Safety at work is everybody’s business. But instilling a culture of responsible safety behaviour, particularly on mining projects which involve many contractor companies and individuals, can be challenging.

However, a number of measures and techniques have proven to be successful in encouraging diverse workers with varying degrees of commitment to safety, to adopt uniform safety behaviour.

A Case Study – The Dampier Port Upgrade Project
A number of key strategies were applied to the Dampier Port Upgrade (DPU) Project, which proved to be invaluable contributors to safety success, and which provide key learnings for the future.

The first involves having excellent working relationships with contractors, whereby an environment of commitment, responsiveness and cooperation is created.

Utilising teams from previous projects who understand the standards of safety expected, and who work together as a team to focus on important safety issues, is invaluable.

Safety requires the commitment of every individual working with others towards a common goal, so building trust and a proactive culture over a period of time, is a key strategy for safety success.

The second strategy involves open communication, aided by the establishment of a forum for discussing, identifying and addressing safety issues and trends. SKM formed a Safety Committee on the DPU project, consisting of the Construction Manager, Safety Superintendent and representatives from every contractor.

The concept of a Safety Committee is to meet regularly, and in an environment of trust, to discuss any safety trends or issues which are emerging.

One of the leading indicators of developing trends of serious injuries is the frequency of minor injuries such as those requiring simple first aid. By analysing the frequency and the type of injury through a collective group in the committee, the incidence of more serious injuries was reduced.

The committee also reports formally on safety statistics, so that any areas of concern can be highlighted and addressed. It is important that management place a strict onus on identifying and addressing issues, so this can be achieved in an atmosphere of acceptance and trust.

SKM also implemented Rio Tinto’s Fitness for Work Program on the DPU project, which proved highly effective.

The program involves providing information and raising awareness on issues which impact on performance, such as fatigue, stress, working in hot environments and working under the influence of alcohol or drugs.

As well as specific safety measures, adopting methods of project delivery and management which alleviate safety risk is also valuable.

On the DPU project, SKM revolutionised wharf construction by utilising a method traditionally used in the oil and gas industry, of modularising the construction of components off-site, resulting in safer working methods.

Usually, working over water carries a high level of safety risk, but by utilising modular construction and maximising the amount of work undertaken at the fabricator’s workshop, safety risk is significantly decreased.

Coupled with this is the utilisation of sea transportation, also adopted on the DPU project, which decreases the need for on-site labour and hence on-site safety risk.

This simple yet effective solution has since been adopted on other similar port projects in the Pilbara.

Developing a Health and Safety Practices Culture Program
As well as the key strategies implemented on the DPU project to improve safety performance, SKM has formulated and instigated an integrated safety program, called LiveIt, into its workplace, with the aim of consolidating a safety culture not only within SKM but which can be utilised on all client projects.

The LiveIt and other safety programs  are offered by SKM to clients via a dedicated SKM Safety Learning Centre, which has been specifically designed as a ‘one-stop shop’ for all safety, predeployment medical, induction and training requirements. The centre coordinates the provision of client-tailored inductions, supervisor leadership, safety and learning programs, and a range of learning and development services.

LiveIt was developed by Michael Walsh together with Professor Dennis Else of Ballarat University, with input from Professor Andrew Hopkins of ANU. It utilises the latest research conducted by Else and Hopkins as well as Patrick Hudson and James Reason. Else and Hopkins are excited by the program due to its ability to transfer the mental models developed by researchers into a practical program for implementation within organisations.

Why Develop a Safety Culture?
A safety program is often needed to meet a number of goals and obligations, such as the expectations of clients, legislative compliance, to align safety moral obligations with other organisational, moral and ethical business practices and to achieve many of the business benefits that stem from progressive safety management.

Too often, organisations are relying on the existence of a safety management system to provide a safe workplace. Managers become frustrated that ‘the system’ has not prevented incidents occurring, but rarely look at the role they play in creating a safety culture that brings management systems alive.

Safety comes from the top, so creating a successful safety culture starts with a management commitment to safe practices. From this should flow a commitment by every individual to personal and collective safety practices.

If a safety culture doesn’t already exist in an organisation, or isn’t adequately entrenched, then a safety change program may be required.

Overcoming Barriers to Safety Performance
Unfortunately, businesses do not stop and contemplate the barriers to proactive safety performance. The work that is imagined in organisations is usually far removed from the reality.  Often, obstacles exist to improving safety performance, which will, unless removed, prevent any organisation moving forward.

In practical terms, improving safety performance can be hindered by the hidden messages being received by those making decisions at the coal face. These messages, including the age-old conflict of ‘actually it is productivity that is the priority, not safety’, will continue to thwart all safety efforts unless turned around by the practices of senior management. Where mixed messages are sent, further difficulties are created for field supervisory staff managing time and safety requirements, for leaders having difficulty influencing subordinates, and for workers who may have an acceptance of higher levels of risk, and have training deficiencies.

It is only the executive of the company who can change the way safety is managed within an organisation. It is their integration of safety into the way they operate, together with their management team, that will mould a safety culture. It is only when an executive team accepts and implements systematic change, supported by individual practices, that the road to safety maturity will gain momentum.

The LiveIt program employs social marketing principles to create recognition for the need to change and contemplation of a new way forward, to sculpt and engineer a new safety culture and to implement core and personal practices to support the new culture.

Establishing the Ideal Safety Culture

Few leaders in organisations can articulate their own safety culture. Often this is because it doesn’t exist!
Organisational culture is often defined as “who and what we are, what we find important and how we go about doing things around here” (Hudson). In ‘safe culture’ organisations, there is a high degree of commonality in practices and beliefs.

The ideal safety culture combines the elements of adequate information, effective reporting, continual learning, risk awareness, safety planning procedures and the caring attitudes of staff. 

Reason sees several core characteristics of safe cultures:

• Informed Culture – when all stakeholders have the necessary knowledge about the personal, technical and environmental components of a systematic approach to managing safety
• Reporting Culture – people are encouraged and supported in reporting hazards, near misses, incidents and errors
• Learning Culture – lessons learned are regularly communicated across the business so continual improvement is achieved
• Risk Aware and Planning Culture – people focus on the identification of hazards prior to exposing stakeholders. Being proactive in hazard identification, control and removal, and accident and injury protection as well as health preservation and promotion is important
• Just and Caring Culture – no blame is applied to those who proactively report and there is an environment of trust

The LiveIt program draws on the above characteristics, but in addition, encourages leadership teams to determine other safety characteristics that make each organisation’s safety culture unique.

Core Safety Practices
To support the targeted safety culture, a series of core practices need to be identified against each cultural element. These form the basis of the safety program.

Developing a more informed culture begins with induction and continues through to regular and specific safety education and communication at the commencement of projects.
 
To ensure continual improvement is achieved, lessons learned should be communicated and incorporated into safety policies and plans. Reporting of safety performance across the organisation also assists in raising awareness and encouraging improvement.

Individual responsibility for safety can be encouraged by embedding safety practice requirements into Performance Plans and Dialogues and conducting learning reviews at the completion of projects.

To mitigate safety risk, all projects should be risk assessed before commencement, and a Safety Plan developed and adopted by the team. Ongoing risk assessments should be undertaken and all personnel should have defined safety roles and responsibilities.

Good safety performance should be recognised and rewarded and poor performance not tolerated. Caring for colleagues should be encouraged, intervening in all cases of safety risk. Staff and contractors should be selected and retained based on key personal attributes of safety awareness, cooperation, commitment and caring.

The organisation must be able to measure the extent of compliance and hence drive improvement, so it is important to develop performance indicators for each core practice. KPI’s supporting each cultural characteristic must be linked to the business or project KPI’s. They must not stand separate.  Incentive programs should be developed that reflect the safety priority as determined by the executive or management team.

Personal safety practice plans should also be developed to support core practices and these should be able to be monitored and evaluated.

Personal safety practice plans need to also be linked to the broader safety strategies and complement business-wide initiatives such as informal Communities of Practice which involve staff interested in the sharing of ideas and information on ways to improve safety performance, regularly meeting to discuss initiatives.

In Conclusion
Safety cultures are created by the practices of senior management. The beliefs of the senior managers must permeate all other stakeholders.  Stakeholders, particularly employees and contractors, will only come on board when they see the beliefs or values reflected in practice, not just words.

Once the road to building a safety culture is commenced, safety should become everybody’s business. It is important that every employee and contractor is committed to the same goals, but these goals will only be achieved if the cultural practices become commonplace. Selecting the right employees and contractors, and inducting them into a clearly articulated culture, is therefore vital. Encouraging and maintaining relationships built on trust, commitment, support and cooperation is essential.

Providing workers with the appropriate training and tools to adopt safe practices is also vital.  Initiatives such as Safety Committees, safety induction training, Safety Communities of Practice and Fitness for Work Programs are helpful in achieving widespread awareness and adoption of a safety culture.

Monitoring performance, identifying emerging issues, addressing problems, reporting and evaluating, are also key elements of any safety program. Operating a just culture where people are recognised and rewarded for their safe practices as well as holding them personally accountable, will bring management systems to life and bring companies or projects closer to a workplace free from harm.

© Sinclair Knight Merz
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