Posted By Merv Newman Caro, these books might help ; "Improving Safety Culture, A practical guide" Dominic Cooper, John Wiley and sons. "The values-based safety process, improving your safety culture with a behavioural approach" Terry McSween, Also published by Wiley You might get them second hand from Amazon. Other than that, I have a paper presented by Dom Cooper a couple of years ago on the interactions between the three major aspects of a safety culture. It's mainly researched based and would take a lot of work to get practical use out of it but if you want a copy just send me an e-mail. You can also google the above names and that of Aubrey Daniels. Another possible source is "Step Change in Safety" a cultural change attempted in the off-shore industry. There is a web-site but, again, digging out practical help is tough work Merv

Posted By steve williamson Hi Caro, Try the IOSH Safety for Senior Execs and Managing Safely. If they dont help get yourself out of there. Cheers, Steve

Posted By Kieran J Duignan Caro What you're describing responds to initiatives designed to make change as easier as possible. One successful approach lies in an alliance between the safety professional and those responsible for developing managers. If you don't have a management development specialist, you may benefit from developing skills in coaching and facilitation, so that safety is not simply perceived as legal compliance. An American safety consultant called David Sarkus has published a couple of good books on safety coaching. In the UK, you can develop coaching skills through the Association for Coaching or the BPS Special Group for Coaching Psychology (which non-psychologists can join as Affiliate members).

Posted By R Joe Hi Caro, sounds like an all too familiar problem. Positive motivation should always be the preferred option, but in my experience of senior executives - who have to lead the change that you seek - an unfortunate fact of life is that for a significant number it will take a serious accident and/or negative pressure from the enforcing authority to really trigger their enthusiasm and wholehearted support. It can be possible to get this before the event, however, by using the current focus on business risk management and the recent corporate manslaughter proposal intelligently to, for example, persuade the senior executives that a workshop to take a pro-active look at a 'top H&S risk' / realistic serious incident that could occur, and its ramifications at both a company and individual level, makes good business sense. Clearly, the workshop has to be well thought out and delivered by someone who has genuine experience of this sort of scenario. Happy to talk a bit more about this offline if it would help. Regards RJ

Posted By Steven Mellor It is absolutley essential that you have the support of senior managers and that they set an example. It is also useful to have supporters on the front line such as keen safety representatives. Regular safety committee meetings are useful. Multi-disciplined departmental inspections are also useful (with manager, rep, electrician, maintenance and yourself). The absolute backbone of your system as you will know is your health and safety policy which clearly states organisation and arrangements and the responsibilities of everyone on site - evreyone is responsible. Has evryone seen a copy of any risk assessments pertinent to them and are aware of necessary controls and safe systems of work? It can be very frustrating. I know I've been there. I've had Directors and Senior Managers who just didn't care and saw my role as a buffer between the law and themselves! Good luck