Frank Timmons’ Blog

This article has been published in English in the American Chamber of Commerce (Thailand) Magazine (Sep - Oct 2003), Hydrocarbon Asia Magazine (Oct 2004), and in Thai in the SHAWPAT Safety Management Magazine (Jan - Feb 2005). I have also given several speeches based on this article (including one occasion in impromptu Thai).

Can Your Health, Safety & Environment Program Provide a Sustainable Competitive Advantage?
By Frank Timmons

“The ability to learn faster than your competitors may be the only sustainable competitive advantage”
— Arie DeGeus, Royal Dutch Shell
 
Manufacturing management is constantly faced with competing priorities. Material and labor costs rise each year, while prices for our products face downwards pressure. Fluctuations in currency exchange rates, interest rates, and energy prices constantly reshape the economic landscape. Efficiency must be improved to combat shrinking margins. New products must be developed to meet customer demands and to counter threats from competitors. The balance sheet needs attention to satisfy shareholders and creditors. Each quarter seems to see the birth of a new initiative to champion through the organization: TQM, Six Sigma, CQI. And top management wants us to hang signs and banners around the site declaring “Safety First”.

Where should Health, Safety & Environment (HS&E) fit into your management policies? With today’s business challenges, safety can’t really be put first, can it?

Young and Inexperienced
Many manufacturing organizations, particularly those in developing economies, are populated by young, eager workers having a basic portfolio of skills and willing to deliver decent productivity, but lacking in industrial experience. There is a general lack of senior, experienced workers to coach and mentor younger workers, especially in the developing industrial economies.

Your workers, and likely your entire supervisory team, will join your organization without adequate awareness of good safe-work practices. Over time, your team will gain proficiency using your machines, operating your processes, and troubleshooting problems. However, they will not develop safe work habits on their own, or at least not until they have experienced some serious incidents. The collective Western world has spent decades developing an understanding of safe work practices. Your team won’t “magically” discover this modern wisdom without firm guidance, effective education, persistent encouragement, and enforcement.

Can you afford to wait until someone is electrocuted to discuss electrical hazard training, electrical isolation, non-conductive tools, and protective equipment? Can you afford to wait until someone falls off a high scaffold or a bamboo ladder to introduce fall protection standards and safe elevated work platforms?

Safe Work Culture
I believe that a Safe Work Culture is the cornerstone of manufacturing excellence. A pervasive safety attitude creates the foundation upon which all other core competencies can be built. Without a safe work culture, the organization lacks a foundation, a guiding principle. Lacking a foundation, other competencies are unable to flourish and realize their full potential.

Imagine a workplace where workers don’t protect their eyes from flying debris, where work is done at high places without fall protection, where ladders are homemade from bamboo, where machines are serviced without first isolating and securing all power sources. Imagine workers moving welding cylinders without caps; welding without fire prevention and a fire watch; using wobbly scaffolds; walking on dirty slippery floors; and wearing open-toe sandals. Not hard to imagine, is it? Now does it seem reasonable to believe that workers in this workplace would treat equipment with tender loving care, thoughtfully considering all aspects and consequences of a task before beginning to work, double-checking facts and figures before making changes to the process?

If your workers don’t have an ingrained safe-work attitude, where consequences are carefully considered and hazards identified and managed prior to beginning work, then, I can assure you it will be impossible to get these same workers to treat plant equipment and processes with more respect than they have for themselves and their co-workers. It is inconceivable that an unsafe workplace can be successful with TPM, TQM, CQI, Six Sigma, ISO-9000, etc.

Management Integrity
A manager’s integrity is probably his or her most valuable asset.

I have never seen a workplace with a sign or banner proclaiming “Return on Assets First”, or “Free Cash Flow First”, or “Share Price First”. The large green sign we hang prominently in front of our workplace reads “Safety First”. If you don’t believe that safety should come first, if you are unwilling to hold safety higher than all other workplace priorities, then, please take down the “Safety First” sign. Your integrity is too valuable to waste on a proclamation that you don’t believe in.

When workers see that you don’t respect safety rules, when they see that they can ignore these rules without repercussions, they begin to see all company rules as “flexible”. Break time, designated smoking areas, quality procedures, preventive maintenance schedules; why should these rules have more validity than your “Safety First” rules? As organizational discipline declines, what will happen to your product quality, efficiency, worker attendance statistics, or profitability?

Safety Statistics
“We haven’t had a serious safety incident yet. If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it.”

One of the most common mistakes management makes is to assume that “no accidents” means adequate plant safety. We all know people who have smoked for many years and don’t have cancer; who don’t wear seatbelts when driving or helmets when riding their motorbikes and have not been hurt. We see trucks on the highways riding on bald tires and they usually arrive safely at their destination.

“Safety” means taking a proactive approach to identifying hazards, eliminating hazards, and protecting against hazards. Don’t wait until someone loses an eye to enforce safety glasses in your workplace. Actively promote a pro-active approach to work. As you gain competency and develop awareness, you should track “Near Miss” incidents: incidents that could have resulted in an injury, such as using a grinding wheel without safety glasses, working at elevation without fall protection, or operating an unguarded machine.

I like to emphasize “Stop—Think—Act” to all members of my team. This encourages staff to plan their work in advance; to gather relevant information; and to consider what must be done and the best way to do it. As they are thinking of how to accomplish the task safely, they are also thinking about the best way to complete the task, what tools and parts they will need, which safe work procedures to use, what technical skills are required, what contingencies to prepare for, etc. A “safe work” attitude has a direct impact on the entire operation: employees benefit from fewer safety incidents; the community benefits from fewer environmental incidents; and the business benefits from reduced quality incidents and better overall quality; fewer and shorter downtime incidents; reduced wastage of time and materials; better planning and organization; improved housekeeping; much greater worker morale and motivation; and ultimately a healthier bottom line.

The Agency Problem
Perhaps you believe in safety and see the value to the business in placing safety first. You have introduced appropriate HS&E procedures and purchased some personal protective equipment (PPE) and tools. These are important first steps, but more is required to realize the safety and economic benefits of your safety program.

How do your managers and supervisors feel about safety? Do they believe that you believe in safety? Do they understand the benefits of a safe workplace or do they still view safety as an operating expense that needs to be minimized? Your managers and your supervisors act as your agents in the workplace. The message your workers receive from you is filtered and interpreted by your agents. You might be surprised to learn what message your workers are really receiving. This is true in all organizations and especially true in a bilingual, multi-cultural environment.

You audit your books to be sure your accounts and capital assets are being managed according to your policies. You need to audit your HS&E program to be sure your work policies are being managed properly, too. You also need to audit attitudes. Talk directly to your workers, observe their behavior, and evaluate whether they have a safe work attitude. If members of your supervisory staff are not creating the proper environment; are not supporting a “safe work” culture; are not willing to make safety their top priority; then, they need to be re-educated or replaced. Remember: they are your agents. They act on your behalf; share your message; and, therefore, directly influence your integrity as measured by your workers. If your agents don’t enforce your rules, your integrity is damaged, because your workers can’t differentiate between your policy and that of your managers/supervisors. They are your agents, after all. They work for you, don’t they?

Holistic Management
Most things perform best and most reliably when all of its parts work together in harmony. Remember those 1960’s American Muscle Car Hot Rods, with their huge V-8 engines, small front tires, massive rear racing slicks, and awesome, ground-shaking, straight-line acceleration? They were very fast in a straight line, but couldn’t steer well, stop quickly, or pass a gas station without refueling. This is an example of a system that wasn’t designed to perform its various functions in harmony.

Put safety first. I tell my workers that everyone — from Maid to MD — is personally responsible for our HS&E performance. Then, drive your business development by linking your other organizational initiatives to your HS&E program in a Holistic Management Framework. Emphasize how your Preventive Maintenance initiative seeks to anticipate and avoid equipment incidents, just as your HS&E program helps to avoid safety, health, and environmental incidents. Emphasize how your SPC/SQC, Six Sigma, TQM, SPC, or similar program is a system designed around data capture, analysis, improvement, and control, following the same fundamentals as we use to document and improve our HS&E processes and performance.

The Safety First approach to management will directly contribute to all organizational activities.
 

• Stop to consider the task at hand, gather information and data.
• Think about approaches, hazards, methods, consequences, contingencies.
• Act using company procedures and operating principles.

It doesn’t matter if you are planning to rebuild a pump, reconcile an account, or launch a new product, this approach can serve as a foundation upon which your organization can grow and thrive.