I recently described how I visited a site whereby accidents and incidents, some big, some small, were frequently happening.
Finally, one happened that necessitated the hospitalization of an employee and police intervention and investigation.
The client called in Corporate OHS to ask for help from a Health and Safety Consultant, to assist in rectifying these frequent issues. There was no pattern that we could find into the incidents, risk assessments had correctly identified hazards and risk, the root causes of the incidents were all different.
There was however no culture of health and safety in the company and despite the Health and Safety Departments best efforts, employees were not working to keep themselves safe and human error failures kept occurring.
Introduce a Behaviour Based Safety Observations (BBSO) Programme
We then discussed with them introducing a Behaviour Based Safety Observations (BBSO) programme into the company. Perhaps you read our previous Blog on Behaviour Based Safety (BBS) ? There has for many years been much talk of its importance and effectiveness.
For someone new to health and safety though, or, someone who is perhaps not a health and safety professional but is tasked with health and safety responsibilities. BBS can sound like an advanced and daunting concept. I get that !
In the last Blog we went back to basics on Behaviour Based Safety (BBS) Lets now delve a little deeper…..
What Makes Behaviour Based Safety Observations (BBSO) so Effective ? Why are we talking about them ?
Behavioural Based Safety Observations (BBSO) are recorded observations made by health and safety staff. They note what they see employees do to assess workplace behaviours.
In a nutshell, these observations shine a light in dark corners and give us mirrors to see blind spots. They help to ensure that the workplace remains incident and injury free.
This is done by taking a proactive approach to health and safety. Looking to get to the real root cause behind potentially unsafe behaviours.
- By observing and correcting habits, the focus in on preventing Not responding to them
- Alerting employees to habits aids self-improvement. Always far more effective than havong change forced on you
Behavioural Based Safety Observations (BBSO) examine the workplace environment and workplace habits. They also allow for proper exchange of information and feedback from employees to management. Finally, they can greatly aid in preparing health and safety training needs analysis and safety training materials.
Planning for Effective Behaviour Based Safety Observations (BBSO) ?
As with any new task or programme, plan well ! What will you be looking to observe ?
- Job Hazard Analysis:
- Break down each job task and activity into individual elements
- Enabling assessment of the risk associated with each task to ensure that you will consider mitigation after every step
- Safe Work Practices:
- These should be reviewed prior to conducting your observations so you are already aware of any documentation modifications needed for each job task or activity
- Safe Job Procedures:
- Same as the above, study them to ensure that your documentation is outlining the best possible way to carry out each process or task
What will I be Looking for in the Observations ?
You will primarily be looking for unsafe behaviours:
- You may or may not already have a clear goal or process in mind. Or, you may be open to determining why behaviour is occurring, and how to rectify it
What if I observe dangerous behaviours ?
- Dangerous situations may arise while conducting your observation. In this case, you must stop the work or task immediately, and ensure the employee is safe
- Next, conduct an investigation to determine the root cause of the situation. Do not blame the employee, but instead understand how the dangerous behaviour occurred
Be sure to applaud good practice !
- Try not to focus on the negative. The observations are there to help find out what employees are doing right too
- This empowers the workforce to help create a positive safety culture. Also encouraging them to participate more in safe behaviours
Have you any Pitfalls to Warn Me Of ?
Yes, be sure that employees understand that your observations intention is not to apportion blame or decide punishments for employees with bad habits and practice. This is paramount, otherwise the programme will be interpreted as a way for management or health and safety to snoop on employees and catch them out. Be clear that the programme is about working together to improve safety via prevention.
Ensure that all levels of the organization are involved. Without top management buy in the programme will likely fail.
Be sure to ACT on your findings. Just collecting data without making tangible and seen improvements will be noticed. This will lose employees engagement and trust.
If you are looking for an HSE Consultant in the UAE, Corporate OHS is a Health and Safety Consultancy whose HSE Consultants offer expert resources and superior performance to give you greater results.
We specialize in creating workable, user friendly solutions aligned to your business activities, operations and budget.
Our range of health and safety consultancy services includes;
- Long term or project based HSE outsourcing
- Flexible monthly support retainers giving access to HSE services without the burden of a permanent cost
- Health, Safety and Fire Risk assessments
- Hazard identification and control measure implementation
- Gap Analysis and HSE audits
- HSE legal compliance reviews and assistance
- HSE management system development, implementation and improvement including locally compliant systems such as Abu Dhabi OSHAD, Sharjah OSHJ and/or accredited systems such as ISO 45001, ISO 14001, ISO 9001 and ISO 50001
- Accident investigations
- Business continuity and crisis management
To find out more about our services, please visit our website www.corporateohs.com send an email to enquiries@corporateohs.com or call Caroline Savage on 052 566 0949