Annual Safety
Monitoring
Management
Corrective
Employee
Incident
Hazard
Employee
Manager and
Optimized
Senior
Senior
Best practices of leading companies include:
There is typically no formalized plan for conducting a critical review of the safety system, including senior leadership sign-off. When it comes to protecting people, it’s worth investing more formal effort, on a more regular basis, and starting with a current to future state analysis to ensure the safety system is optimized to achieve expected safety results.
What we see:
feel that management does not have a prescribed yearly, formal or informal meeting to address the overall safety management system or review safety results and establish new goals. However, they do not necessarily contemplate activity-based metrics for the entire workforce to engage.
54.3%
Best practices of leading companies include:
Performance indicators submitted to management often show no evidence of being used during performance appraisals or improvement planning. Additionally, metrics geared towards senior leadership are lagging in nature, which does not allow for timely action or intervention, and are often misunderstood by employees.
What we see:
say that they measure lagging indicators and monitor safety performance on a regular basis, but metrics are often not individualized.
55.4%
Best practices of leading companies include:
Change is a constant at most organizations. However, there is often tension with safety involvement, as any additional steps are perceived as delaying progress. Without safety’s early involvement, injuries, penalties, and additional (avoidable) costs often are the consequences.
What we see:
believe there is no written procedure requiring a safety review prior to changes in equipment, processes, or materials. Often the review occurs after the change has been made.
57.4%
Best practices of leading companies include:
Corrective actions are at times informal and are often not completed in a timely manner, while decisions may be based on budget availability as opposed to risk severity.
What we see:
50%
Best practices of leading companies include:
Employee reporting of hazards goes hand-in-hand with good corrective action management. A lack of feedback results in a higher likelihood of employees not reporting hazards. Therefore, having a dedicated process to track corrective actions is a key component of the feedback loop.
What we see:
feel that there is at least one “safety suggestion box” for employees to submit a concern anonymously, but there is usually no formal process for a response back from senior management.
52.7%
Best practices of leading companies include:
While most companies have an incident investigation plan in place, the root cause is often employee error. However, often many causal factors contribute to employee injuries.
What we see:
indicate they have a robust incident reporting and investigation process.
63.2%
Best practices of leading companies include:
Hazard identification and risk assessment are key to the success of safety management systems. Yet operational risks are often unclear due to the lack of a working risk register documenting hazards and risks and their respective corrective actions.
What we see:
scored themselves unfavorable in identifying, ranking, and mitigating hazards properly, despite a written procedure for analyzing jobs and tasks.
52.7%
Best practices of leading companies include:
Often the safety committee is the only means for employee involvement in safety processes and employees are rarely asked to participate in additional safety activities related to their work areas or skillsets.
What we see:
feel systems are in place to engage and consult with employees in order to improve participation in safety efforts, but a similar number feel they may be lacking.
50%
Best practices of leding companies include:
Managers and supervisors lack specific safety training and tend to favor optimizing productivity and efficiency over safety. This fact is particularly concerning as this group typically is responsible for translating senior leadership safety objectives and goals to frontline employees.
What we see:
feel unfavorable towards manager and supervisor safety training, as it is often infrequent and focused on standard or basic compliance training.
51.6%
Best practices of leading companies include:
Safety committees may have limited representation from across levels and departments, keep inconsistent meeting minutes that are rarely shared with employees, and meet infrequently with large gaps at key times.
What we see:
54.7%
Best practices of leading companies include:
There often is a significant gap in senior management’s perception of its commitment to safety and frontline employees’ views.
What we see:
feel that senior leadership is committed to employees’ safety and health and is meaningfully involved on a regular basis.
73.6%
Best practices of leading companies include:
Companies’ safety roles and responsibilities have been documented at a high level — for example, in a safety policy — but with little detail or guidance.
What we see:
feel senior leadership defines, documents, and communicates safety roles and responsibilities to all supervisory and management personnel.
60.1%
feel corrective action is not optimally managed through a combination of the work order system and the safety committee, or some other mix of functions. While serious safety issues may be addressed quickly, corrective actions for less immediate hazards may be delayed. This is concerning as 52% feel employees are reporting hazards, but these may go uncorrected and discourage future reporting.
do not feel the safety committee is optimized with sufficient representation, lacks a standardized agenda and meeting minutes, and does not track corrective actions related to safety concerns/issues.