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Episodes
Safety Culture Excellence is a weekly series designed to support your efforts towards excellence in performance and culture. For more information or to contact the host, visit www.ProActSafety.com.
Episodes
Monday Apr 06, 2015
Monday Apr 06, 2015
Wednesday Mar 25, 2015
Wednesday Mar 25, 2015
I see more and more safety procedures written by corporate attorneys and their staff. While legal exposure is a real business consideration that deserves attention, so is safety. If the procedures are written in language the average worker can’t understand, or are too complex to remember, they have little chance of actually being implemented. What corporate attorneys need to understand is that a written procedure is not an insurance policy against government regulators, especially if the procedure doesn’t become common practice. Stiff fines have been given to organizations with excellent documentation but common practice that doesn’t match. The people in the field need to walk the talk or the exposure is still there.
Sometimes all that is needed is a shorter version of the procedure aimed at worker terminology and mapped out into an implementation plan. The legal document can still be in place as the organizational goal, while the shorter document is a practical attempt to turn the goal into reality in the workplace. I have found regulators much more understanding of performance that falls short of the ideal if there is a plan in place to make it happen. Attorneys: work with the safety staff to make procedures practical and applicable as well as liability limiting.
-Terry L. Mathis
For more insights, visit
www.ProActSafety.com
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 three consecutive times. 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).
Monday Mar 23, 2015
Monday Mar 23, 2015
Wednesday Mar 18, 2015
Wednesday Mar 18, 2015
One day during my management career, I got visited by four specialists from corporate, then by my regional manager. The safety, quality, logistics and IT specialists in sequence told me about all their new initiatives that would require my support, understanding, and staffing. Then my boss showed up and asked me if I had any questions. I simply asked him, “While I am doing all these programs would you like to try to continue to do business as well?”
Almost all managers must juggle a number of priorities without dropping any. Safety should not be one of these! Safety is not something else you do; it is the WAY you do everything. It is not a conflicting priority with anything else if you integrate it into the flow of work and the fabric of culture. Yes, safety meetings take time, but not if they are simply a part of shift start-up meetings or tool-box meetings, which you have anyway. Yes, safety training takes time, but workers attend training of many kinds, none of which is expendable. The best safety is completely imbedded into the workflow and not perceived as separable or competing. If you think this is not possible, seek out some of the excellent organizations that have made it happen.
-Terry L. Mathis
For more insights, visit
www.ProActSafety.com
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 three consecutive times. 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).
Monday Mar 09, 2015
Monday Mar 09, 2015
Wednesday Mar 04, 2015
Wednesday Mar 04, 2015
W. Edwards Deming urged organizations to establish relationships with suppliers and stick with them, even when they could save a few pennies by changing to another. He knew that the reduced price was usually a loss leader and that the changeover would cost more than the savings. We have not yet learned this lesson in safety. We farm out services and products to the lowest bidder, assuming the quality is the same and that continuity of provider has no value. We also assume that a consultant who specializes in one service, or a manufacturer who specializes in a particular product, is superior. These assumptions are not necessarily so.
The relationship with a provider can make them more valuable than price, product or service. Someone who really takes the time to understand your business can often tailor to your needs much better than a subject-matter expert who doesn’t know or understand your organization. The relationship is often what gets you superior support, preferential treatment and customized solutions. Look for someone who cares for you, not just who gives you the lowest price. Quit trying to save pennies and concentrate on saving lives.
-Terry L. Mathis
For more insights, visit
www.ProActSafety.com
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 three consecutive times. 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).
Wednesday Feb 25, 2015
Wednesday Feb 25, 2015
In spite of some progress toward strategic thinking, safety efforts remain largely program- or process-minded. This is kindred thinking to the “more is better” and the “silver bullet” mentality of the past three decades. Organizations think the new program is going to be the add-on to their existing efforts producing the magic that gets them to zero. Consultants and trainers answer this demand and produce product-and-process things to sell to organizations. The chase to fail less this year than last goes on.
The vast majority of organizations we assess do NOT need a new program or process. In fact, most need to get rid of some of their existing ones rather than add new ones. More is not better; only better is better, and adding on to failing or falling-short efforts is not the answer. None of the programs or processes are silver bullets or magic pills. Once an organization begins to press the limits of programmatic and new-process thinking, the way forward is almost always a strategic approach. Strategies are more successful at producing reduction rather than simply adding more programs.
-Terry L. Mathis
For more insights, visit
www.ProActSafety.com
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 three consecutive times. 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).
Monday Feb 23, 2015
Monday Feb 23, 2015
Wednesday Feb 18, 2015
Wednesday Feb 18, 2015
Sometimes in safety, it can seem impossible to fix a problem or identify the cause of a rash of accidents, or find the best way to get workers more engaged. Safety people are problem-solvers, and unsolved problems are a thorn in their side. It helps to remember that everything is impossible until we figure it out. It was once considered impossible to split an atom, run a mile in less than four minutes, or even for human beings to fly.
Many organizations that strive for safety excellence keep a “temporarily impossible” file in which they list issues and problems that have not been addressed or solved. They pull it out from time to time and review the issues and problems in light of recent changes and advances. A few each year get removed from the list and out of the file. The world is full of miraculous possibilities patiently waiting for our wits to grow sharper.
-Terry L. Mathis
For more insights, visit
www.ProActSafety.com
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 three consecutive times. 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).
Wednesday Feb 11, 2015
Wednesday Feb 11, 2015
Many sports teams who have a good season develop high hopes for a good play-off performance only to be badly disappointed. It seems that play intensifies in the post-season when only the best teams are left and winning is contingent on more than the basics. Safety has some similarities: going from poor performance to better performance comes with the basics and reasonable effort. But when only a few accidents remain per year, preventing them takes a whole new level of effort.
The biggest mistake in both these scenarios is assuming that the strategy that got you to this point will get you the rest of the way to top. The problem is that the tools of “bad-to-good” don’t work on “good-to-excellent.” That game plan and those tools must form the basis of your effort, but winning will take a dose of “above and beyond.” The last remaining risks aren’t always visible to the naked eye and a whole new level of analysis is needed. When you get rid of the obvious risks, the next level is less obvious. When you eliminate the high-probability risks, the remaining ones are lower probability and harder to detect. Excellence is a whole new game overlaid on the old game. When you get to the playoffs, develop a new game plan.
-Terry L. Mathis
For more insights, visit
www.ProActSafety.com
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 three consecutive times. 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).