Beyond lip service: The differences that add up to effective safety

The two main underlying causes are misapplication of technology and incorrect interfacing. An example of misapplication would be a fixed guard over a point that has to be accessed daily for cleaning or maintenance. “It has to be gotten around, so soon it’s hanging by one loose screw or missing altogether,” says Peabody. Better would be a moveable guard with a switch.

Another example occurs in presence-sensing. The machine should stop when the operator is there, but the sensor is too close to the point of operation and the machine can’t stop in time, or the operator can reach over the sensor.

An example of incorrect interfacing is a circuitry failure that stops a critical machine or shuts it down in a high-risk way. The system should be redundant and monitored so it fails safely.

“Problems usually occur when work is done by a local integrator who isn’t a safety integrator, for example, slapping a light curtain into a stop circuit without considering distances or interfacing,” Peabody says.

Operators who bypass safety systems are trying to tell you something. Hornbeck says, “If a supervisor or operator is thinking, ‘How can I bypass the system because I need productivity?’ that means it’s a poorly designed system.”

A similar situation occurs when equipment is designed and installed without considering ergonomics.

“People know they have issues with repetitive injuries,” says Mark Pasko, product engineering manager, ergonomic lifting and material handling, Ingersoll Rand (www.irtools.com/lifting), “But often they don’t call until the major equipment is done and they find they have a problem.” If ergonomics expertise is drawn on at the design stage, it can be integrated with the process and equipment, reducing the potential for injury and sometimes reducing labor costs and product damage.

For example, a facility receiving automobile hoods found out too late that they were packed too compactly for automatic unloading. “They had to get the first one out manually,” Pasko says, which led to operator injuries, product damage and unplanned unloading time.

Better plants are more proactive, bringing safety personnel to see vendors’ equipment before the specifications are finalized. “They used to be walking in after the engineering was done and beating up the engineers,” Pasko says. “Now safety is coming upstream to the vendors’ plants. And there are more safety people – they’re coming in groups.”

Safer plants are open to better ways of doing things. “My worst meeting was with an industrial facility that did not see the need,” says Karla Lemmon, program manager, Honeywell Instant Alert (www.buildingsolutions.honeywell.com). She was visiting to describe an instant Web-based system for emergency and regular communications via land lines, cellular service, text messaging, e-mail, etc. The system can protect the surrounding community as well as the plant. “They said nothing has happened to warrant it,” Lemmon adds. “It may take an incident for that company to understand.”

Perhaps the most telling behavior takes place when an incident occurs without injury. “This does not mean that this incident should be forgotten,” says Michael Hewitt, vice president, Global Workplace Safety Practice, DuPont (www2.dupont.com/Consulting_Services/en_US/). “Rather, it is important to acknowledge the incident and question why it occurred.”

A safety-minded company will conduct a thorough incident investigation and try to capture and analyze the information from the event, reevaluate the process and make the necessary changes or corrections to ensure that the incident doesn’t happen again. A less-safety-minded company won’t take the time to investigate because there was no injury. “Just because no one got hurt in this particular incident that does not mean that the outcome will be as favorable the next time,” Hewitt says.

How to get safer

If you see the opportunity to protect personnel or increase profits by improving safety, experts offer far more detailed advice than we have space to print on how to migrate to a safer culture. Several resources that express their consensus succinctly are posted on or linked through our Web site (see sidebar, “More at www.PlantServices.com/thismonth”).

The two most often repeated keys: the drive to safety must come from the top, and it must become everyone’s core value. “The main difference that I have witnessed is in the level of management commitment,” says Hewitt. He emphasizes “Felt Leadership, a DuPont concept that defines leaders as those with visible commitment and passion for safety – and a dedicated involvement by all in the implementation of the overall safety management process.”

Hewitt says Felt Leadership:

• Is easily observable
• Clearly demonstrates belief in safety
• Makes a positive impression on employees
• Demonstrates a personal commitment
• Pervades the organization
• Affects all employees
• Involves all employees

The principles of Felt Leadership include:

• Be visible to the organization
• Be relentless about time with people
• Recognize your role as teacher/trainer
• Develop your own safety functioning skills and pass them along to the organization
• Behave and lead as you desire others to do
• Maintain a self-safety focus
• Confirm and reconfirm safety as the number-one value
• Place continuous emphasis and clarity around safety expectations
• Show a passion for zero injuries, illnesses and incidents
• Celebrate and recognize “zero” successes

Every employee has critical responsibilities to a safety culture:

Finance: Understand and publicize the business value of good safety performance.
HR: Develop guidelines that embody good safety performance and leadership as performance indicators used in promotion and pay increase considerations each year.
Supervision: Uphold full responsibility for the safety of every individual working in their crew and ensure that each and every employee receives the necessary training to perform their jobs safely.
Technicians and operators: Maintain individual responsibilities to respect safety procedures and make sure their fellow workers also are adhering.

Safety is worth the trouble. “It’s not just about the company and the bottom line,” says LaCook. “When each person goes home to their family alive and intact, it keeps families together. Think about that.”