Google “safety culture” and you get about 1,600,000,000 results in 0.95 seconds. Safety and health managers have long known the importance of culture – the organization’s values, beliefs and leadership - on safety, morale, productivity, engagement, presenteeism and absenteeism. Culture has been at the top of safety and health issues for the past ten years at least.
Traditionally, safety departments get opinions and guesses thrown at them, says Stinson. There may be a hazard. Equipment doesn’t seem to be working. “Now you have objective data all mapped out. It’s very important that this is objective data, so you know for a fact that a part of plant is leaking. It’s a fact, not a suspicion,” he says.
Our company has been roofing/remodeling injury-free since inception in 2004. The behavior of people is the predominant cause of accidents and the variable that is most easily changed. Although this article is based on our roofing experiences, the principles are easily applied to any industry, especially those that involve hard labor, high turnover, or dangerous conditions.
Safety professionals work diligently to engage both leaders and employees. But there is often a challenge: leaders wish their employees would just "be careful" without doing diligence to hazard identification, assessment and control. The result: workers claim leaders are only concerned with productivity and budgets.
Whether you use ISO 45001, ANSI Z10, OSHA’s Voluntary Protection Program or another management system, there are common elements. The most important are management commitment and leadership, and employee acceptance and participation in the system.
It only takes a cursory examination of a welding torch to understand there are some real safety concerns with this craft. Welding is a 100-plus-year-old practice that's still a fundamental component of machine work and industry today. Proficient welders are becoming harder and harder to find, which is another excellent reason to learn the craft. It's also a handy thing to know how to do.
Each year when OSHA reports its most frequently violated standards, the control of hazardous energy, also known as lockout tagout (1910.147) consistently appears high on the list of greatest offenders.
Does your manufacturing facility have a smoke stack? If it does, your facility also likely contains a valve safety train, commonly known in industrial circles as a “gas train” or a “fuel train.”
Breathing hazards such as hazardous gasses can be a danger to all types of workers, including those in the oil and gas, water treatment plants, metals refining and processing, and chemical plants. To keep safe working in these environments, workers need to carry a range of personal protective equipment.