Shifting to a Positive Safety Program

What’s more effective in changing safety behavior?  Is it waiting until the end of the month or quarter to let your employees know that they missed their safety objective by 10%?  Is it showing them what they did wrong and how much it costs the company after they’ve had an accident?  Or, is it observing a positive safety behavior on the job and thanking them for that safe performance? 

By and large, the entire discussion of being safe is negative.  To discuss being safe means you have to discuss the consequences of not being safe.  The dictionary defines safety as “the condition of being protected from or unlikely to cause danger, risk, or injury.” Safety is generally interpreted as implying a real and significant impact on risk of death, injury or damage to property.

When you shift your focus on the direction you want to move, the positive outcomes, you will create a more positive safety culture, higher morale and improved workplace productivity.  When you focus on what you want to achieve and give clear and concise tools on how to achieve them, you are well on your way to a positive environment. 

When you recognize safety performance on a continuous and consistent basis, you will form positive safety habits.  Make sure your employees go home at the end of the day knowing they made a difference, knowing they had been listened to, knowing their efforts had been appreciated. 

When you refocus your attentions on positive change, you will concentrate on your own leading indicators to safety.  You will not be comparing yourself to other industry or national standards, you will be comparing yourself to your own results, you aren’t average, so don’t

make average your goal.  When you compare yourself to your own results and improving daily to make a positive difference, you will have positive results.

Sometimes the safety industry gets a little too analytical.  Developing safety competence takes time and that’s the advantage of working with your employees on a daily basis.  It means being in the workers environments, understanding their daily challenges, and offering new ways to act or think about them from a positive perspective

After all, life is really simple; we create the circumstances that complicate it. 

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