In the first two parts of this series, we cited the results of four case studies as evidence of the link between common organizational culture issues and safety records. Let's now build on these findings and consider the steps that organizations can take to improve their safety performance.

New Benchmarks Based on Towers Perrin-ISR Research

By comparing strong positive and weak or negative safety cultures as maintained in a series of normative benchmarks, Towers Perrin-ISR pinpointed consistent organizational culture differentiators. As indicated in the case study results, companies with strong positive safety cultures had much more favorable opinions on workplace issues related to supervision, empowerment, teamwork and workload.

Towers Perrin-ISR aggregated its survey data into a series of new benchmarks that were unveiled at the National Safety Council Congress & Expo in October 2007. These benchmarks enable organizations to compare the cultural and environmental issues that impact workplace safety to factors that drive the top performing organizations of the world. The benchmarks include the:

Improving Your Safety Performance

Through its safety culture research, Towers Perrin-ISR has identified three areas of employee opinion that consistently show a relationship with safety metrics tracked in organizations today:

1. Supervision

Empirical evidence suggests that strong leadership and supervision are the basis for a safe work environment. Work sites where employees report favorable supervisor-employee relations also report a lower frequency of on-the-job injury. In particular, employees at these sites are more likely to report that their supervisors are receptive or responsive to suggestions for change, willing to furnish recognition for work done well and perceived as competent in the technical aspects of the job. To this end, senior managers must define and clearly communicate a set of values, policies and procedures, which should then be promoted by local supervisors.

2. Empowerment

Supervisors must empower their employees and foster teamwork to create an environment that facilitates safe decision-making. Empowerment involves providing employees the knowledge and tools they need to make informed judgments, trusting them to solve problems and giving them ownership over projects. Work sites that promote cultures of empowerment are also environments that researchers found had lower rates of work related injuries.

3. Teamwork

Fostering teamwork provides employees with the support and guidance they need to make the right decisions, particularly in the face of high work demands. Promoting cooperation and teamwork is not only associated with greater safety performance in general, but is also particularly beneficial in work environments where employees perceive that their workloads are heavier than average. With support and guidance, an employee is more capable of handling the negative impact of work overload.

Conclusion

Providing employees with safety training; keeping equipment current and operating properly; and instituting safety policies and procedures. These tasks are at the heart of the traditional occupational health and safety program. And while their importance remains inarguable, there's a supplementary element that has an impact on safety performance: organizational culture. Towers Perrin-ISR didn't "discover" the link between culture and safety performance. But its research has provided valuable evidence that what many people have previously only sensed is scientifically true: Culture does affect safety.

Towers Perrin-ISR's research also provides the basis for turning this abstract principle into a basis for concrete and specific action. The researchers demonstrate that improving employee-supervisor relations, empowering employees and promoting cooperation and teamwork are the aspects of safety culture most likely to generate lower rates of illness and injury.

It's important for SafetyXChange members and other safety professionals to be aware of these important insights and apply them at their own organizations. At the end of the day, Towers Perrin-ISR has pointed out that there's real substance to the concept of safety culture. Recognize this. More importantly, recognize that each of you has an opportunity to improve your safety performance by improving your organization's safety culture.

A list of safety-related research is available in the Tools section of SafetyXchange

SAFETY CULTURE

Chernobyl: Crucible of the Culture Concept

An Overview

By Glenn Demby

"Safety culture" generally refers to what the people within an organization think about safety and how much they value it as an organizational goal. According to most accounts, the term was first used by the International Nuclear Safety Group (INSAG), a subagency of the International Atomic Energy Agency, in its 1986 report on the Chernobyl accident. INSAG cited the lack of a safety culture as a leading cause of the disaster:

"The accident can be said to have flowed from deficient safety culture, not only at the Chernobyl plant, but throughout the Soviet design, operating and regulatory organizations for nuclear power that existed at the time. . . . Safety culture. . . requires total dedication, which at nuclear power plants is primarily generated by the attitudes of managers of organizations involved in their development and operation."

Safety culture has been the subject of numerous studies in recent years (for a list of some of the prominent ones, see the TOOLS section of SafetyXChange). But there's still no consensus on exactly what the concept means. One of the more prominently used definitions comes from the U.K. Health & Safety Commission: Safety culture is "the product of individual and group values, attitudes, perceptions, competencies and patterns of behavior determine the commitment to, and the style and proficiency of, an organization's health and safety management."

The Towers Perrin-ISR research represents an important contribution to the research of safety culture by translating the concept into benchmarks that can be used to monitor and improve performance.

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