Frankly I’m puzzled why others don’t see the parallels between world-class manufacturing and reliability and maintainability and worker safety,” says Phil LaDuke, who taught reliability and maintainability for one of the Big Three auto companies before moving into safety consulting.

He’s not alone. “I really believe in this alignment,” says Doug Pontsler, former vice president of operations sustainability and EHS for Owens Corning. “People who are driving TPM (Total Productive Maintenance) within their organizations use an integrated operating system that includes safety as a core pillar. It was rare for us at Owens Corning to have a facility performing well from a safety perspective that wasn’t also doing great from a productivity, quality and reliability perspective. The vice versa was also true.”