The Management of Safety: The Behavioural Approach to Changing Organisations

Citation

Holyoak, L. (2001), "The Management of Safety: The Behavioural Approach to Changing Organisations", Leadership & Organization Development Journal, Vol. 22 No. 2, pp. 88-92. https://doi.org/10.1108/lodj.2001.22.2.88.3

Our safety at work is something which we would all agree is important. Some individuals see their safety as the responsibility of those further up the hierarchy, when the reality is that even though employers have a duty of care, all employees should play an active part by working safely. Statistics show that workplace accidents continue to happen in frightening numbers, despite initiatives designed to encourage safe working. The basic argument in this well‐written volume is that traditional initiatives focus on the wrong things, such as changing attitudes, and that it is only when we focus on changing behaviour using appropriate principles that accident rates will be reduced.

The first chapter provides some background information on accident statistics and costs. By then providing the reader with examples of infamous accidents, which show common underlying factors, it is clearly demonstrated that we do not learn from our mistakes. Concentrating on finding someone to blame and punish is too reactive an approach, and also encourages the covering up of accidents and near misses to avoid punishment. The authors argue that a proactive approach, which rewards individuals for acting appropriately (in this case safely, though the technique applies just as well to other organisational problems, such as absenteeism) and makes safety awareness a continuous thing rather than a knee‐jerk reaction to an incident, is the only one which will work.

The constant theme of this book is that safety programmes can only work by changing behaviour. Traditionally in safety campaigns, attempts have been made to change attitudes, which are assumed to be linked directly to behaviour, but the second chapter of the book deals with the psychological research that shows how far from straightforward the relationship actually is. This leads the reader into the discussion in Chapter three of the psychological theory underlying the approach which the authors use. The theory is that of operant conditioning or behaviourism, but readers will probably be more familiar with the term organisational behaviour modification (OBMod). There is a good résumé of the basic principles of this theory, which culminates in the argument that it is better to encourage desired behaviour than to punish that which is undesirable. This is illustrated by a couple of safety related examples.

Chapters four and five are the meat of the book. The former gives, in great detail, a description of the authors’ first attempt at instigating a behavioural safety programme in a factory. They are honest about the lessons that they learned from this experience and identify the conditions that they regard as necessary for success. The chapter finishes with a discussion of the way the programme has developed as a result of further work with other companies. Chapter five goes into more detail about some vital aspects of the programme, namely the role of the observer and using and scoring the safety checklists.

In the final two chapters the book concern themselves with other, associated issues: managing change in organisations and other applications of the OBMod approach. Although this reader could see the point of the material on organisational change, it felt a little flat after the engrossing reading to be found in the previous two chapters. As for the final chapter, that felt, frankly, like padding: many of the examples had been touched on previously and really did not need to be gone over again. It was a shame that such a readable and convincing book had to finish in this way. My only other quibble with the book was its purpose: on the one hand it was telling the reader all that he or she needs to know about this technique (or gave that impression), but on the other hand gave examples of companies who had adopted the approach on their own and failed. Also, it was mostly written from the point of view of the consultant, further implying that consultants will be a necessity. These quibbles are just that, however, and I would thoroughly recommend the book to anyone struggling with the problem of managing safety in organisations.