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Posted By RA
Hi All,
Recently after attending a well known awards ceremony- a construction company was awarded for having zero accidents. This is quite an achievement, but to be entirely honest I just don't believe that a sizeable construction site can go without having the occasional knick here or bruise there.
I had a few of our site managers quiz me after they have been requested by me to record all accidents no matter how small. They spoke of their disbelief of this situation also. But I could see these guys were really annoyed as they believed their reporting was giving them a bad image- although not the case at all.
But there has been a considerable reduction in accidents being recorded by these site managers- I have quizzed them regarding this reduction- they stated that the minor accidents are hardly happening.
I used to work on construction sites as a Joiner and I know from experience that someone on a site gets a cut/knick now and again.
Anyone out there got any advice to help these disillusioned guys see reporting in a more favourable light- and I don't mean legally more of a subtle persuasive technique.
Cheers,
RA
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Posted By Darren J Fraser
Hi RA
Any company that reports zero accidents is normally referring to no accidents above the 3 day criteria or other reportables, that does not mean to say that they have a good accident record as they could be suffering from more minors than your company, just they do not report it, only record internally.
This always causes problems, as managers feel that if they report everything it will look as though they are failing, when in fact the opposite is true, as it gives them an opportunity for improvement, obviously you need to 'sell' this concept to them and may need to hold their hands at times, positively encourage over reporting, something along the lines of 'The more we report, the better we become' etc.
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Posted By Tabs
Try a bit of separation ...
3+ day accidents are recorded and reported by numbers - and used as specific cases for improvements. Upgrade them.
<3 day accidents are trended - set a base line and report trends up or down, and make it a positive that the site is following reporting procedures and developing a healthy safety culture. Downgrade them.
By keeping the 'smaller' accidents lower profile, you should be able to encourage reporting because there should be no 'bad light' issues.
Perhaps a few months of observations before setting targets to lower the >3 day accidents would be beneficial? (Allows them to get used to the idea, and gives you a realistic monthly average to beat).
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Posted By Raymond Rapp
I would like to see an end to the use of LTAs as form of good performance benchmarking. Many organisations simply 'cook the books' and either do not report LTAs or fiddle them for their benefit. Any construction company who claims that they have not had a LTA in 100,000 man hours of work is telling a lie!
A couple of years ago I went for an interview for a h&s role. Whilst waiting in the reception I noticed all these grande certificates. During the course of the interview I raised the subject of LTAs. The Safety Manager said: 'we do not have accidents because the blokes know it is their fault. They know the rules. If they have an accident then they are sacked.' I replied, 'Assuming of course they are still alive.'
No, I never got the job!
Regards
Ray
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Posted By RA
Thanks for The Responses,
It irritatess me when I see that it is obvious that there are porkies on the go when small knicks or knocks are not being recorded.
I guess the ones who are in a true position of judging construction accident records are insurance companies.
Regarding rewarding someone for not having any accident records questions the value of the awards- and believe me this was one ceremony that is well thought of.
It took a lot of persuasive work from me to get the site managers to improve recording accidents then to take them to this ceremony to feel as though they have failed despite myself and Directors telling them that they hadn't.
Don't get me wrong folks we did get a couple and these were gratefully received by our men but I just couldn't get the bad impression this left me with.
Am I wrong or am I being a jobsworth here?
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Posted By GT
Lost Time Injuries
Hi Ray, Read your thread and I have to
say that I think they did you favour,
not that you were not the man for the
job but you are better off not working with a
safety Manager that operates on blame
culture. Sorry about the title and I
don’t wish to be pedantic or antagonistic
but I don’t see accidents as lost time,
near misses are still accidents
( no injury no time lost) it’s the consequence of
an accident that loses the time, the
injury. Just the way I read it, awaiting
to shot down in flames.
GT
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Posted By Jim Walker
I'm trying to avoid naming names here:
Certain Gas companies
Certain Rail companies
Certain Oil companies
Common factor - have all slaughtered people through management failures over the last few years / all have these awards hanging up in head office.
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Posted By AJM
Here Here, Jim,
A voice shouts from the back
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Posted By Raymond Rapp
Yes, I think many could name some companies who are guilty of 'massaging' the figures.
GT, thanks for you support. I am glad I did not get offered the job!
In principle I am against any reward for the prevention or reduction of accidents, LTAs etc. That includes those initiatives arising from BBS.
Regards
Ray
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Posted By David Rowbotham
Ray
Agree with your sentiments about the usefulness of accident rates as a performance measurement tool if they are used in isolation, but why the reluctance to reward people for accident prevention? Or is it an objection to financial rewards?
David
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Posted By gham
Because...... loosly you could argue that you are rewarding them to under report.
There is a reward for low figures so you get low figures, like if you reward for high productivity, output and quality, if the rewards are big enough you will get it.
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Posted By Jeffrey Watt
A shift manager once told me "You can measure things out of existence."
This was a company heavy into measuring everything. I thought corporate EHS sat around thinking up new things for us to measure.
On leaving the company I suggested they get a weather metric, where sites with bad weather got marked down and had to put an action plan in place to improve the weather results in the next quarter.
They didn't get the ironic bit about some things being outside our control.
Nothing wrong with trending LTA's it keeps focus but some take it to mean that the whole system has fell to pieces because we had two more LTA's than last year.
Statistics and other forms of fibbing call it "outliers" when you get strange results you didn't expect. Look it up and practice it's use it could come in handy at a meeting some day while being grilled by an angry CEO.
Kind thingies
Jeff
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Posted By Merv Newman
I'm strongly with Raymond here. Accidents will always be under reported where there is a "blame" culture. Better is the attitude "tell us, we need to know"
I'll even put RIDDOR out of the frame here. Management needs to know. And I have always tried to install that sort of attitude wherever I work.
As for "cuts and knicks" of course they happen. And we know that the difference between a plaster and stitches and 3+ days is only a matter of luck, management and employee attitude.
My attitude with First Aid Treatments has been to go and have a chat with the person in order to see if it really could have been much worse (talk to the supervisor or even mount an inquiry) But I do not want them written off as "accidents happen"
And I do not want the injured person to be written off as "stupid" or "careless"
The Neil Budworthy (?) article on Safety Measurement Criteria is still the definitive source. IMHO. Is it still available on this site ?
Merv
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Posted By Advanced Safety
I have worked with some very large construction companies who had indeed had no accidents to report, and publisised this. However, they counted their own employees only, e.g. Site Manager, QS, etc. They did not include the sub-contractor accidents that had occurred on their sites. Agree with earlier post, while we have a blame culture for accidents, we will never have a true reporting system. Some Site Managers i have met have told me that their accident performance forms part of their overrall annual bonus! Although this did not apply to senior managers.
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Posted By Raymond Rapp
Well, that is unanimous then.
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Posted By Raymond Rapp
David, sorry did not spot your response. GHam sums it up very nicely - 'it often causes people to under report.' The concept can also breed a blame culture, which is very unhealthy. I should know, I worked in an organisation with such a culture for 22 years!
I am not against rewarding people for reducing accidents per se. That said, h&s practitioners et al are employed to reduce accidents, why pay them a bonus? Call me a cynic if you like, but most reward systems that I know of have a machinistic tendency.
Finally, take a scenario where in a company there are no accidents being reported. Does this tell me that there are very good safety management practices in place? Perhaps. Although I suspect not, under reporting will often surface with a huge bang and a wake up call.
Ray
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Posted By Ian P
Staff at a branch of a certain High St shop relied on the annual bonuses for zero accidents and anybody who wanted to report an accident was pressured by their colleagues not to do so. The bonuses no longer exist there but I wonder how many other similar schemes are in place.
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