I recently came across an old article that I first read about 10 years ago. The article highlighted the connection between the decline in violent crime in New York City during the early 1990s and the “Broken Window Theory.” While the original intent of the article wasn’t meant to be applied to the world of safety, I think it fits very well.

What’s the “Broken Window Theory”?

The “Broken Window Theory” is well known in the criminal justice world. Its basis is that the environment in which we live impacts our behavior. For example, people will feel more inclined to break the law in an area that is run down and dirty, hence the term “broken window.” Criminals feel less threatened and people seem to expect crime in this environment.

Applying the Theory to the NY City Subway System

In the early 90s, violent crime was rampant in the New York City subway system. The City hired a new subway director, who just happened to practice the "broken window" theory. The first item on his agenda was to solve the graffiti problem. To others, this priority seemed odd, to say the least. People are being mugged and killed and this guy wants to re-paint the subway cars? But every single car was cleaned and painted. And every time a car was vandalized, it was taken out of service until it was clean again.

As you can imagine, spending so much money on something that was seemingly meaningless didn’t sit so well with everyone. Until crime started to rapidly decline.

Soon after, the city hired a new head of police for the subway system, who also just happened to practice this theory. (Can you see a pattern here?) With violent crimes still occurring on a regular basis, the first plan of attack was to hire more officers and crackdown on fare beaters.

Up until that point, anyone who jumped the turnstile was not really important. It took way too much time and effort to arrest someone for not paying their fare. But under the new system, mobile police stations were set up, equipped with everything that was needed to process these individuals.

After a short while, crime began to decline again. It seems many of these fare beaters were also carrying a weapon or drugs or had outstanding warrants against them.

Applying the Theory to Safety

So why does this theory fit well with safety? Think of a violent crime much the same way as you think about an accident. Each of these has many causative factors involved. If we can eliminate some of the causative factors, we reduce the likelihood of the undesired result.

I’m sure we’d all like to say that our safety practices are consistent, no matter what other people are doing, but the reality is that other people’s actions do in fact affect our behavior. For example:

• Are you more or less likely to wear safety glasses when others around you aren’t wearing them?
• How about housekeeping? Does a dirty, messy jobsite impact how people work?
• Do you tend to follow traffic when other cars are speeding?

Now think of a worksite where “little things” are neither addressed nor corrected. These little things add up and have a major impact on our – and our workers’ – decision-making.

Conclusion

Unfortunately, when we talk about the little things, we’re accused of “nitpicking.” After all, there are much bigger things to worry about. That’s always going to be true. But by gaining control over the little things, by proactively setting the stage – and the standard – for a safe workplace, we may actually have that much less to worry about in the long run.

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