Safety Culture Excellence®

Measuring STICK

The old wooden yardsticks with advertising on them were called “measuring sticks.”  They were handy tools before the invention of tape measures and laser measuring devices.  They had feet, inches and fractions of inches marked along the edge of the stick.  You could hold them up to an item to see its length or height or stick it in liquid to see its depth. 

Today, the word “stick” is used more and more to mean the retention of information. “Sticky” information is easily remembered.  Remembered information is used in decision making and planning.  In safety, we often attempt to communicate critical information that could potentially improve safety performance.  We sometimes measure the amount or reach of this communication, but we seldom measure its “stick,” or retention.  Information that is sent but forgotten does not improve safety.

So, how can we make safety information stickier and how can we measure the stick?  Three easy steps to improve stickiness are to 1) start with the story, 2) stress the people and 3) tally all the numbers.  For example, if you want to communicate an accident that occurred, tell the story of how it happened, stress how it impacted the people involved, and tally the number of similar accidents that could have been prevented by the same precaution that could have prevented this one. Periodically ask workers to recount recent accidents.  Ask which precaution could have prevented the most accidents over the past several months or years.  Measure the “stick” of your safety communication and constantly improve it.

-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.

338 – Creating a Culture of Have to or Want to?

Greetings everyone, this podcast recorded while in Clinton, IA. I’d like to share an article I wrote that was published April 2014 in BIC 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

337 – To Delegate or Not to Delegate Safety?

Greetings everyone, this podcast recorded while in Bangkok, Thailand. I’d like to share an article I wrote that was published April 2014 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

336 – Giving Safety a Brand Identity

Greetings everyone, this podcast recorded while in Bangkok, Thailand. I’d like to share an article Terry Mathis wrote that was published March 2014 in EHS Today 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

Safety as a Split Job-Title

Many organizations, especially smaller sites, are making safety part of someone’s job title.  It may be HR/Safety, Plant Engineer/Safety, Environmental/Safety, Health/Safety or some other combination.  I seldom see “safety” listed first on such combined titles.  Is that intentional or do the words just sound better in that order?  In the majority of cases, it is the safety responsibility that is the “add-on” and the person assigned is another kind of professional and a part-time advocate of safety.

Having even a part-time safety point person can be better than having none; but there is a definite downside to this arrangement as well.  It can send the message that safety is not important enough to dedicate a professional to it.  It can also suggest that safety is not all that complex and a little attention is all that is needed.  Not everyone takes these kinds of inferences from such an arrangement, but it often happens.

The most common problem with such assignments is that safety is seriously subjugated to the other job because that is where the expertise and interest lies.  Safety is more or less a hobby that gets whatever extra time is available.  Communications from the safety person are less than expert and less than official. 

If your organization has such dual functions, carefully define the division of responsibilities, provide professional development for the safety function, calendar the first year’s safety activities and follow-up to see that they are accomplished, and periodically ask the personnel at the site how the safety function is going and how it could be improved.  Today’s economic reality calls on many individuals to wear multiple hats.  Just be sure one hat, doesn’t wind up in the closet.

-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.

Can-Do Safety Cultures

It is important to define the desired capabilities of a culture instead of simply the desired characteristics.  What a culture “can do” is much more crucial than what it “is like.”  That said, some cultures become can-do cultures without internalizing safety as a part of what they can do.  Such cultures become “get it done at all costs” cultures.  The members of the culture become willing to give their bodies up for the team.  They put job completion ahead of all other priorities.

The history of a site can be a major influence in developing such a culture.  Sites that have experienced multiple downsizing or threats of closing tend to develop work groups that perform for survival.  The constant threat of being laid off or having your workplace closed tends to outweigh the threat of personal injury.  If managers and supervisors constantly use these threats to motivate or hurry workers, the perception that production trumps safety is constantly reinforced.

When companies downsize, reorganize or otherwise disrupt site cultures, they should anticipate and manage the safety aspects of the change.  Survival is an economic necessity, but poor safety can impact a site’s viability as much as ineffective or incomplete work.  Survival mode should include both surviving the economic challenges and the safety issues.  Again, it is not a dichotomy between production and safety, but addressing the need for safe production.

-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.

334 – Misunderstanding the Role of Safety Culture Assessments

Greetings everyone, this podcast recorded while in my home in Texas. I’d like to share an article I wrote that was published March 2014 in Occupational Health and Safety 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

Site vs. Corporate Support Safety Staff: How Does the Job Get Done?

We have seen a trend in recent years for organizations to add safety staff at the corporate level rather than at the site level.  The basic idea is that these corporate staffers can be shared among sites who might not need them full time.  The idea is valid on the surface.  Shared resources could have higher levels of competence, could be more specialized, and could be paid more than the site budget could bear.  Having a floating pool of resource people also allows companies to send more help to sites when needed.

The downside of this practice is the disconnection between these corporate resource people and the sites.  Many view their job as exercising their field of expertise rather than addressing the needs of the site.   They tend to become subject-matter experts rather than support staff.  They also tend to function better with technical issues than with people issues.  All these tendencies can potentially make them less useful to the site.  When this reduced effectiveness is combined with the fact that their jobs might effectively eliminate site-specific jobs, this becomes a double blow to the site safety program.

The best ways to address these potential problems is to consider the relationship of corporate support staff with site mangers.  When corporate folks are assigned to the manager rather than a specific site issue, things tend to get done.  Effective managers tend to seek solutions rather than fixes.  They, if effective, will have deeper knowledge of the people issues at the site and include them in the solutions.  Managers that aim the expertise of corporate people at site issues in a more holistic manner, will make relationships more effective.

-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.

333 – Are You Solving the Right Problems?

Greetings everyone, this podcast recorded while in Lake Charles, LA. I’d like to share an article Terry L. Mathis wrote that was published February 2014 by IndustryWeek 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

Heads and Habits

I recently attended a safety training session in which the three types of distracted driving were being taught and discussed.  I stood outside the door after the training and asked the departing trainees if they could name the three types of distractions.  Only one of ten could name two of the three, three more could name one and the rest could not remember any of the three.  If those being trained cannot remember the training on the way out of the classroom the chances of them adopting the safety practices and turning them into safety habits is virtually non-existent.

The principle is this, “If you don’t get it into workers’ heads, you won’t get it into their habits.”  Training that isn’t memorable or sticky is not effective training.  Safety training that does not utilize mnemonic devices, repetition and post-testing may meet legal requirements, but it won’t improve safety performance.  Even with such training techniques, too much training material can create overload rather than internalization of the materials. 

Remember the principle. Before taking workers away from work and putting them in classrooms or in front of computers, consider rethinking your training strategies to make the most effective use of the time and a greater return on investment.

-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.