Building a Strong Safety Culture: Principles and Practices
Safety Culture: Core Principles
Safety Culture is the set of principles, perceptions, and beliefs shared by members of an organization regarding the prevention of occupational accidents and diseases.
Characteristics of Safety Culture
- It’s often invisible to those within it, considered normal behavior.
- It cannot be changed quickly by internal legislation; it’s a slow, gradual process.
- It can change if its manifestations and harmful effects are visible to each component of the organization.
Safety Attitudes
Safety attitudes are the biases that lead us to identify permissive behaviors. These can be negative (indifference and apathy), leading to accidents and losses, or positive (commitment), generating correct conduct.
Process Safety Improvement
- Non-Permissive Culture: Security is understood as a personal value, with real commitment.
- Permissive Culture: Apathy and indifference prevail, with little value placed on safety.
Risk Prevention Management
Risk Prevention Management involves the decisions and actions taken to avoid accidents and occupational diseases.
Management Objective
The goal is to produce a cultural shift from a permissive to a non-permissive culture regarding workplace hazards.
Roles in Safety Management
Managers
- Executive: Define policies, ensure application, and define improvement stages.
- Supervisors: Promote worker participation, investigate accidents, and modify permissive behaviors.
- Workers: Engage in preventive management, provide improvement ideas, and prioritize safety.
Considerations for Effective Management
Effective management requires safety to become a personal value, with workers aware of their own prevention culture, prioritizing safety for lasting results.
Transforming Safety Culture
Strategic Vision
Convey the need for attitude change at all levels, recognizing it as a process of improving security, enhancing hazard response, and promoting safety training.