Safety Leadership | Safety Excellence For Business

Close Up: YOUR Safety and YOUR Security in the Workplace

October 10, 2023 By Richard N. Knowles Leave a Comment

It is a nice exclamation mark on my day when I’m asked to participate in a blog-talk radio show on topics I’m passionate about: Safety and Security in the Workplace.

On October 2nd, I was interviewed on Close Up Radio by host Jim Masters.

Below is the gist of the broadcast, and while everyone has a crucial and personal role in workplace safety and security, leaders have an even higher level of responsibility and accountability.

Consider this: Employees in the public and private sector are extremely apprehensive about workplace violence. Over the years many incidents of terrible injuries and fatalities have occurred from active shooters and other homicides which has become shockingly all too common. Whether physical, psychological, or sexual, workplace violence is a major concern for employers and employees. We are all entitled to a safe and secure workplace – All of us! The responsibility for preventing these tragic occurrences falls directly on the leaders who must adopt a different mindset and decide on the best approach to commit to the business and their people.

I shared that leaders play a critical role in creating and maintaining a healthy work culture. Leaders need to lead by example in creating a supportive and inclusive environment. That is why in my previous work as a plant manager in chemical plants and now, as we consult (Nagele, Knowles and Associates), we prepare leaders to improve employee engagement and retention. Because an intentional, highly engaged workplace results in employee satisfaction where a sense of community is established, and the business and the people thrive.

Respect is one of the most important traits in the workplace because it creates a positive work culture, promotes teamwork, productivity, and collaboration. Treating people with courtesy and kindness should be the standard in any workplace. Examples of respect in the workplace include listening to one another’s opinions and conversing with an open mind so we build nurturing relationships. It is also about insisting on good behavior across the board – codes of conduct and respectful workplace policies are necessary for eliminating dysfunctional workplace behaviors like bullying, and harassment of all kinds.

Respect is essential for leaders to build connections.

Leaders are in charge of making certain that all employees feel valued and that each has voice, so they feel like part of the team.

How leaders and workers treat each other by interacting respectfully is critical. Effective leaders model this behavior and set the example resulting in more respect being shown by employees. It becomes a genuinely good place to work with increased job satisfaction where employees work well together and stay productive, boosting the company’s bottom line. Foster a culture of respect and you will create a safe working environment where they will feel emotionally safer, happier, even in these challenging times.

If you’d like to hear the broadcast in its full form, here is the link.

Always willing to answer your questions – Call me at 716-622-6467.

Filed Under: Safety for Business, Safety Leadership Tagged With: Close Up Radio, Jim Masters, Nagele Knowles And Associates, safety in the workplace, safety leadership, working safely in the workplace, workplace safety, workplace security, workplace violence

Teen Injuries for Young, Inexperienced People at Work

August 10, 2023 By Richard N. Knowles Leave a Comment

I recently saw several reports of teen injuries or teens being killed at work.

All these deaths involved young people working in dangerous environments like logging and heavy equipment work. It is sad to have any person killed, especially a young person with all their life ahead of them.

But these are not the only places where young people get killed. They are often hired to do basic tasks in unfamiliar environments. They do not know the potential of serious injuries from fork trucks scurrying about, or logs being sawed, or cardboard compactors, or woodchippers, or other moving, dangerous activities. Many get put into these new jobs with little safety training. They think that bad things will not happen to them and take dangerous risks. Their understanding of safety is usually very sparce. These young people are very vulnerable. And it is unconscionable that adults are willing to put these vulnerable youngsters into such situations.

With the heat waves we are experiencing, they probably do not understand the dangers of heat exhaustion. They may be assigned to work in a closed warehouse, a truck, or other confined space where the heat dangers can be very high. I have a young friend who just started with a package delivery company and was out making deliveries. He was very active and darting in and out of the hot truck to deliver packages. The sun was blazing. He knew he was getting tired but did not know the dangers of heat exhaustion. He became dizzy and threw up but tried to tough it out. He wound up in the hospital.

Newcomers Need Our Help

All of us who know our workplace understand the hazards and know the safety procedures necessary to help these young people. For many of us, these newcomers may seem like they are from a different world. Their work ethics may be strange like thinking it is okay to be late for work or to not follow safety rules.

We need to reach out to them and give them a hand. They need guidance and help as they enter our strange, new world. It helps to talk with them about the work, the expectations, and rules in a way that makes sense to them. We need to sit together with them and talk about this new world they are entering without putting them down or making them feel stupid. Tell them some stories about incidents that have happened. Show them, with hands on, the things they will be doing. Show them where they can find help if necessary. Maybe assign them to an experienced person who cares about people and who can help them get established. Make sure that they have the safety equipment they need. We should not baby them in the process, but make sure that they have the information they need and know the people to whom they can talk if they need help.

It is important to let them know what the standards and rules are so they can clearly understand what is expected of them. We need to be sure that they understand the language we use. Be careful with all the acronyms since they will sound like a foreign language to them.

We, as leaders and managers, have a great responsibility to
these young people and their families to really help them.

The plant manager of a big sugar mill where I was doing some safety work shared a powerful, sad story with a group of men with whom we were working. He asked the men if they remembered what happened to Joe, a mill operator, when he was so severely injured. They all remembered Joe’s tragic accident. The plant manager then told them about visiting Joe in the hospital. Joe’s parents were there also visiting. At one point Joe’s father turned to the plant manager and said, “I trusted my son to you and the company and look at what you did to him!”

Let’s all help the young people coming into our workspaces,
and never have to look a grieving parent in the eye,
apologizing to them for having failed them.

Leadership

When I was a Plant Manager, I did not work directly on safety issues. My focus was on the people and our relationships together. I spent hours every day talking with people all around the plant about things that were happening, how the business was doing, and some of our challenges. Safety often came up, and we addressed it as we went. Many of them began to take the initiative to identify and solve their own problems.

I felt it was important for people to know what was going on around them. I did this with respect, listening, asking them how I could help them, what problem was bugging them, and how we could improve things. I worked hard to let them see that I genuinely cared and built trust. Sometimes I would have to apologize for something I had said or done unintentionally. I also wanted them to see that they were an important part of the whole plant and were making a positive difference.

Sharing information, listening, and building trust, and helping people to see that their work (including their safety) was important and both their work and integrated safety connected to my leadership work. As I did this every day, things changed and the whole culture shifted. Our total performance significantly improved and in just 4 years we cut our injury rates by 97%. Then they sustained this for 19 years.

Why am I emphasizing this?

Because safety attention is integral to all work…and all work gets done through people…People do their best work when they understand the whole picture, and caring, authentic leadership (listening, sharing information, and building trust) are the absolute essentials to extraordinary outcomes.

Filed Under: Safety for Business, Safety Leadership Tagged With: reducing risks in the workplace, safety challenges in the workplace, safety in the workplace, safety leadership, safety procedures in the workplace, teens being injured at work, working safely in the workplace, workplace safety, workplace safety for teens

The Culture Wars

July 10, 2023 By Richard N. Knowles Leave a Comment

Our country is being pulled apart by people at both ends of the culture spectrum.

The political parties and most of the candidates are engaged in this hateful act. Over and over again they say and do things that are far out and of little use to anyone except the big internet companies who make money by getting people to click on something. People in other countries with whom I talk are amazed and wonder what we are doing to ourselves.

This is not just spoiling much of the public discourse; it also is poisoning our discourse at work. It is very risky to bring up something that may be controversial because arguments may break out and everyone gets angry. The pace of work slows down or even stops. Safety incidents are more likely to occur as people lose focus on their jobs. The culture of the organization gets broken down such that people stop talking together and learning stops.

There are many organizations that offer consultants to come into fix things as if culture is a thing like a car that we can take to the auto shop to fix something. Culture is not a thing.

In my view, culture is the outcome of the collective behaviors in which the people engage in their organization.

Here are some ideas about culture to think about:

Does your organization have a culture of respect and trust where people can come together to learn, share ideas, help each other, try new experiments, grow, and create new things?
Does your organization have a hard, top-down driven culture where directives and orders flow downward with little or no feedback?
Does your organization have a culture where things are so disorganized that no one seems to know what is going on?
Does your organization have strong silos of various experts who don’t talk and protect their territory with a vengeance?
Does your organization have different business objectives, often conflicting with one another so no one is working for the greater good?

When consultants are hired to fix these sorts of problems, they usually fail. They are working at the wrong end of the process. The culture is the collective outcome of what we are doing.

Shifting the Culture

When Richard N. Knowles and Associates is asked to come into an organization we come with questions and create a safe space for people at all levels from across the organization to come together to solve their complex problems.

Most organizations have about 85-90% of the information they need to solve their problems. So when they work together on an opening question like, “How do we make this place better and more effective?” in a space that is safe to be open, to share, to listen, to explore new ideas, to explore old ideas in a new way, to learn together, lots of new possibilities emerge.

They co-create their agreements about how they want to work together like helping each other, telling the truth, treating each other with respect, working for the greater good, apologizing for mistakes, sharing all information and building trust. Since these are co-created by all the people, they hold each other accountable and learn. As they come up with things that they want to do to address the opening question, they form teams to address them and work on them.

As people begin to work together in a new way that they have co-created, the culture begins to shift to one that is vibrant, safer, more productive, and healthier.

In our workshops, all these ideas which the people come up with are written onto a big poster which they put in their workplace so everyone can talk about it and keep it alive.

All their work needs to be kept visible and open for sharing and upgrading as conditions change. Everyone from top management to those working below needs to be a part of this process.

We have done this in many organizations of all types, and the process always works as long as the people are willing to talk together, learn and make things happen.

A vibrant, new culture quickly emerges from doing real work together this way and is sustained by posting their chart and continually talking together about it.

For example, in working with the City of Niagara Falls, NY, the Mayor and her leadership team cut $16,000,000 out of a $62,000,000 budget (24%), improved services and ended up with a $4,000,000 fund balance in their first term.

Please give us a call at 716-622-6467 or go to RNKnowlesAssociates.com to learn more.

Filed Under: Safety for Business, Safety Leadership Tagged With: collective behaviors in the workplace, culture wars in the workplace, effective workplace, reducing risks in the workplace, safety challenges in the workplace, safety in the workplace, safety leadership, understanding each other in the workplace, working safely in the workplace, workplace culture, workplace safety

The Stockholder Revolt at Dollar General

June 12, 2023 By Richard N. Knowles Leave a Comment

I just saw an interesting safety item in my morning safety alerts about the Dollar General Stores.

If you have been paying attention to the safety news, you know that Dollar General is under a lot of scrutiny from OSHA over their very poor safety and injury performance. They have been experiencing a lot of safety violations, accidents, and deaths.

When I go into a Dollar General Store, it is amazing to see all the variety of things that I can buy. They are the modern-day version of the old country general store. They are quite popular and new stores are springing up in many communities around the US. They really seem to focus on pleasing the customer with all sorts of things we most need and want. In just looking around their stores, it is hard to see why they are having safety problems.

Their safety problems are not usually in the front of their stores, but rather back, behind the scenes where new merchandise in being delivered and empty boxes and other wastes are being disposed of. They have mobile equipment like fork trucks and push carts to help unload their delivery trucks, move heavy pallets of goods around and restock shelves. They also have trash compactors to crush and bail cardboard boxes to make them ready for the paper recyclers to pick up.

Slow moving, heavy equipment is dangerous. The equipment is very heavy, does not make much noise as it is moved around, and is easily overlooked by other workers. There is a lot of history of people being maimed or killed by equipment like this. There is also a lot of training that needs to be done for everyone who works around or with this equipment to keep them safe.

The cardboard trash compactors are also very dangerous and need to be carefully used by well-trained people. How many stories have you heard of people being caught and pulled into a compactor with tragic results? You must know what you are doing when using equipment like this. Do all their people get the training they need to do their work safely?

Dollar General tries to keep their labor costs as low as they can, so they keep their workforce at a minimum level. This means that their people are very busy and preoccupied with getting their jobs done. Do they take the time to have the people thoroughly trained and knowledgeable about the safety hazards?

Very busy people mixed in with slow-moving, heavy fork truck and movers, and having to get the trash out of their stores as fast as they can is a very dangerous mix. In this article I just read, they mentioned that Dollar General has had 49 fatalities in the last 10 years. OSHA is pushing them hard to improve with little progress being made. Their board has not been very aggressive in improving the safety in their stores.

However, the Dollar General shareholders have had enough, and they have voted to over-rule the Board’s resistance, and to have safety inspections and audits in their stores. This is a powerful and great event of the shareholders deciding that killing and injuring people is wrong and that it is time do what is the right thing to do. This effort combined with the efforts by OSHA are very likely to have a major, positive impact on Dollar General’s safety performance. We’ll see.

Why am I emphasizing this situation at Dollar General? Because in your own workplace, there can be similar situations: crowded conditions, products and goods being rapidly moved around, housekeeping concerns, fork-trucks, and pallet movers, etc. Diligently adhering to the safety rules and keeping logistics running smoothly, while fully training your people – all come together for reducing the potential for injuries and incidents.

We can all take heed of this situation and learn from it!

Filed Under: Safety for Business, Safety Leadership Tagged With: equipment training, equipment training in the workplace, reducing risks in the workplace, safety and injury performance, safety challenges in the workplace, safety in the workplace, safety inspections, safety leadership, safety violations, working safely in the workplace, workplace injuries, workplace safety

Are You Convinced that Working Safely is a Good Thing?

March 10, 2023 By Richard N. Knowles Leave a Comment

What future lies ahead for safety?

The Winter 2022 HR Magazine has some interesting insights about looking into the future of work. While their focus is on Human Resources, we know that HR and Safety go hand-in-hand. The same future scenarios are coming for Safety Professionals and Leaders.

The Covid pandemic and aftermath became an ugly reminder of how difficult it is to predict and prepare for the future. Yet that doesn’t mean that safety leaders shouldn’t think ahead – especially when there are no absolutes. Older, experienced workers are retiring, and the digital revolution continues. It is not too early to start thinking and preparing for new generations to be taking over or that effective digital training will become a necessity. It is never too soon to think about preparing employees to expect the unexpected…to prepare for what may not yet be known.

One quote that struck me (in this article regarding future training) was, “You’ve got to convince people why they need to do the work, and it’s not just ‘because you’re paying me to do it.’”

For decades, now we’ve been teaching our workers the “why” to work safely, so that they can go home at the end of their shift whole – with life and limb intact – eyes, ears, fingers, toes. The “why” becomes evident with every piece of protective equipment that is required…the last line of defense.

Convincing people that being able to go home to their families in the same condition as they entered the workplace is the goal, without being maimed, having long-term disability, or worse, a fatality in the workplace. That is the “why” that underscores workplace safety.

The next “why” is what we all should know as human beings…we grow, we develop, we learn, we solve problems…individually and together. There is much value to learn by experience, and to learn by training mechanisms that are most effective to the task, the job, the larger picture. Learning while doing work fulfills a natural need for personal and professional growth.

The final “why” is because our economy runs by money…we live the way we choose because we have money to spend on our own pursuit of happiness…when we work, we get paid; when we are paid we provide for ourselves and loved ones; we contribute to the economy in the system in which we exist.

Because of the changing futures (as noted above), Teamwork will become the new game plan. Healthy culture and trust will have to draw more focus. The article notes that scrums, sprints, and squads will be widespread as employers draw workers from all over the company and even from outside the organization to work on projects together. You’ll see a breaking away from hierarchical ways of working and putting people into these newer constructs. Putting together effective project teams is the way of the future.

In safety, however, this is not new. The best safety improvement teams and trouble-shooting/problem solving endeavors have drawn from people across the workplace – where sharing ideas, prompting new innovations, and, ultimately, improving the safety of the workplace (system changes, process flows, etc.) spring forth from people who have knowledge of the concern, a relationship to what’s at stake, a voice and information to share, experience to convey, and an overall desire to make things better.

In safety, the “buddy” system is tried and true. Looking out for our workplace “brothers/sisters” – everyone – has been a mainstay to help ensure that people not only get the job done well, but that they get the job done safely. The individual “person” has a valued life – underscoring the “why our workplaces have to be safe, and work be meaningful.”

While signage in the workplace helps us with prompts to work safely, taking cues from those we work with, paying attention, having situational awareness for ourselves and others must be the norm. That’s not a bold prediction – that’s a bold requirement in my mind, for the present and the future of work.

We’re all in this together.

Filed Under: Safety for Business, Safety Leadership Tagged With: buddy system, project teams in the workplace, protective equipment, safety leaders, safety leadership, safety professionals, teamwork, teamwork in the workplace, work safely, working safely in the workplace, workplace safety, workplace safety in the future

Safety Isn’t Just Safety Anymore…

February 10, 2023 By Richard N. Knowles Leave a Comment

What every Manager needs to know that OSHA and ISO already do!

It started out in 1970 with OSHA’s regulations to enhance Safety in the Workplace – the first leg of the Safety Stool, a.k.a. as Occupational Safety, exampled by preventing slips, trips and falls, requiring hearing protection, hand and foot protection, and eye-ware.

Then came the second leg of the Safety Stool, Occupational Health, exampled by preventing environmental/respiratory and ergonomic hazards. Then came Process Safety Management (PSM), exampled by what it takes to keep hazardous substances in the pipes, and which became an essential part of workplace safety with the comprehensive issuance of OSHA 1910 – the third leg.

All three legs are important and are critical for Safety professionals, HR professionals, Managers and Supervisors to embrace and for people to understand. Indeed, OSHA requires this attention to keep our people safe (life and limb) within the workplace.

Now, with this new decade of Workplace Violence rearing its ugly head, we know that we must add a fourth leg to the Safety Stool. Because attention to this 4th prong needs diligent awareness, it is now becoming paramount that every manager and supervisor be schooled in Situational Awareness:

What is happening around you?
What is happening between and among people in the workplace?
Where are your vulnerabilities?
Are you noticing the cultural dysfunction happening in your workplace?
Are you able to engage appropriately to find out what’s happening?
How do you address these dysfunctions?

The fourth leg of this stool is what is called Psychological or Social Safety. Another way to describe it is the psychological harm that comes with repeated bullying, harassment, incivilities, and dysfunctional behaviors, that leave workers dreading to go to work, or that increase the risk of home-growing an active threat/shooter, or having a suicide or murder in your workplace, let alone the bad press that comes with a highly publicized incident.

If no one steps in to stop bad behaviors when they are happening, they continue and escalate over time. Not paying attention to social risk manifests into psychological harm as the continuum of bad behaviors escalate in the workplace – and ultimately can impact people in harmful ways. Yes, OSHA is keen on this 4th leg of the safety stool, too, and wants to know what your business, company, organization, or team is doing about it. Prevention of Workplace Violence is the operative word.

What is Workplace Violence?

OSHA explains that workplace violence is violence or the threat of violence against workers. It can occur at or outside the workplace and can range from threats and verbal abuse to physical assaults and homicide, one of the leading causes of job-related deaths. However it manifests itself, workplace violence is a growing concern for employers and employees nationwide.

OSHA makes it very clear. Employers are responsible for ensuring that the workplace does NOT become a hostile workplace. (Bullying, harassment, and incivilities contribute to hostile environments). OSHA requires employers to provide a safe workplace for their employees…both physically safe and psychologically safe. This is covered by the General Duty Clause Section 5(a)(1).

Enter the new ISO Standard: ISO 45003 IS THE NEW INTERNATIONAL STANDARD (2021-06) – Occupational Health and Safety Management – Psychological health and safety at work – Guidelines for managing psychosocial risks. This new standard states that Management must be prepared to deal with violence that involves a person (employee, visitor, vendor), etc., losing control, without a weapon. This normally means dealing with psychological safety factors.

It is difficult to predict violent acts, so the Standard expects managers and associates to be vigilant. Report any concerns of erratic behaviors to supervision and HR as soon as possible.

Examples of violent behavior include but are not limited to:

Intimidating or bullying others
Abusive language
Physical assault
Threatening behavior
Sexual or racial harassment
Concealing or using a weapon
Anger
Tantrums

You get the picture. None of these types of behaviors belong in a workplace, thus the underscoring of new Respectful Workplace policies.

At Nagele, Knowles and Associates, we understand the construct of workplace violence and how to identify it. It starts with knowing your inside culture (culture assessment) to understand where bullying and dysfunctional behavior is happening and how to stop it in its tracks. What is your workplace doing to ensure a Respectful Workplace? It equally starts with a physical security vulnerability assessment to understand where you, your site, your people are most vulnerable to a perpetrator entering your workplace to do harm, and how to deter that from happening.

The 4th leg requires Situational Awareness – that is the tip of the spear when it comes to the prevention of workplace violence…from the inside or from the outside! This holds true in the workplace, and in living our daily lives. Wake up! Be Alert! Observing, expecting, embracing, and requiring a Respectful Workplace is powerful for reducing those harmful dysfunctional behaviors.

Employees must become stakeholders in their own safety and security and develop a survival mindset as well. Vigorous prevention programs, timely interventions, and appropriate responses by organizations and their employees will contribute significantly to a safe, secure, and respectful environment. That’s what we teach; that’s what we do.

Want to know more? Check out our book “Guide to Reducing the Risk of Workplace Violence…the Absolute Essentials” available on Amazon. It has been labeled the “gold standard” – a comprehensive guide to reducing your risk of workplace violence happening in your workplace…from the inside or the outside or give us a call at 716-622-6467.

Filed Under: Safety Excellence, Safety for Business, Safety Leadership Tagged With: bullying in the workplace, harassment, ISO, occupational health, occupational safety, OSHA, OSHA regulations, safety in the workplace, safety leadership, situational awareness, social safety, violence in the workplace, work safely, working safely in the workplace, workplace safety, workplace violence

Building Respect and Trust

December 12, 2022 By Richard N. Knowles Leave a Comment

Why do so many managers and safety professionals keep treating the people in organizations as objects to be controlled so they will work safely?

They seem to assume that the employees can’t or won’t think for themselves and have to be made to work safely. These managers and safety professionals are not bad people, but they are stuck in their basic assumptions about people. So many seem to think that they have the answers and the power to make people do as they are told.

Thinking of the people as “employees” is part of the problem. Thinking of people as “employees” brings different thoughts to mind. The word “employee” is a legal word that defines my relationship with my employer with respect to things like hours of work, pay rates, benefits, etc. It also carries some tough top-down implications. If the boss gives an order, it better be done. The boss and the employee are not seen as equals in terms of respect, hopes, aspirations, good ideas and creative energy.

This has been the approach for generations and yet, there are still over 6,000 people a year getting killed at work and thousands are suffering serious injuries. Just using the same approach, with variations, over and over, and expecting to see real improvements is a problem!

There needs to be a fundamental shift to assumptions like these.

My Safety Focus: Building Respect and Trust.

My basic assumptions are:

We work with people who have brains and can think; their hopes and dreams are similar to my own.
People do want to work safely and not get hurt.
People want to be treated with respect.
The people doing the work have important knowledge and ideas to contribute.
People want to be listened to.
I do not know what they know, so we need to share information together so we can do our best.
Safety is connected to everything we do; it is part of the whole system.
It takes everyone pulling together to achieve excellence.
I do not have a right to make my living at a place where it is okay for people to get hurt.

I did not work on safety as such. My focus was on the people and building trust and a better, safer future. The more I worked this way with the people, the better our performance became. Within 4 years, our Total Injury Rate had dropped by about 97% to a rate of about 0.3. (The rate was only a way to keep score.) The people liked working this way and sustained their performance for 19 years. I wrote about this in my recently published paper in Professional Safety [Knowles, R.N. (2022, Nov.). Leading vs. Managing: A tale of two organizational processes. Professional Safety, 67(11), 42-46].

The importance of building trust and working with people has been known for a long time. Douglas McGregor wrote The Human Side of Enterprise in 1960 about Theory X and Y. Recently the work of others like Rosa Carrillo in her book, The Relationship Factor in Safety Leadership, 2020, and even in this current issue of Professional Safety [ Sarkus, D.J. (2022, Nov.). Building community through servant leadership. Professional Safety, 67(11), 24-29.] are emphasizing the importance of respect and trust.

This shift in thinking and working with the people results in a lot fewer people getting hurt or killed at work. Yet why do so many safety people seem to be all wrapped up in chasing injuries and incidents? Some just counting the numbers. Others developing more advanced ways to get employees to work more safely, or to develop better ways to analyze incident situations. Many are just pushing production with little or no regard for safety. Some safety consultants have learned to give great motivational talks that are fun to hear, but have almost no impact in the workplace. The BLS statics on workplace injuries and deaths are not showing much improvement.

The global safety improvement industry was estimated to be over $20,000,000. The trade shows have lots of very fancy safety equipment and the consultants are selling their approaches. Is there a vested interest it doing things like we have always do it and getting the same results?

Many managers think that you can not have excellence in safety and earnings at the same time. That is not what I found at the plant I led where we cut the injury rate by 97% and increased the earnings by 300%.

Conclusion

If the whole safety effort was shifted to treating people with respect, listening and learning together and doing what makes sense, there would be a huge improvement in total safety and a lot fewer people getting injured and killed.

Is the effort to build trust, learn to treat people with respect, to listen more carefully, to build on each other’s good ideas too high a price for saving many, many lives?

What will it take to make the shift?

Filed Under: Safety for Business, Safety Leadership, Safety Partnership Tagged With: building respect and trust in the workplace, creating a safety culture, D.J. Sarkus, Douglas McGregor, leading versus managing, Rosa Carrillo, safety improvement, safety in the workplace, safety leadership, safety management, safety performance, safety practitioners, safety professionals, safety systems, work safely, working safely in the workplace, workplace safety

A Safety Systems View for Organizations

November 10, 2022 By Richard N. Knowles Leave a Comment

Everything happens through the people and all three phases of safety are interconnected.

Note: Many Safety Practitioners go about their safety work task-to-task without considering the broader “systems” in which they work, nor the people that are impacted by their decisions. This newsletter is intended to help lift up safety thinking and actions to a higher level. A systems approach can have a big impact on improving the total safety performance.

In October, I introduced a new figure showing a whole systems view of safety, where occupational safety, occupational health and process safety management are connected and work together through all the people in the organization.

I have thought a lot about this figure and want to share a new figure with you.

the whole safety system

We all live in a world with dynamic systems moving all around us all the time. When we can see the systems around us, we can be much more effective in understanding how things are interacting and deciding what we need to do. We can become much more resilient and sustainable. This is certainly my own experience when working with organizations. In many ways the safety system behaves like a living system where everything is connected and working together.

The traditional approach I see being taken in most safety work is one where the organization is treated as if it were a machine. The belief is that if we take it apart and fix the parts, that it will work better when we put it all back together. The “master mechanic” comes in, fixes the parts, (the employees) and tells it what to do. Improvement is modest at best, and resilience and sustainability are low.

Taking the “living” safety system apart to fix it, kills it.

In thinking about the living safety system, all the people in the organization are involved and partnering to build a better safety future through continuous conversations in a psychologically safe space, at all levels, about how to improve together, think about new ideas, learn, and do things for improvement. All the people in the organization are the center of it all.

Each component of safety is placed around the people. Each safety component has their own particular technology which needs to be done very well. In doing each part as if they are separate does not result in achieving safety excellence. It is in embracing the whole safety system where everyone wins. Together we co-create a culture that is both resilient and sustainable.

You’ll notice that I have introduced a new term I call “Environmental Safety,” which looks at process safety management in a different way. Environmental Safety relates to impacts on people and the air, water and land from wastes, spills, fires, explosions, leaks, sloppy operations, etc. It includes a lot that is already in process safety management PSM When the PSM is done well, the environmental safety is excellent. When the PSM is neglected disasters like the Deep Water Horizon kill people and create huge messes.

The safety system does not exist in isolation. There are a lot of other systems surrounding it that connect directly or indirectly that can be influenced by how well the safety system performs. A highly effective safety system can have a powerful, positive impact on the larger systems in which is functions. A poorly functioning safety system can negatively impact a lot in the larger systems around it, which can then raise concerns, drive regulations, anger the people, the families, the communities and weaken the business in countless ways.

dig deeper to reach a little higher when it comes to business safety

Conclusion

When we use a systems view and see what is going on around us, we are much more able to make effective decisions. Everything moves through the people. In sharing all information, treating people with respect and trust, and giving people the credit for their learning and accomplishments, we create the conditions where energy and creativity are released. We can effectively move in response to changes and become much more sustainable. The people and the business are winners.

Note: I refer to the people in the organization as “people” rather than “employees.” The word “employee” is a legal term that defines the relationship of the person to the organization with things like hours of work and rates of pay. It also carries strong, negative implications about the boss/subordinate relationship. However, referring to people as “people” implies that we are all in this together coming from different perspectives, bringing different gifts, knowledge and skills which are all needed for shared success.

We all work together with respect and build trust.

Please call me at 716-622-6467 or email me at RNKnowles@aol.com if you would like to talk about these ideas. See also RNKnowlesAssociates.com and SafetyExcellenceForBusiness.com.

Filed Under: Safety for Business, Safety Leadership Tagged With: creating a safety culture, environmental safety, occupational health, occupational safety, safety in the workplace, safety management, safety performance, safety practitioners, safety systems, work safely, workplace safety

Respect, Trust, Partnering and Safety…Excellence Emerges…and it Matters!

October 10, 2022 By Richard N. Knowles Leave a Comment

Safety and Environmental Performance

When I was the Plant Manager of the DuPont Belle, West Virginia chemical plant, I developed a practice of walking around the Plant 4-5 hours a day, every day for almost 8 years, for the safety of the employees. The plant was a mile long and a third of a mile wide, with about 1,300 people working there.

I needed to engage with everyone to get to know them, their work, and to see what I could do to help them. I did not make decisions as I walked around, since that would weaken the line supervision. I would talk about our mission of being the best we could be with our responsibilities for safety, the environment, the people, the quality of our products and work, our customers, our customer service, our costs, and our community. I would share the news of the day, talking openly about things I knew about the plant, our businesses, and the community.

I would also ask if they had any news to share. I would ask for help in how I could improve my own job. There was a lot of give and take; some days were great and some were very hard. My mantra was, “I don’t have a right to make my living at a place where it was okay for you to get hurt. We also need to make a living so let’s figure this out together.”

In our conversations, we talked a lot about occupational safety and occupational health. Many good ideas emerged. I would encourage the people to follow-up on their good ideas and support them. We would also talk about process safety management and the importance of keeping the chemicals in the pipes, improving yields, and reducing waste.

I encouraged them to go after leaks and to talk with the engineers about how they could run the processes better. I encouraged the engineers to teach the supervisors and operators about the theory and processes they were running. I encouraged them to learn as much as they could. I would ask about the safety and environmental maintenance work orders and if they were being taken care of promptly. When people asked me questions I couldn’t answer, I told them I did not know the answer, and promised to get back to them with the answer, which I always did.

We had a Central Safety Committee of about 50 people, which met monthly. People from across the organization participated and led the various committees. We integrated all our discussions, so everyone was thinking about their roles in improving occupational safety, health, and process safety. The 4-person safety group, operators, mechanics, supervisors, and engineers were all involved.

While each of the three parts of safety have their own technology, they all overlap in the people doing the work. We saw all aspects of safety and environmental performance as an integrated whole where everyone could make contributions. As the safety and environmental improvements built, this way of working, sharing information, building respect and trust, and helping people to see the importance of their contributions and to find meaning, spread all across the plant.

Treating the People with Respect and Building Trust

In addition to improving our safety and business performance, we emphasized the importance of treating people with respect and telling the truth. I modeled this as I walked around and visited with the people. I apologized for the mistakes I made. I encouraged them to talk together this way as well. I also worked hard to eliminate any bullying or harassment behavior because it is bad for the people and blocks the open flow of information, greatly hindering any improvement efforts. As it became safer for people to speak up and share their ideas and thinking, our total performance significantly improved. Everything happened through the people giving their energy, creativity, and resourcefulness.

The Integrated Whole

Everyone does some of each of these three phases of safety in their jobs. While each of these has different technologies and requirements, they are all in play all the time. For example, an operator moving a container of chemicals needs to be wearing the correct PPE, lifting correctly and being sure that nothing gets spilled. Or a clerical person needs to be seated properly to take care of their back, handling office equipment like scissors carefully, and putting their trash into the proper containers. Or a truck driver needs to use three-point contact when entering and exiting his truck to prevent a fall, have proper cushioning in the truck to support their back and adhere to speeds that are appropriate for the highway conditions.

All dimensions of safety are taking place all the time, as each person does their work. Each person needs to integrate these as appropriate for their particular assignments and tasks. When these are an integrated whole, their jobs are much easier as they think about them together.

Having them as an integrated whole also goes a long way to preventing disasters like the Deep-Water Horizon where the people on the drilling platform received a safety prize for great occupational safety, and then the platform blew up a day or so later because the process safety was falling apart.

The work of the Belle Plant people clearly shows that if we approach safety as an integrated whole, the total performance of the people improves.

Summary

Trust was built, people opened up, shared their ideas, learned, made decisions about improving their work, and brought occupational safety, health, and process safety management together into an integrate whole. The mood of the entire organization became very positive as things came together. In just four years the people had cut our injury rate by 97% to a Total Recordable Injury Rate of 0.3, reduced our emissions to the air, water, and land by 95%, improved productivity by 45% and increased earnings 300%.

This integrated way of working can happen for your business too. Give me a call at 716-622-6467 for more details. Let’s get started! Please check out our website: Safety Excellence for Business.

Filed Under: Safety for Business, Safety Leadership Tagged With: accountability in the workplace, creating a safety culture, embracing safety in the workplace, engaging employees in workplace safety, environmental improvements, environmental safety, improving productivity in the workplace, improving safety performance in the workplace, occupational health, occupational safety, safety performance, workplace safety

Leaders: You Must Understand This in the Workplace!

September 12, 2022 By Richard N. Knowles Leave a Comment

I’m presenting at the New York State SHRM Conference in Verona, New York, this coming weekend.

That is the state-wide gathering of Human Resource Managers – it is good to be able to return to this big conference (post covid). I’ve also spoken in the near past at Safety Professional gatherings around the fact that it matters what Leaders do or don’t do!

Whether we are HR Managers, Safety Leaders, CEO’s, Supervisors or Managers – the same message applies.

Notes:

I am amazed by how few Safety Leaders understand that the Cultural side of Workplace Violence (which can negatively manifest into bullying, harassment, incivilities, and dysfunction) is part of Safety – having a workplace free of intimidation and abuse is how we eliminate psychological and emotional injuries and incidents.
I am concerned how many Human Resource managers (many of them siloed into various positions, like “I only deal with Benefits; or I only deal with Talent Recruitment; or I only deal with onboarding”), have shunned their responsibility for behavioral dysfunctions within the larger organization. Yet, they do consider themselves Leaders.

Consider this: A Supervisor/Leader walks by an obvious Safety hazard/condition in the workplace, that if not corrected, will likely lead to a physical injury to someone. When that Leader walks by, ignoring it, he/she is telegraphing to the organization what their standard is – it doesn’t matter enough to him/her to take action – it’s okay if someone gets physically hurt.

Similarly, when a supervisor or leader observes or overhears harassment or bullying or disrespectful things being said, or gestures being made, and does nothing to stop it – he or she, again, conveys to the organization that it doesn’t matter – in other words, it is okay if someone is being hurt emotionally / psychologically – in effect, the Supervisor by not stepping up, allows the disrespectful dysfunctional behaviors – and because they go unchecked, these behaviors continue.

This begs the question: Why are Leaders timid? Afraid to step in? Lack the managerial courage? Is it lack of skill? Lack of will? Fearful of how they may be seen? Afraid of not being liked? Afraid of not being supported? There is always something underneath that every leader needs to understand about their own Leadership. How about YOU?

At Nagele and Knowles, we teach Leaders HOW TO LEAD. It is about stepping up, stepping in, and staying in the heat. The heat is hottest in the nosecone of the rocket. Do you need to learn more about handling conflict, engaging, and being better at confrontation skills?

Call us at 716-622-6467. We teach Leaders how to Lead effectively.

Filed Under: Safety for Business, Safety Leadership Tagged With: business leadership, embracing safety in the workplace, lead effectively in the workplace, leadership, leadership in the workplace, Nagele and Knowles, New York State SHRM Conference, safety in the workplace, safety leadership, workplace safety