E064_Investing in Leadership and Safety: The Secret Ingredient to Success

Welcome to this week's podcast episode, where we examine the pivotal role of leadership and safety and its impact on organisational success.

Is it merely a tick-box exercise, or could it be the secret ingredient to unlocking your company's potential?

Return on investment (ROI) is a critical consideration in today's business landscape. We often focus on profitability and sustainability, but quantifying the costs of neglecting certain areas, especially safety, can be challenging.

We refer back to our podcast episode 035, where we explored the concept of "blue money" – the funds that could prevent losses – versus "red money" – the costs incurred when something goes wrong.

Drawing from real-life examples such as the BP Trans Ocean Deepwater Horizon Disaster, we examine the dire consequences of neglecting safety. With 11 fatalities and billions in cleanup efforts, this catastrophe underscores the importance of proactive safety measures.

Safety leadership is more than just compliance; it's about creating a culture of safety within the organisation. We discuss the ripple effects of safety investments, from boosting quality and efficiency to enhancing team dynamics and trust.

Quantifying ROI goes beyond numbers.

It involves understanding the human element of safety investments and fostering a culture of continuous improvement. Through case studies like Trimec Transportation's safety culture transformation, we highlight the tangible benefits of prioritising safety.

Our mission is clear: to empower organisations to safeguard their most valuable assets – their people – while ensuring operational and financial resilience.

We offer practical steps to invest in safety leadership, from assessments and expert observations to leadership development programs.

Investing in safety leadership isn't just good practice; it's good business.

Join us as we unlock the safety secret ingredient for long-term success and sustainability.

Key Topics Covered:

• Understanding the true cost of incidents and accidents
• Safety leadership as a catalyst for cultural transformation
• The ripple effect of safety investments
• Quantifying ROI beyond numbers
• Practical steps to invest in organisational leadership and safety

Takeaways:

• Prioritising safety yields positive outcomes and mitigates the dire consequences of neglect.
• Investing in safety leadership is a strategic move that offers substantial financial returns and a sustainable competitive advantage.
• Understanding the true cost of incidents and accidents is crucial for proactive safety measures.
• Continuous improvement and fostering a

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This episode was produced under Safety Collaborations Limited and now continues as part of Karin Ovari Limited. While we are not currently releasing new episodes, the entire library remains active, and the topics covered are just as relevant today as when they were first recorded.

To learn more about my current work in leadership and communication, visit karinovari.com and the leadership community, The Supervisors Hub.

Connect with us on LinkedIn: Karin Ovari, Nuala Gage,

If you enjoyed this episode, please help us spread the word and leave a review on your preferred podcast player.

Stay Safe, Stay Well
The Safety Collaborators

Chapters

• 0:12 Investing in Safety for Business Success
• 6:39 Cost and Complexity of Safety Incidents
• 16:13 Safety Leadership and Organizational Culture
• 20:39 The Ripple Effect of Safety Investments
• 31:24 Investing in Safety Leadership for Success

Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:12

Is investing in safety, just another tick box exercise, or can it be the secret ingredient to your organisation's success?

Speaker 2: 0:20

I am Karen and I am Nula, and we are the Safety Collaborators. Our mission is to help people have better conversations and change the way they think about safety.

Speaker 1: 0:32

Consider us your thinking partners, sharing expertise and wisdom in everything safety, safety culture and psychological safety.

Speaker 2: 0:40

Before we climb into this week's episode, you may hear that Karen has a little bit of a sexier voice this week, yeah, but I am very impressed that she is showing up. You know, rule number one of leadership is show up to share some wisdom and expertise with us today.

Speaker 1: 0:58

Good, I was thinking about we should probably mention something so well done and today we are going to have that conversation around.

Speaker 2: 1:09

Is safety just another tick box exercise? And what is the value in it? And it reminded me of that quote that we have all read, I am sure plenty of times before, and if you haven't, hopefully it is a light bulb moment. What happens if we spend the money to train them and they leave? The CFO Chief Financial Officer cries what happens if we don't train them and they stay?

Speaker 1: 1:36

the CEO says I think this came from Richard Branson that person him.

Speaker 2: 1:42

I was going to say that the question of return on investment and everything you do in business is crucial, because the reality is that you in business to make a profit, to be sustainable, to deliver on your company's mission, and sometimes it's really hard to quantify the costs of not investing in areas that may, at the moment, seem either unnecessary, it can wait or we have every award. All of our statistics show that we're doing amazingly and we all believe it won't happen to me until something goes wrong and then we wish we had spent the blue money. What is blue money? Well, that's the money that we could or should have spent to prevent the loss in the first place, and I'm not going to dive into that anymore. You can learn more about red, green and blue money in episode 35 with Karen and our guest Andrew Burton. And red money is expensive. That's the money that we spend because something's gone wrong and when we consider the cost of safety versus the cost of accidents, it can hurt a lot.

Speaker 1: 2:50

I wonder how many times we go out of wish we had have done it, should it could or would have.

Speaker 2: 2:55

Oops, yeah, oops, and hindsight is 20-20 vision. I mean, I was actually chatting with a friend during a walk this weekend and she mentioned the whole thing about aging. We don't believe it's going to happen to us, or that it's going to happen to us in the way that it's happened to other people. Then you have these signs and these things and you're like, oh gosh, what could I, should I be doing from this point forward? And I think it's a great mirror in the sense of exploring the topic of return on investment in safety as the secret ingredient in your organization.

Speaker 1: 3:30

That is such a good analogy. It's a living moment, let me put it that way. But I think what's really important is that it's about the consistency. It isn't about, oh, let's go and change the systems today and hope for a better result tomorrow, because that's actually not how it works. No, it's about what do we need to do today and every day in a proactive way to get the result that you want later down the line? The problem is, we humans want everything today, and so decisions and even profitability of businesses, and there's lots of reasons and pressures as to why we might need to do it today or want to get it done today, and particularly in business. You've got shareholders, you've got clients, there's lots of pressure coming from everywhere, so it takes a very brave, I think, organization and leadership to step back and say no, we're going to do this in a proactive, consistent way.

Speaker 2: 4:25

Mindful way comes to mind.

Speaker 1: 4:28

It does. We'll mention that again shortly.

Speaker 2: 4:31

In the conversations that we've had building up to this and the research that we've been doing and the case studies we've been reading, it does give a very clear message that investing in safety leadership is not just good practice, it's good business, and that is some of the wisdom we hope to share with you today.

Speaker 1: 4:53

So we are going to share some case studies Many of you may already be aware of them, but if not, we might have a different spin on it and sort of four key areas to consider why you should invest in your return on investment of safety leadership and safety culture development. So we're going to kick off with the BP Trans Ocean Deepwater Horizon Disaster, which happened back in 2010. And this particular one is very poignant to me because around that time I was actually working with BP running a crew development safety leadership program.

Speaker 1: 5:26

And it went on for months. It was amazing and it was very successful for them. But, of course, needless to say, this was a very hot topic and I was on the other side of the world. We were in South Africa at the time actually, and, in case you don't know, the Deepwater Horizon I was built was, in the US at least, one of the worst environmental disasters in their history. It did occur in the Gulf of Mexico. There was an explosion, 11 people did lose their lives. I will say at this point and what often gets missed, there was something like 160, I can't remember the exact figure that actually were evacuated very safely.

Speaker 1: 6:02

And so I think that's really important to state, because there was some investment made.

Speaker 1: 6:07

You've got to look at what worked in those moments as well to keep those 160 odd safe Exactly, but one of the biggest problems was that it literally released 4.9 million barrels of oil into the Gulf over the next 87 days, wow. So there was a lot of investigation into this and, as a result of it, there was an overhaul of their safety protocols, emergency response systems, operational practices between BP and trans ocean and, of course, that impacted the wider oil and gas industry. However, part of the discussion which is also really important here is leadership. There were many decisions being made at the time that will also have contributed to this. Were they doing what they should have been doing more proactively around the failure of equipment, all sorts of things? What maintenance was and wasn't being done? I don't know. They also were celebrating some crazy a number of man hours without incident on the day it happened.

Speaker 2: 7:08

Wow, I think that is just such a scary reality of you can't predict the next 60 seconds.

Speaker 1: 7:15

Absolutely so all of that time spent celebrating no LTIs, etc. Etc, etc. And it was something like million man hours or something.

Speaker 2: 7:23

Million man hours, but whatever it was, yeah.

Speaker 1: 7:26

But what's interesting here? It costs the company over $65 billion in cleanup efforts, fines and compensation for economic loss. That is an enormous amount of money. So you know, I think what's really important with this is that this is an example of a absence of a proactive safety culture and investment. So talk about that blue money. What might they have done leading up to this? Now, we can't predict the future as much as we'd like to, but safety leadership was a really key component into this, and what could they have done differently that didn't lead them to really years of challenge for their backtracking and having to fix, and not just the immediate financial cost but, you know, the long term, reputational, Exactly.

Speaker 1: 8:13

I mean people lost their jobs. Apart from lives, lots of things are affected. These are big, catastrophic events that we're going to share today, these examples, but what about the smaller events that happen on a day to day basis when we're operating? What happens from week to week? How do we be more efficient, more effective, have better conversations, better leadership, so that we continually look at what is the best return of investment for safety, leadership and our culture?

Speaker 2: 8:41

That dives so beautifully into having a look at the four key areas that we've identified for the return of investment in your safety, leadership and culture. Because cost is a huge one. And it's terrifying when you actually question and say do I understand the true cost of incidents and accidents? Because there's the visible stuff, there's the direct cost. So we have medical expenses, we have evacuations, we have lost time at work, we possibly have legal services that are required, we have claims against us, and those are the immediately tangible costs. We can see them. But then there are the indirect costs and the potential consequential losses that we don't take into consideration. So it might be the equipment damage or knock on damage of equipment and product damage from this incident loss of production, loss of people because they no longer want to work with us. So we have a higher turnover. We have people slowing down work or going on to like duty for extended periods because, well, you know they're not going to look after me. So if it could take me five hours to do this job and it takes me a whole shift, well, nothing wrong with that. Karen, you mentioned reputation.

Speaker 2: 9:57

One of the things that we've seen with quite a few companies is their increase in insurance premiums. So, whether it's for insurance premiums, workmen's compensation in the mining industry, it's paying into the mining compensation. Then we've got additional supervision time because, oh, it must be the people. So we're going to just add on an extra supervisor and the time it takes for investigations. I mean, how many times do you hear like, oh my gosh, look at the paperwork we're going to have to do around this. Where's my time? I can't, as the safety officer or lead, I can't go and be where I am most needed, which is on site, because I'm not drowning in paperwork to actually do the investigation, things like I mean. The list could go on and on, trust me. Hr issues, having to bring in temporary labor, pay over time consider your lost time. And it's only when we take all of these costs. Loss of clients I mean haven't even mentioned that one or contracts.

Speaker 1: 10:53

Absolutely.

Speaker 2: 10:54

Not winning the tender because of your reputation in the market and you take all of these costs, you can actually work out well what is the cost per worker for this particular incident or accident? The question many companies don't ask is the next one, which is what is the estimated value of goods or services or production that each worker now needs to make up to offset this cost, because we've got to make back what we've lost here. So what does each worker need to do? When you add those two figures, so the actual cost plus what we have to now work back, is when you get the true cost of the incident or accident, and it is often terrifying numbers, even on supposedly small small events.

Speaker 1: 11:38

Exactly, it just made me think of you know it does impact the people. Much more than I think it's given credit when you just mentioned that. You know how do we estimate the value of goods and services that each worker must produce to offset the cost. So cost-op sending it also made me think about. It's not just the monetary cost but the emotional cost, the psychological safety costs, mental health. All of that plays into those costs Completing and that adds a whole other layer of costs it does Cost and complexity.

Speaker 2: 12:07

We live in a complex world and when we actually really want to dig into it and you think of recalls analysis, how deep do people really go into what the recalls is? Because it just gets scary. The complexity behind it actually is quite terrifying and this all leads into. Well, if we understood it and we took the time to be mindful and really look into it and learn from it, where would we be investing so that we are not having to make back these expenses in the long run? You know and that really, karen Neeler, still never happened to me, won't happen in my operation, and sadly we've said it before that's usually when we get called in when it was like, excuse the language, but oh shit, it just happened to me, it just happened in my operation I just got blindsided. What do I do now?

Speaker 2: 13:01

So when we consider those costs, and then we actually question, well, how much would we really need to invest in safety measures? So in leadership support, in training, in the correct equipment, whether that is safety equipment or production equipment, what is actually needed in maintenance costs and having effective safety leadership programs? So, when we have a look at all of that the cost of investment suddenly becomes, and what we talk about there blue money actually becomes inconsequential. It's pocket change, one of the other examples, and I promise you we're not picking on BP today, however. No, it just feels like it, but yeah.

Speaker 2: 13:39

It just feels like it because you know these were some of the crucial high income or high cost incidents that came up was the BP Texas City Refinery Explosion in 2005, where a lot of the recourse around that was neglect in systems and processes and what was happening and that resulted in 15 deaths and over 170 injuries and was considered one of the most devastating industrial accidents in the US to date of 2005. Up to that time and again, you then have a look at the financial implications. It was another 1.6 billion in compensation costs, in fines, in settlements. It led to massive reputational damage and a loss in shareholder value. So again it's that financial actually the tangible financial but the indirect and the human cost of neglecting your safety, culture and leadership and high reliability organizations has the potential to actually I nearly said, wipe you out, but I don't know if that's quite the right wording.

Speaker 1: 14:45

When these things happen, unfortunately, when do we stop and take stock of what's going on when it goes wrong? It's the same with our own personal health. When things start to go wrong, you start thinking, oh crap, what am I supposed to be doing? How do I take the lead on this? And so I think that these two incidents that we've already looked at it's that same thing we often look at. You know, we say production and safety go hand in hand.

Speaker 1: 15:08

They are not two separate entities, but unfortunately we do have a bit of a tendency and it's just human nature to be a bit pendulum. So we'll go all right, nothing's going wrong. So we'd focus, focus, focus on the other side until something starts to go wrong and interesting, it's usually lots of little things that if we're not paying attention, we'll end up with that pendulum swing going way the other side to a major event. And then everybody's scrambling to think, oh, now we've got to really focus on being safe. And blah, blah, blah. Yeah, and where did that come from? How did it happen? Yeah, so it's. How do you minimize that pendulum swing but make sure that it's happening all the time? It's?

Speaker 2: 15:51

little wins all the time and I love what you mentioned earlier. That consistency was the word you brought up earlier. Correct yeah, so once we understand the cost. So this is the actual cost of our incidents, and you can do that on the. You know the what if cost as well. What if something goes wrong? What could it cost us? Where do we go next?

Speaker 1: 16:13

We talk about safety leadership.

Speaker 1: 16:15

Now I think when we use those terms, most people think about the supervisor at the front line supervising people and that safety leadership, you know, making sure people are doing the right thing in the moment. But it actually goes beyond compliance and it's really about so, yep, we need to manage the job, we need to have good systems in place to help creating that culture of safety. But the role of leadership is critical and it starts at the top, because the rest of the organization how do they feel about maybe challenging the status quo, so to speak? Is senior leadership listening? Are they actually walking the talk and not just a lot of talking and words? So leadership is the role of leaders in modeling safety behaviors and setting the expectations, and that really does start at the top. And the impact on organizational culture. So a strong leadership that's a nice word permeates the organization. I suddenly had this like spongy mass vision in front of me.

Speaker 1: 17:16

We talk about safety culture, but we talk about organizational culture. We've said this many, many times. If people don't feel safe to speak up at any point in the process, whether you're a senior person or not, then what are you missing as an organization? So that safety leadership is a catalyst for the transformation here. Give it those words, it really does help you. So how do you start having the conversations that you need to have? How do you start to inspire people to speak up, to look for innovative ways to do things? What investing are you doing in that?

Speaker 1: 17:51

Because, as an organization, there has to be some sort of investment, and that investment is time, not just money Allowing people, which of course, converts to money at some point, but you have to give people the time to develop their skills as well, and the long-time benefits of that is how our culture of safety leads to sustainable operation. So, if we start to practice every day, a little bit every day, be consistent in how we show up from the top to the other end I don't like saying the bottom, because I think that's just the wrong word but across the food chain. Well, to the boots on the ground that's a nice term I like. That Is the senior leadership listening to the boots on the ground, because they've got a lot of knowledge and they're seeing everything.

Speaker 2: 18:35

Oh my gosh, you just reminded me of there was one of our favorite graphic artists on LinkedIn and it was the typical onion cut in half and you see the layers. And it shows what senior leadership see, and then, as the onion layer is stuck, it's a little fatter as it goes in what middle management see, what supervisors see, and then that core nugget in the middle is what the people on the boots on the ground see. Oh, I love it. And it is such a brilliant visual because that is exactly what it is.

Speaker 1: 19:04

We'll put it into the show notes. Yeah, we'll put the visual into the show notes. Show notes yeah, definitely.

Speaker 2: 19:10

And that's what it is. And that's what it is when you don't feel safe to speak up in an environment, where do you start? And I've got this vivid, vivid memory of a while ago with one of our clients and I stopped a job and I spoke up and I was made to feel incredibly uncomfortable and I mean that's my role, you know, that's that's what I do. And when I walked back into the accommodation offices area, people were like, oh, do you think you're going to be on the next helicopter out of here? And I was like, why would I be on the next helicopter out of here? I was like, quite taken aback. I was like they're like because of what you said and to whom you said it.

Speaker 2: 19:49

And it was really interesting because when I went back shore side and went to meet with the top leadership team and I gave them that as an example and I said I am an external consultant and I am here to highlight the difficult things to what have you? And if I was made to feel so incredibly uncomfortable as an outsider, how are your people on the ground feeling? And you know what kudos to them because they went. Oh, what do we need to do? How do we improve this? How do we make this better? And started doing incremental things the time I left. It definitely was a whole lot better, but sometimes that's the value of being an outsider is that you can see and you can speak up on behalf of the boots on the ground and say here's the mirror.

Speaker 1: 20:39

Paul O'Neill was the new CEO of Alcoa. Alcoa was, or is actually a aluminium manufacturer, smelting. But when Paul O'Neill took over Alcoa as CEO in 1987, the company was not doing very well. The shareholders were unhappy, they were losing money, they were really not in a good place. And I remember hearing this story years ago and it was 1987. And he really shifted the company's focus to being a safe operation. And I remember the story that his first shareholder meeting because as CEO he was brand new, the shareholders wanted to meet him. He stood up the front and of course you can imagine a group of shareholders in the room are thinking right, he's going to tell us how he's going to cut costs and save money here and chop off bits there and do whatever, whatever, whatever. And first thing came out of his mouth was right, we're going to talk about safety. Apparently you could hear a pin drop. I would love to have been a fly in the room in that place. And for him, well, he did make it his top priority and he seriously did walk the talk. So he implemented a comprehensive safety program that included rapid reporting of safety incidents, company wide safety protocols, open communication lines for all employees to report safety concerns directly to him. Apparently, people walked out of that shareholder meeting thinking and getting on the phone and going oh my God, the company's going down, sell your stock, because he's like this guy's talking about safety bonkers. He completely turned that organisation around. Within a year of his leadership the profits hit a record high. By prioritising safety they not only reduce workplace accidents but improved operational efficiency and employee productivity. So it isn't pie in the sky stuff. Now I know most people listening to this realise that. You know we're not trying to say something that isn't there, but sometimes we need to hear it over and over again. And the company's market value increased from. Some of these numbers are just like mind boggling, and this was back in 1987, 88. In the late 80s. Right increased from three billion to 27 billion during his tenure. So the key message here is that it illustrates how focusing on safety can lead to operational accidents and significant financial growth. It is worthy of considering your leadership, your safety culture. The blue money DuPont is another story.

Speaker 1: 23:08

Now most of us in our industry look at it as you know stop cards and all that sort of stuff but that's not where it started. They were a gunpowder manufacturer back in the early 19th century and you can imagine it probably wasn't a great place to work back then. No, but over the years they developed systems and safety management systems focusing on continuous improvement, getting people involved, getting the employees involved, leadership commitment which, fyi, the stop card as we know it and the observation card as we know it today was actually only designed for supervisors. So in the early days it was only the supervisors that actually use those cards to monitor the manufacturing line, to see where there could be improvement, to see what else we could do. That was part of their continuous improvement methodology. Now it obviously got translated into many different ways of being used. So again, that sustainable commitment, that regular, consistent commitment driven from leadership to boots on the ground with the complementary management systems, became part of their success and they're still going very strong today.

Speaker 2: 24:17

I love that because it links so beautifully into what the third one which we were talking about, which is the ripple effect of safety investments.

Speaker 1: 24:24

Yeah.

Speaker 2: 24:25

Because we've spoken a lot about the ripple effect of when things go wrong and the indirect and the direct costs. But what are the ripple effects of when we actually do a safety investment? And sometimes it's almost a bit invisible. And this is what we talk about, as you know the fairy dust. Yeah, absolutely yeah. How do you make it visible?

Speaker 2: 24:46

And when you're focusing on improving safety and people are speaking up and they are able to give suggestions, they're able to innovate, they're able to say oh, you know what? Here's an area where we could improve. Quality improves, efficiency improves. You build trust. There's far more cooperation amongst team members, so we start bringing in all of that trust and psychological safety. You enhance your team performance, but you also streamline your operation. Things just become more effective and efficient. You improve your quality, you reduce things like conversational waste, which is something that we often speak about.

Speaker 2: 25:26

Okay, but two words you can have, and we often use the ripple effect as an exercise to explore what can go wrong, but I love the twist on this that we've given you today is to what is the ripple effect of what could go right in your safety investment and when you invest in safety? So when we look at companies, like when Chevron implemented their operational excellence management system and they really started taking actions to include rigorous safety standards, to improve employee training, to have leadership accountability and consistent accountability. That investment led to lower operational risks, reduced liabilities, improved efficiency and improved long term financial growth and stability. And when we look at that as an example of how, looking at a comprehensive safety system that works and again we are always looking at continuous improvement Just because you've put a system in place doesn't mean you've ticked the box. Oh no, it's always around what happens next. You know what do you do, but it really does improve the overall efficiency and profitability in your organization from the direct and indirect costs.

Speaker 2: 26:39

And we were safety coaches on a drill ship refurbishment project and at the end of that project, before the vessel set sail, there was a bit of a celebration and the project manager that I was reporting into pulled me aside and gave me this huge hug and he said you know, we still can't quite figure out what it is that you do. This has been one of our best projects. We finished it on time. We've had no major incidents or accidents. At most we've had a couple of first aid cases. And you know when I was sharing this with you. In hindsight you know you had the perfect words to respond and go. Well, it's quite simple. We hold people accountable and help them have conversations that matter. Yeah, and that builds trust, improves efficiency and hopefully, part of this conversation is around putting words to what that fairy dust looks like, because it is the positive ripple in your organisation and in your operation.

Speaker 1: 27:35

As I was listening to you reflecting on that, I was thinking I've actually written down, what a neat activity. I've never thought about doing those two side by side, actually no yeah, well done.

Speaker 1: 27:45

So see, even when we're doing this, we're thinking and designing and learning all the time. What a great activity. I mean anybody can do it. Start with what we're. I mean they usually use it as you know, if something goes wrong and you're in the middle because you are the most important piece in that puzzle at that time, then who's the next layer? Who's the next layer? Who's the next layer that it impacts? But if we still do that and then but look at it from when it went. Well, what a great after-action review. I like it.

Speaker 1: 28:14

And, look, there's lots of examples out there that we can probably use. So how do we quantify that? How do we go beyond numbers? And it can be really difficult to think beyond numbers, and I think that's a lot, especially in, I think, high hazard industries where there's so many rules and regulations and spreadsheets and where it's all about look, we need to fine-tune this piece of the puzzle. How do we have the conversations? You need to have to discuss the difficulties in directly linking the safety investment which could be into people not just systems, but the people and to the financial returns.

Speaker 2: 28:49

And especially when margins are small, because what goes first Really challenging. Yep, no, the margins are tight. We're going to be going to put training on hold for a while. We're going to put development on hold.

Speaker 1: 29:00

Yeah, and I sometimes. We sometimes shake your head and go is that really the best use of what you should be doing? There's some qualitative benefits, of course, to this. So you enhance your reputation. If you improve your return on investment beyond the numbers, you enhance reputation, customers trust you, employee satisfaction goes up so you don't have that high turnover. Now, some of our industries, you know people do move around but regardless, do they want to come back or not?

Speaker 2: 29:33

Yes, and do you have a core that is consistent?

Speaker 1: 29:36

Absolutely, and that's really important. So, getting feedback and not just getting the feedback for the sake of it, but actually listening to it and acting on it the one of the things that we hear so often is well, I do, I give them feedback and I tell them stuff, but I never know where it goes, so I just stopped telling them Exactly exactly. Feedback is the meat, I guess, on the bones when you will look at improvement, the nutrition of your organization.

Speaker 2: 30:06

That's nice.

Speaker 1: 30:08

So how do you measure some of these things? So there is the obvious measurements. There's quantitative data and qualitative data. So the benefits of having conversations with people is you'll get to the real. It's very easy for people to do checklist type things, but you really want to hear what people say, because that's what they're not saying. That actually gives you even more information. So when we look at companies who want to really measure this not just the statistical side but the human side we then look at safety culture transformation and we can do this in a couple of different ways. But we have another case study because we're actually in conversation with the company where we will look at safety culture transformation, possibly from a different perspective.

Speaker 1: 30:55

So here is a company called Trimac Transportation. So this is a big Canadian transportation company, a logistics company, and I think they're the largest in Canada, if I'm not mistaken. They're enormous and they work with all of the big major organizations transporting goods across the country and they truly believe they had all the safety measures in place and that it was a strong safety culture and safe operationals. They've won multiple awards, they won lots of things. And then they experienced a frightening high consequent incidents when a facility was levelled by an explosion. So nine workers were involved. Three went to hospital for observation and there were no injuries, thankfully. But it was enough for them to go. Holy crap, what just happened. They were blindsided because they were in this lovely, almost la la land of everything's fabulous. That belief of it won't happen to me Absolutely. And then, how could this happen? What didn't they know? So, thankfully for them. They asked these questions. And what more could they do? So they did a really deep assessment and the results were very, very sobering for them. So they thought that they were like it let's give it a figure at 80% great. In reality it was something like 2%. It was a very low, or 24%, whatever else, can't remember the numbers. So they did this deep assessment and the improvement driver by focusing on a few vital behaviors. That achieved their results.

Speaker 1: 32:23

With on the ground tactics. They do ongoing performance monitoring. So once they did their assessment they had lots of red and a year later they have a lot more green on their assessments. So they're constantly monitoring performance, short term wins, alignment with what matters most and increasing their transparency and accountability. So they improved procedures. Their working conditions for employees in engagement improved. They reduced their safety spend by 20%. By doing some of the things that they chose to do, they lowered their insurance premiums. I think now, if I'm not mistaken, they've got the lowest insurance premiums for that sort of industry. Yeah, yeah, and that wasn't where they started. And they've increased their client base because people want to work with them and they know that it's an ongoing process, that it didn't just okay. We've improved. A year later, say la, we stop. In fact, they're increasing their efforts and constantly looking for that innovative way of getting everybody involved in improving their safety culture.

Speaker 2: 33:27

But sometimes you need a bit of help. You do, and I think what was interesting as part of that conversation was around how what they have saved by reducing their costs and lowering their insurance premiums has far given way more benefit than what it has actually cost to invest in doing that kind of ongoing deeper assessment and continuous improvement initiatives.

Speaker 1: 33:51

By a long shot. It's actually such a good system that the insurance companies are thinking about bringing on board as making it part of the process for them. But yeah, but that's conversation for another day.

Speaker 2: 34:02

So what can we learn about this? We've shared these insights and stories because they offer such valuable lessons on the positive impact investing in your safety, but also highlighting the dire consequences of neglect. So when you do invest in it and you prioritize safety, it catalysts improvements in your productivity, your efficiency and your profitability, and all of that impact your people. You reduce the costs, both human and financial. So your compensation, your funds, your premiums, reputation, you know all those indirect and direct costs. But it also creates that way of being that gives sustained commitment to contributing to and improving operational efficiency, which automatically reduces, you know, gives you a cost reduction.

Speaker 2: 34:54

And when we were, as during this discussion and I love the fact that every time we do research and we learn more, we come up with different ideas of how we can help you different exercises, programs. But above all of that, it is so clear to see the undeniable truth that investing in safety leadership is not merely a regulatory compliance or ethical obligation. It is a strategic investment that will yield significant financial returns, give you operational excellence and a sustainable competitive advantage, because people want to work with companies who are always driving to do better, delivering better results, and it's not just in the numbers on the board. So, as we look forward to a future where operational excellence and sustainability are paramount, the need for investing in your safety leadership becomes not just compelling but critical. Part of what we do is really around empowering organizations to protect their most valuable assets, and that's their people, but we're very conscious of the fact that we're in business to be operationally and financially secure and creating a future of sustainability Without it. Without it, what's the point?

Speaker 1: 36:08

There isn't a place for the people, so they're equal, absolutely in measure.

Speaker 2: 36:12

And it brings in that pendulum of operational importance and efficiency and safety, with the two of them together, consistently and focusing, coming to parity. Karen, what can you do to invest in your organizational safety leadership?

Speaker 1: 36:30

So understanding where you are now is always, first and foremost, the most important pace to start, because everywhere is different. Make the invisible visible. Use assessments. We have a complimentary safety culture quiz. I'm not going to say it's a deep dive into anything deep and financial, but it'll give you a starting position and it's only based on one person's perceptions. So, but it's complimentary and if a couple of you within your organization want to use it, feel free to do so. You know more than one person can do the quiz. It's on our website. Yeah, it's on our website. You can go to safetycollaborationscom forward slash culture quiz, I think, but you'll find it underneath our knowledge hub, actually. So that's something you can do for yourself right now. Then, if you're interested, we can do deeper assessments to help you measure where your mind is at in terms of safety culture. So what is your organizational learning like and how sensitive are you to operations and expected outcomes? Have a conversation with us.

Speaker 1: 37:27

How do you align with your people? They know the answers and they have the capacity to co-create the way forward. Another thing that we can help there. So if you're not ready to do assessments and that's fine, not everybody thinks that that's the greatest way forward consider having on-site expert observations. So that's what we do as well. We go on site, we agree what that will look like, we observe and interact with people on the ground and do some coaching around that as well, and then we can give you some feedback on areas that we may feel that could do with some improvement and give your leadership some support with coaching and training and skills development.

Speaker 1: 38:05

Too often people at the front line specifically thrown into team leader roles, supervisor roles, early management roles and do not get any support, mostly because everybody's busy, it's not because nobody wants to. So we recommend you join the wait list for the Safety Leaders Hub, and the Safety Leaders Hub is designed to help you, help your people to learn and grow and have leadership support. So don't wait till you spend the red money. Invest in the blue money now.

Speaker 2: 38:34

Because the message is clear Investing in safety leadership is not just good practice, it's good business, and what Karen and I can help you do is design your journey to develop your safety secret ingredient. Thank you for joining us today. It's always lovely to have conversations that matter. Connect with us on hello at safetycollaborationscom. You will find the show notes and all of the links for some great, interesting information from this episode on our website, safetycollaborationscom. Leave us a message. Follow us on LinkedIn. Safety Collaborations Kara Novari and me, new Legage. And, of course, sharing is caring. Follow us on your favorite podcast platform. Leave us a review. Five stars would be amazing, because that helps other people share the wisdom, learn and grow. Until next week, stay safe and stay well.