It is a common thing to hear regarding safety in workplaces today… “Own it”. The concept is solid; management wants broad ownership of safety. Safety is NOT safety’s job, after all. But like many safety movements, this one usually fails in significant ways because it takes years of educating and motivating a workplace to accept owning safety broadly. This is talking about organizational values – NOT personal values; we have to first LEAD BY EXAMPLE before people begin to step up on a personal level to own their safety.
But far too often, what we see happening is the organization grows tired of the turnover of safety pros and the different approaches to managing safety by all the new safety pros and decides that they no longer need (or want) a safety pro/team, and instead, they adopt the “we will just share the role of safety via this ownership” approach.
I am always puzzled by this reaction to the turnover issues in the safety role(s) and the lack of curiosity from the leadership as to why that is happening; instead, their answer is to turn the ship 180º and go off on an uncharted path. Ironically, the problem that is frustrating management is their creation. They state they want everyone to “own safety”; however, they have failed to lead in this approach. Had they owned safety, they would not have grown frustrated by the different approaches of the former safety pros. This frustration stems from the lack of management ownership and a formal safety management system (SMS). Safety becomes more about the personalities in the safety role/group rather than a formally structured SMS owned and led by the senior management.
This formal and structured SMS creates a framework that all management (including the safety pro/team) work inside; it matters NOT who the people are filling the roles, as the roles and responsibilities are clearly defined, and the business works to fill the roles with the right people, realizing that some of those people may need some training on the SMS and how they fit into it. This SMS approach drives OWNERSHIP across all levels and functions within the organization; without it, we behave more like a professional sticking our fingers in the dam every time it springs a leak.
