Business leaders (topmost level) can poise themselves to create participatory safety culture by looking to key people across the organization who can help spread the word and educate others. Safety culture investments are about helping people navigate risk and uncertainty effectively. Davide Scotti, Head of HSE Culture, Communication, and Training at Saipem, and General Secretary of the Leadership in Health and Safety Foundation, adds:
"It is key to identify a mechanism to engage the informal leaders of the organization to create a bottom-up effect that can support the top-down effect."
It’s important to integrate safety into daily operations, involving front-line workers in key decisions. Doing so fosters a risk-free environment for employees to voice concerns, transforming safety conversations into an ongoing, dynamic dialogue rather than just fulfilling annual compliance requirements. Daniel Hummerdal goes on to add:
“Engaged workers drive not just safety, but efficiency, cost reduction, and operational excellence. Organizations that fail to prioritize engagement risk creating rigid, compliance-heavy environments that miss the nuances of how work actually happens.”
The bottom line remains that building a safety culture requires intention and action from every part of the organization. It’s also not a one-and-done job, it’s ongoing work. Which leads to the next facet of building the future of workplace safety: training.
Ongoing Training and Safety Assessment
Effective safety culture demands continuous, strategic training, not merely ticking a compliance box. The best move is opting for spaced learning models, providing workers with frequent, short, scenario-based sessions throughout the year instead of lengthy annual courses.
You’ve probably sat through an annual training that lasts 8+ hours. Did you remember the content a month later? How about five months later?
Daniel Hummerdal expounds on this idea, noting that:
"Forward-thinking organizations prioritize operational learning – leveraging real work experiences over theoretical instruction. Instead of generic training modules, they incorporate job-site walk-throughs, peer-to-peer knowledge sharing, and micro-learning during shift transitions. The key is ensuring training evolves with the work itself, rather than being a static compliance requirement."
When these trainings involve the work itself, there’s more urgency and tangible results than a theoretical lecture. Borrowing from the previous section on intentionality, this training style encourages all personnel to be a part of cultivating safety culture and holding each other accountable. Why does this work so well? Humans are social animals, we like being a part of something.
Dynamic Training and Human Performance
Most training needs to be tailored to certain work groups, departments, and the like. One-size-fits-all training isn’t the answer for organizations seeking a well-rounded safety culture.
Davide Sciotti, Head of HSE Culture, Communication, and Training at Saipem, and General Secretary of the Leadership in Health and Safety Foundation, says:
“Training is fundamental for success within the safety space. To succeed with human performance and embed it within your organization's DNA, you need to ensure that all members of the organization understand the principles and how to incorporate them into daily routines. To adopt, embrace, and operationalize the five principles of human performance, training needs to be tailored to each group.”
The five principles of human performance drive the idea and practice of safety in the workplace and acknowledge key points:
- Error is normal
- Blame fixes nothing
- Learning is vital for improvement
- Behavior is context driven
- Response to failure matters
Injecting these principles into daily operational practice is crucial to a strong safety culture. It’s people-centric and communicates care for employees and their well-being making space to learn from mistakes and improve.
Humans and the jobs they do are constantly changing. The training that helps keep these dynamic workplaces safe for the people running them has to be equally dynamic. And, how best to help organize how to do all this? A little technology goes a long way.
Implementing Safety Management Technology
Workplace safety has come a long way since the famed picture of steel workers taking lunch on beams hundreds of meters in the air during skyscraper construction. Environment, Health, and Safety (EHS) software is getting more sophisticated and plays a major role in helping organizations monitor, maintain, and regulate workplace safety.
Since no two organizations will share exact technological needs for safety management, it falls to each to assess the technology landscape to identify tools that fit their specific needs. Successful technology integration results from constant review of business requirements.
Artificial intelligence and machine learning are becoming more commonly used for risk prediction, optimizing resource allocation, and enhancing risk management tactics based on historical data. More organizations are also shifting towards cloud-based EHS software for centralized safety data, better compliance tracking, efficient reporting, and improved interdepartmental communication. Similarly, the adoption of robotics and automation is on the rise for hazard identification, geared towards reducing human risk exposure and boosting efficiency.
Hugh Maxwell, President of Maxwell Safety Limited, created a checklist of EHS software must-haves that will help any organization with their software decision:
Real-Time Data Capture and Monitoring
- IoT Integration: The ability to integrate with IoT devices for real-time data collection on air quality, temperature, noise levels, and worker health metrics.
- Incident Reporting and Tracking: A user-friendly interface for employees to quickly report incidents, hazards, near misses, and safety violations, with automated workflows for follow-up actions and resolution tracking.
Customizable Dashboards and Reporting Tools
- Data Visualization: Interactive dashboards that present key safety, health, and environmental metrics in real-time, helping stakeholders quickly identify trends, risks, and attention areas.
- Automated Compliance Reporting: The ability to generate compliance reports based on the latest regulations and automatically submit them to the necessary authorities and stakeholders.
- ESG Metrics: Tools for tracking and reporting on sustainability goals that are becoming essential in corporate EHS strategy.
Risk Management and Predictive Analytics
- Risk Assessment Tools: Automated tools for conducting and tracking risk assessments, ensuring that potential hazards are identified early and mitigated.
- Predictive Analytics: Machine learning algorithms that analyze historical and real-time data to predict risks and safety incidents, allowing for proactive interventions.
- Corrective Action Management: A system that automatically assigns tasks related to addressing identified risks and tracks the resolution process, ensuring accountability.
This list is a comprehensive look into what a piece of EHS software should be able to do to help bolster workplace safety and lay the foundation for a safer future.
