Safety incentives as traditionally deployed (prizes rewarded for no reports of injuries) often do more harm than good. To win rewards, employees might hide injuries and not report them. You’re left with an inaccurate picture of your true safety performance.
The use of prepaid reward cards to recognize employees is a growing trend. According to one study, 87 percent of U.S. firms that use non-cash rewards are now using gift cards, spending more than $24 billion annually on those cards.
Behavior that gets rewarded gets repeated is the cornerstone of positive reinforcement, said Ted Neubauer, safety director at Atema. He said employees are more likely to repeat safe behaviors when they are positively and regularly recognized for them.
In watching many Commitment Based Safety meetings and how employees are reporting in on their contributions to their commitments for the last 24 hours there is something noteworthy going on. As we know, in a zero injury culture every employee manages his or her risks every day.
