As I was catching up on the goings on of my friends and family on Facebook, I stumbled on a story of a teacher who truly knows how to communicate with students. First, the teacher made it a part of the job as a communicator to know and understand the audience. We, as safety leaders need to do the same.
Today, salary and benefits are not the only drivers of employee satisfaction and engagement. In fact, employees’ indoor environment plays a significant role in fostering productivity, performance and wellness. Similarly, productive classroom environments have a major impact in cultivating effective learning and student achievement.
ComSTAR is a new generation of full duplex wireless that allow up to eight users to talk simultaneously. These revolutionary headsets feature a self contained, “All in One” design and do not require cables or belt pack transceivers.
I am the managing director of Australia's largest safety solutions organisation, the Industrial Foundation for Accident Prevention (IFAP). We are a wholly self-funded, not for profit organisation which provides services across the broad spectrum of safety-related matters ranging from low level induction style training courses to whole-of-organisation safety culture change programmes.
I quite often hear the lament from the safety fraternity that "my manager doesn't understand me ...".To this I reply - when one understands the myriad of demands placed upon C-level personnel, why should it be incumbent upon them to "learn the language of safety (environment, labour laws, accounting, IP, IT, etc). Rather, if safety pro's are so keen to have their voices heard, the responsibility should be on them to learn the language of management, and place their commentary in the management context.
As people were gathering for the meeting, Ami, the safety professional who had brought me to their site, thanked one of the employees for being at the evening session. The employee replied, “Management ‘strongly recommended’ we attend.” By the tone of his voice, he made it clear his leadership was doing all but making attendance at the meeting mandatory.
It’s long been a beef with safety and health pros that senior leaders, with the rare exception, just don’t get safety. Business bosses don’t study it in business school, and since safety is a cost center and not a profit generator, leadership spends little time studying safety issues. Health issues, with their more delayed consequences and debatable connection to worker lifestyle issues (smoking, obesity, alcohol and drug abuse) are even further off the executive radar screen.
Trust is one of the fundamental aspects contained in the British Health & Safety Executive’s ubiquitous definition of Safety Culture, which states “organizations with a positive Safety Culture are characterized by communications founded on mutual trust, by shared perceptions of the importance of safety, and by confidence in the efficacy of preventative measures”[i].
Butterflies in your stomach. Dry mouth. Fantasy of escaping through the back door. It’s inevitable: at some point in your career, you’ll need to speak in front of an audience. Whether at a small meeting, a conference, a general session, on a panel, or on your own.
