Page 24: of Maritime Reporter Magazine (November 2013)

24 Maritime Reporter & Engineering News ? NOVEMBER 2013 SAFETY & TRAINING The Magic Ingredients of a Healthy Safety Culture This is the second in a series of Maritime Reporter and Engi-neering News articles on Safe-ty Culture in the maritime in-dustry. The Þ rst article, which appeared in our October, 2013 edition, discussed the importance of management leader- ship, training, measurement, a focus on learning rather than blame, and continu-ous reß ection on safety. In this second article, safety culture expert Captain John Wright discusses the key ingredi- ents of a healthy safety culture.Talking with the Expert I had the good fortune of meeting Cap-tain Wright because of his involvement with the BC Ferries SailSafe project. SailSafe is a multi-phased project aimed at creating an industry-leading safety culture (and safety record) at BC Ferries. It is a project that the company I work for, Marine Learning Systems, is fortu- nate and proud to be a part of. SailSafe has seen time loss injuries cut in half, se-rious injuries reduced by two-thirds, and annual insurance claims costs reduced by over three-quarters. And the numbers continue to improve. Captain Wright is a Master Mariner and has spent his long career in the mari-time industry in a variety of roles includ-ing those of vessel master, marine super- intendent, chief executive and general manager. All of John?s roles have had a focus on safety and cultural change. He holds a wide variety of certiÞ cates and qualiÞ cations concerning health and safety, risk management and safety tech- nology. In June, 2013, John was honored with a safety at sea award for training which recognizes innovation and excellence in the maritime safety industry. I asked Captain Wright a number of questions about implementing a healthy safety culture:Please start us off with a high-level overview of how a company can im-prove its safety culture? The very best way to improve a safety culture, which means improve absolutely everything in the business, is achieved when a company decides to properly ask their employees this ques-tion in a structured way:?What?s wrong and how can we Þ x it?? Employees are rarely asked that ques-tion and when they are, their brilliant and often simple ideas end up on some poor hapless, overstretched manager?s desk, who is forced to put it in the ?too dif-Þ cult? tray. The net result is an already demotivated employee becoming even more demotivated. The answer, instead, is real workforce involvement and ownership of their own ideas. People are endlessly supportive of their own ideas. By allowing employees to implement their ideas for themselves, an organisation puts the enormous work- force ?horsepower? (which is otherwise underutilized), onto the ?propeller shaft?. This results in:
? Reduced loss events (for ex., inju- ries and damage to equipment),
? Reduced turnover of personnel,
? Reduced training and re-training costs,
? Reduced sickness absence, and
? An increase in motivation, involve- ment, enthusiasm, communication, teamwork and quality of decision making.For management, what is the biggest indicator that they can look for in their company to determine whether they have a safety and culture prob- lem - before an accident occurs? The most important of all is how well accidents, incidents and near misses (which we prefer to call ?learn-ing events?) are reported, acted upon and learned from. Under-reporting com-mon and is a solid and reliable indicator. Another is how often directors, manag-ers and front-line supervisors visit their people at their place of work, and how well they communicate with them. Is the communication conducted in a, ?I speak, you listen? way, or is it a conversation seeking the employees ideas on what?s wrong and how they think it can be Þ xed (which, by the way, they always know)? The quality of these conversations is critical and yet managers are rarely giv-en any help with developing these com-munication skills - skills which will not occur spontaneously. Another clue to the culture is when training is the Þ rst thing to be cut when business is poor - it should be the absolute last thing that is axed.If you had to say, what is the one most important ingredient in culture change? The quality of leadership from the top: The knowledge and commit-ment from the leadership team, their abilities as leaders to inspire their people and demonstrate their belief in the pro-cess, and their ability to prove (by their actions) to the most complete cynic in the workforce that they are genuinely putting the health, safety and welfare of their people as their number one priority. What is the biggest challenge to positive culture change? The ?engine room? of any or- ganisation is its middle management. In ?If you think safety is expensive, try an accident!?Murray Goldberg is CEO of Marine Learning Systems. An eLearning re- searcher and LMS developer, his software has been used by 14 million people world-wide.t: 352-692-5493www.MarineLS.com Captain John Wright is a Master Mariner and has spent his ca-reer in a variety of roles including those of vessel master, ma- rine superintendent, chief executive and GM. MR #11 (18-25).indd 24MR #11 (18-25).indd 2411/11/2013 11:35:25 AM11/11/2013 11:35:25 AM