galloway is the President of ProAct Safety and the coauthor of two books, his latest published Feb 2013 by Wiley is STEPS to Safety Culture Excellence. As an internationally recognized safety excellence expert, he has helped hundreds of organizations within every major industry to achieve and sustain excellence in performance and culture.  He has been listed in this year’s National Safety Council Top 40 Rising Stars, EHS Today Magazine’s 50 People Who Most Influenced EHS and ISHN Magazine’s POWER 101 – Leaders of the EHS World and again in the recent, elite list of Up and Coming Thought Leaders. In addition to the books, Shawn has authored over 300 podcasts, 100 articles and 80 videos on the subject of safety excellence in culture and performance.

Trucking companies are beginning to address driver behaviors with new technologies.  Several companies make tracking devices that monitor drivers and photographically capture their behaviors and the road conditions in which they are operating.  Post trip, these companies can know how many times drivers hit the brakes hard, changed lanes suddenly, exceeded speed limits, and exhibited other behaviors critical to driving safety.  Many of these organizations are also monitoring driver cell phone calls and texting while driving.

All this information is supposedly designed to prevent accidents by changing driver behavior.  But how these technologies impact organizational safety culture seems to be an afterthought.  If used to coach drivers into better driving habits they can potentially create super safety cultures in which drivers strive for more excellent performance.  If used as an advanced way to police and punish drivers for offenses previously undetectable, they could seriously destroy safety culture and create a police state in its place.  

It is not technology that impacts safety culture, but the way in which organizations implement technology.  We have NEVER seen a safety culture punished into excellence.  We have seen many cultures coached into excellence.  How you use technology is up to you, but consider the culture you will create as well as the behaviors you will identify.  A degraded safety culture can quickly erase gains made through policing safety technologically.  

-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 Starkville, Mississippi. I’d like to share an article written by Terry Mathis, published June 2013 in EHS Today Magazine.  It was titled, The Perceptions That Shape Safety Excellence.  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 - http://proactsafety.com/insights/steps-to-safety-culture-excellence

Have a great week!

Shawn M. Galloway ProAct Safety

Listen Now:

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Greetings everyone, this podcast recorded while in Orange, Texas. I’d like to share an article I wrote, published June 2013 in ISHN Magazine.  It was titled, You Need to Manage Strategically. 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 - http://proactsafety.com/insights/steps-to-safety-culture-excellence

Have a great week!

Shawn M. Galloway ProAct Safety, Inc

Listen Now:

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Greetings everyone, this podcast recorded while in Nashville, Tennessee. I’d like to share an article I wrote, published April 2013 in BIC Magazine.  It was titled, Misunderstanding Safety Leading Indicators.  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 - http://proactsafety.com/insights/steps-to-safety-culture-excellence

Have a great week!

Shawn M. Galloway ProAct Safety, Inc

Listen Now:

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Greetings everyone, this podcast recorded while in Bastrop, Texas. I’d like to share an article I wrote that was published March 2013 in QHSE Focus Magazine.  It was titled, Challenging the Goal of 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 - http://proactsafety.com/insights/steps-to-safety-culture-excellence

Have a great week!

Shawn M. Galloway ProAct Safety, Inc

Listen Now:

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Three has been a lot of dialogue lately about high-severity accidents.  Some have questioned the basic assumptions of people like Herbert William Heinrich that tended to think that all levels of severity come from the same risk pools.  Several research projects have focused on severe accidents and sought to determine their root causes and find strategies to prevent them.  The real danger in focusing on topics like this is that we tend to lose the balance of our safety efforts.  We tend to focus either on the highest frequency accidents or the highest severity accidents and not on both.

While the majority of severe injuries result from process issues that are usually covered by rules and procedures, and the most frequent accident tend to be more personal and involve worker behaviors;  there are exceptions to both.  It is crucial that we achieve compliance with regulations and our own rules and procedures while encouraging and empowering workers to go “above and beyond.”  If we take our focus off one kind of risk while we work on another, we do so at our workers’ peril.  Even mundane risks can sometimes result in unusually severe injuries.  A behavioral approach should not take effort away from compliance efforts.  While we strive to better understand both our severe and our frequent accidents, we should balance our efforts to prevent both types.

-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 Billings, MT. I’d like to share an article I wrote that was published December 2012 in BIC Magazine.  It was titled, Avoiding the 10 Common Pitfalls of Behavior-Based 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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