WOW, my article earlier this week on the flaws of the TRIR formula stirred a passionate debate among several SAFTENG members/clients/friends. But from that debate, they now can see what their future safety metrics could look like. I always get the following response (and it is a very legitimate response)…
If measuring the TRIR and DART are so flawed, what should we measure in their place?
When we get this question, we MUST be prepared with our response, as this door will not stay cracked open very long! So, we need to facilitate this journey into leading indicators by helping those asking the questions to see the answer(s) on their own accord. We do this simply by asking several questions to which we already know the answers – but they may not. Here is how I learned to do this process, and it has never failed me when the leaders of the business are ready to move forward with how TRUE safety performance is actually measured.
Remember, our basis for this improvement can be summarized nicely in Dr. Todd Conklin’s statement:
“Safety is not the absence of events; safety is the presence of defenses.”
In other words, measure those Defenses/Safeguards/Barriers that we have in place intending to PREVENT these events rather than simply measuring the number of events or calculating some event ratio!
