The good old “safety incentive program” has been around since man walked upright and has been misleading management since its conception. The concept is valid, based on the old “carrot and the stick” model. There has always been one fatal flaw in these programs… they usually incentivize the WRONG things! The traditional safety incentive programs, many still built in this horribly wrong manner, are based solely on identifying indicators (i.e., injury rates). This approach will push injury/incident reporting underground in order to achieve the incentive, and anyone who has made this mistake in their safety incentive program will testify to this fact. Sometimes, these “secrets” are minor; however, as the incentive increases in value, so does the manipulation of the data upon which the incentive is based.
In 2024, we should be moving away from these antiqued incentive practices. If management insists on having a safety incentive program, it MUST put the incentives on LEADING INDICATORS and activities that reduce risks and create a safety culture.
This 2009 publication is from our safety friends down under in New South Wales, Australia. This is a MUST-HAVE document if you have an existing incentive program or are considering implementing one. It can be used to assess an existing program and aid in creating a new program that ensures the incentives are properly designed, implemented, managed, and measured.
The principles are as follows:
Development process
- A safety incentive scheme should be developed in consultation with employees and/or their representatives.
- A safety incentive scheme should be adequately resourced in terms of time, money, and expertise. Employees should be trained and regularly retrained in each component that is required to be assessed.
- A safety incentive scheme should be integrated with broader organizational and improvement strategies.
- There should be clear links between the safety incentive scheme and other components of the SMS strategy.
- A safety incentive scheme should have broad-based employee, manager, and supervisor support.
Nature of scheme
- A safety incentive scheme should have a clearly defined scope and objectives that enable a shift progressively away from a focus on outcomes, to a focus on improvement in contributions.
- A safety incentive scheme should focus on achieving behavior changes that reinforce positive behavior to create a good safety culture.
- It is important that outcomes are measured objectively.
- To reinforce positive behavior, the incentive should be applied as closely as possible to the act to which it relates. The type and quantity of the reward should have some meaning to the people involved.
- A safety incentive scheme should be actively communicated and explained to employees before being implemented and to new employees upon joining. Regular communication with employees is required.
- Employees should be included in assessing WHS outcomes against the required standards.
- Employees and/or their representatives should have the right to assess and review outcomes against the source data
- Regularly updating employees to demonstrate results across all key performance indicators is essential.
Scope of scheme
- A safety incentive scheme should support a broad-based risk management approach; be integrated into the site’s WHS strategy; and be directed towards improving safety culture.
- A safety incentive scheme should operate at different levels and should recognize contributions from each group.
- Contractors may be included in the scheme according to how they fit into the profile of the site.
Goals and targets
- The measurement criteria used for safety incentive schemes should focus on leading or positive performance indicators.
- Participants and/or their representatives, as appropriate, should be able to influence the achievement of the goals and targets.
- A safety incentive scheme should be monitored on a continuing basis and reviewed against pre-determined objectives (ie to ensure that there are no perverse safety outcomes) at agreed, regular intervals.
- Each review should result in a progression from focusing on lag indicators to focusing on lead indicators
CLICK HERE for the original pdf, which includes a “checklist” to document the review/assessment of the existing program or the plan for the new program.
Source: NSW Department of Industry, Skills and Regional Development, 2009
