Hi, Does anyone have a culture measurement tool or information on Behaviour based safety culture that they could direct me to? An auditor is asking that our "H & S policy shows evidence that it shows Senior Management commitment to a behaviour Based safety (BBS) culture or identify the culture measurement tool." I believe that it shows/states MD commitment so not sure what he is after. Thank you in Advance. Pat

These questions seem to be turning up on the forum with a surprising amount of regularity. Businesses hire an auditor to evaluate the effectiveness of some management system and they identify some non-compliance but the auditor does not explain what the supposed breach actually is and the business feels obliged to ask us, on the forum, to second guess what the auditor might be after. The first thing is to ask the auditor what they are on about- it’s an audit not an exam, you can’t be deducted marks for asking questions. If the auditor cannot explain themselves in words of two syllables they are probably making this up and just saying it so that they can justify their fees. If the auditor has produced a report which you do not understand and they cannot explain, then they, the auditor, has failed and you should get another auditor.

I've yet to see a Safety culture measurement tool that looks remotely like measuring anything tangible. I work for a large UK company and have seen 3 major (expensive) exercises over the past 12 years all delivered by snake oil salesmen and all sunk without trace.

There are some very good safety culture assessment tools (i.e. valid and reliable), with some very experienced assessors. Safety culture has to be 'triangulated', but using three different methods - audits, behaviour results, ands perceptions. See Cooper 2008 at http://www.behavioural-s...ty_culture_profiling.pdf for more details. Relying solely on a survey will not do it.

A Safety Climate Survey will only provide prevailing data at the time of the survey - a snap shot in time. Depending on the size of the survey/organisation it takes a considerable amount of time to design, distribute and collate the information. If you also include actions and timescales you will probably find another audit on the horizon before you have closed out the survey. Auditors - don't you just love them.