E077_Empowering Employees in Safety: Why Engagement Matters More Than Ever

In this episode, Karin and Nuala are joined by Lara Barlow, Chief Operations Officer at Empact Group, to discuss the foundations of a resilient safety culture. They explore how empowering employees to speak up, ask questions and share insights can lead to meaningful safety improvements, particularly in high-risk industries. With real-life examples and a focus on listening, curiosity and inclusive practices, this conversation reveals how organisations can build trust and adaptability from the ground up. Tune in to discover how genuine empowerment can make a difference in every layer of an organisation’s safety approach.

Thanks for listening!

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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,

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 Stay Safe, Stay Well
The Safety Collaborators

Transcript

Speaker 1 0:08

Welcome to In Conversation with the Safety Collaborators. I am Karen. And I am Nuala, Whether you're a safety professional, a leader or an individual committed to making a difference we invite you to join the discussion on creating a culture of safety and care, enabling your team and leaders to design a safer and more productive and collaborative world.

Speaker 2 0:35

Today, we're joined by Laura Barlow, a leader with extensive experience in operational excellence and service delivery. As the Chief Operations Officer of Impact Group, laura has a deep understanding of how to foster collaboration and drive change within complex organizations, with her passion for innovation and building strong partnerships. Laura's insights into leadership, resilience and operational success are sure to inspire our listeners, especially those navigating the challenges of high-risk industries. Laura, it is fabulous to have you joining us today. Welcome.

Speaker 3 1:10

Thank you, I'm delighted to be here. I have to say, podcast virgin, so this is an exciting moment for me. Welcome.

Speaker 2 1:20

Exactly, exactly. And it's always such an interesting thing between whether it's like figuring out the technology or just that thought of the world's going to be listening to me and the reality is is that we're just having a conversation amongst three safety people.

Speaker 3 1:39

I think technology has done their most amazing thing in terms of normalizing it. Ten years ago, the idea of sitting in front of a camera of any sort would be terrifying for most people, but through Zoom and Teams and these kind of platforms it's become so normalized and it's completely changed the way that we interact with media and the way we view it, but also how we, I suppose, absorb it and adopt it. It's not as terrifying as it probably would have been if you'd put me down in a studio 10 years ago. I'd be taking Rescue Remedy up the yin-yang, let me tell you and reminding myself what my name was.

Speaker 1 2:21

Do you know, I think that's quite a good, a good analogy actually for the work that we all do, because we ask people to do things differently and they go through all of those emotions and all the time. Yeah, so if we can do it for one thing, we can do it for you see. You see the looks?

Speaker 3 2:40

yes, exactly, in the safety world, you definitely see that on the looks of people. When you say, did you do a risk assessment, not sure is there a wrong or right way to answer that question. The fear, oh my God, I haven't done a risk assessment. What is a risk assessment? Where do you start? It is true, it is an absolute analogy for the world of safety. It is.

Speaker 2 3:03

And I suppose also just how things have changed, not just in this space but also in the world of safety and the world of communication, when you think about even through the pandemic time, where this really became exceptionally normalized how we were having our morning meetings. We weren't particularly doing face-to-face conversations, we weren't particularly doing face-to-face conversations. It was this constant check-in and getting people comfortable, just doing things differently and realizing that there is discomfort in change.

Speaker 3 3:35

but that also means that we're growing and we're developing and we get to come out of it hopefully better and stronger people for it the, the ability, I think, to embrace discomfort and to normalize the anxiety and the sensations that come with it but at the same time to take comfort in the fact that there will be a learning that comes out of that process that will invariably make you a little bit smarter along the way.

Speaker 3 4:05

It might not be without its bruises and its scars, but it will absolutely give you something in the end. I think it's a thing that comes with age and you almost wish to impart it on most younger people that enter the profession. I see it with my own team is where I say to them it's okay If we don't know and we're in a learning phase, we're going to be okay. It's going to be hugely uncomfortable. We're either going to come out smarter through this journey or we're just going to fake it until we make it and speak with conviction and we'll figure it out along the way. But I do think that with, I I suppose, age and experience, that ability to go I am on a journey and it's it's not going to be an easy ride is something that is a skill we must all learn and I think the sooner the better. You know, and it comes.

Speaker 1 4:58

It does come with its bruises sometime, but most definitely, it's necessary, most definitely, and it's hard and and I think at every phase in life we think that we've got that maturity and it's not until you get to the next. I've got this great belief that every 10 years gives us new lessons, whatever the 10-year period is for everybody, but you know, I suppose it's every seven, I guess, that seven-year thing but you get people who are new into the industry think yep, yep, yep. No, I know how all this works. And then we move along. Maybe I didn't and maybe I need to learn some more. And that change process and helping people to understand that at any, whatever we do, it doesn't really matter is challenging.

Speaker 3 5:41

Yeah, and I think as well, when, certainly from my experience, what I've seen is is that the world or and I feel like a buggered up old thing by saying this, but I'm going to say it anyway that the world is changing so rapidly. Okay, so so I think that maybe 50 years ago the world it wasn't stagnant, but I think your working environment was, was was fairly sedentary, it stayed sort of the same. But I think, as we've moved on, as industries have changed ways of working, methodologies, we work in a state of flux. Things are changing all the time, and that ability to be able to anticipate what that change might be and to be able to respond in a way that is appropriate but at the same time, with a level of curiosity where you say, okay, we haven't been here before, let's figure out what this means.

Speaker 3 6:31

I think the changing environment is really a factor that I have certainly seen in my career and in the last 10 years. Karen, to your point, the impact group, the organization I'm with now I've been with them for 10 years and it's an industry. I think there's not a sector that we don't touch on some level, and I've got to play in spaces that I never, ever thought in a million years that I would be dabbling in or encountering. And every time you encounter a new industry or a new client or a new environment where you operate, it certainly keeps you agile and on your toes, ain't that the?

Speaker 1 7:12

truth, because you constantly yeah.

Speaker 3 7:19

Oh, I don't know if I can do this.

Speaker 1 7:21

Or is it just say yes and worry about it later?

Speaker 3 7:23

you know, whatever, just work your way through it um, but yeah, my, my words always in the workplace is just deliver with absolute conviction and then work very hard to figure out exactly what it is you've said you've, you're going to be able to do yeah, yeah, I love that.

Speaker 2 7:40

It reminds me of richard branson's one quote where he said if you offered a job and you don't know how to do it, you always say yes and you figure it out along the way. And you figure it out to the best of your ability.

Speaker 1 7:53

I think we all do much like that, although, I must admit, when we come to certain safety aspects, maybe we need to look at some of the procedures and processes at the same time, at least have a look at what's gone before Interesting. I'm just in the middle of doing a program and it's actually called Leading from the Emerging Future. So we tend to look at everything and I'm wondering how this will play out as I go through this, because it looks at. So you know, we have history and you know talking about what we were earlier. You know about, I mean, working in an office environment, in a manufacturing. It's 100 years old.

Speaker 1 8:32

That's not how we've always worked, in fact. However, we're learning all of this and we're bringing. Often we sort of look at, well, what's gone before and let's make a difference. What do we need to change? That's one thing, but what this is sort of alluding to is that let's lean into what we don't know and how do we lead from that perspective, so that we become more future thinking rather than well, that's how it used to work, so why do we need to change anything? So I'm very looking forward to this and interesting. You know, one of the key tools in all of that is listening.

Speaker 3 9:11

Yes, listening and curiosity.

Speaker 3 9:14

I think, if you had to hear me, I've been blessed to have a group of employees that are probably, on average, I'd say, about 10 to 20 years younger than me, and so sometimes I do feel like the buggered up old lady in the room, and other times I see lots of opportunity to learn and engage, and the one thing that they will all testify that constantly comes out of my mouth is it's so important to develop an innate sense of curiosity.

Speaker 3 9:44

So when you find yourself in a situation and you don't know, don't accept that you don't know, accept that you have the ability and the tools to go and go. Okay, I'm going to go and Google this, I'm going to go and start with some initial investigation and I'm interested enough to learn, and it might not lead to anything, but along the way I'm going to learn one or two things that potentially I never knew before, and I think it's something that, on some level, our ability to access information, so in the modern technical world, is a blessing on so many levels. But also on another level, I think it's actually quite hard because I think it deadens that sense of curiosity. I think, exactly, it's a mixed blessing, because information and there's a whole lot of twaddle out there, and we can all accept that as well, because information is so readily available, it just is pushed to us. We lose the ability also to discern what we should be taking on board and what we should be discarding and saying no, that's not really relevant to this situation.

Speaker 2 10:49

Love that this is that we have so many acronyms like ABC stands for so many many things. But one of the things I've embraced with that is always being curious, which means that we should be questioning and we should be going. Is this what I really know? And on the one side, we have so much information being thrown at us. But we also have that responsibility to. We have the right to the access to information and we have the responsibility to then actually go and question and go how valid is this? Regardless of what it is? It might be social media post.

Speaker 2 11:27

I mean, my brother's a great one for this. He sees something on social media and, oh my gosh, it it's 100 true. And he will tell me this with conviction. And I go have you fact checked that? Have you done some research? Have you done? And then he's like no, no, I haven't. But it comes into our workspace as well. Just because somebody has more experience than us doesn't mean we just take for granted what they're telling us. Yes, and in teams, if we can build that confidence for people to be curious, to ask to say where did this come from? How does it work, is it still relevant? Where did this come from how does it work? Is it still relevant? I think we could create a fast, more comprehensive and safe work environment through just that simple little thing curiosity and listening.

Speaker 3 12:16

It's such a balance to strike, because I do think that you find yourself in a situation where, on the one hand, information is provided to you through multiple sources, and I think that one of the things that I have really struggled with is that, in the modern age of social media, people very quickly become experts, and then the person who is the expert, who has studied and has done 20 or 30 years of experience and suddenly is no longer considered to be the voice of authority in that space, and so suddenly your voice becomes less, because there's someone who's done a six-week course and their narrative is more attractive, because maybe they're not asking the kind of difficult questions that the more experienced, more seasoned professional is asking. And it's in a world as well especially, I think, when you sit in that compliance role business doesn't always want to hear the expert, because the expert has given quite a bit of thought to well. These are the opportunities, these are the challenges, these are the shortfalls. No, I don't really think we should be going down this road, and if there's another voice that comes in, less experienced but sounds a little bit similar, they will latch onto that and go. Oh my God, dave, have you thought about this, we should be doing it, and you're like, yeah, okay, so the person who's been in the industry for 25 years, we'll just sit back and take back seats.

Speaker 3 13:33

And I think in the world of social media it's so hard because there's so many pseudo experts out there.

Speaker 3 13:42

Because there's so many pseudo experts out there and my background is I studied food science and you only just have to follow some influencers on Instagram who've done a six-week food nutrition course and you think, oh my God, we're all doomed as a human race because suddenly, science is no longer considered to be credible, and science and knowledge and experience take time to acquire, and that doesn't seem to be a currency that's always highly valued in a world where knowledge is so easy to gain and you can become an expert in six weeks. And I think that that's something as well that the safety industry needs to be aware of. This is that because, like I think, in many industries, there's lots of people out there with little experience who've done one or two courses and suddenly they become the voice of authority and it comes with great risk, and especially with organizations who are wanting yes people. There's a lot of organizations who oh, yeah, no, we want the yes person, they don't necessarily want the person that goes. I just don't think we should be doing this.

Speaker 1 14:47

And yet that is something that we should be encouraging. Yes, if we think about how do we make that environment safe so that everybody feels safe to be able to stop the job or raise their curiosity around is is there a better way? And that leads into that whole psychological safety piece. How do we make sure that this is a learning environment so that people can speak up without that feeling of being, oh, I might lose my job? And that's a very real concern for many people and possibly will get worse over the next ensuing years as different technologies come along and people feel that it may take their role in life. It's probably not entirely true, but for some people it will be. And what can we do? And even thinking about health and safety, what technology is coming in towards us? That will also contribute to that feeling of uncertainty. And I'm just going to keep doing it the way I've always done it and hopefully nobody will notice me. Problem, yeah.

Speaker 3 15:54

I think that for me in that kind of context and we see it in our business all the time so we've got three distinct divisions in our business and one of the divisions that we've got is a contract cleaning division, and we employ about 16,000 cleaners that clean everywhere, from a hospital environment to schools, to manufacturers, as well as in the mining industry, the oil and gas industry, and one of the biggest concerns that we have and that we get to see in these spaces is that a cleaner really has absolutely they hardly have a sense of being visible within the workspace and the abuse of positional power, where a cleaner is instructed by anybody to go and sort that out and the cleaner is so fearful that they're going to lose their job that they don't stop and think for a minute about should I have been instructed by that person? Do I have the right knowledge to be able to do that properly? Have I been given the right PPE in order to do that job correctly? Do I understand the equipment or the lockout procedure? And so, within our organization, what we try and instill within the employees is that your voice is so powerful and you are absolutely authorized to be able to exercise your right to speak out and go. I'm just going to go and check with my supervisor if this is work that I should be doing, because we really do have to enable people to, first of all, just recognize that they are potentially in an unsafe situation and to be able to verbalize their concern. And certainly in our industry, cleaners are so often overlooked. They're not necessarily seen by the clients and they're almost on some level not on all sites, but it's almost a commodity.

Speaker 3 18:00

And so for us trying to create that environment, to say you know this environment, you know that this conveyor belt is not necessarily something that you should be working around. Speak out, if you are asked to go and clean a spill near that conveyor belt, it's yeah. Creating an enabling environment where people are able to use their voice to preserve their safety or the safety of someone else is so essential.

Speaker 2 18:29

How do you help people find that voice I mean, because that's a lot of people to one be feeling invisible and possibly insignificant in what they're doing, and then creating that environment because these people are not in your environment, I mean they're not in your office, they're all over the place. They're in multiple sites and multiple organizations and probably end up falling more into the culture of the client than they do into the culture of the work of their company. So how do you help them in that?

Speaker 3 19:02

How do you help them in that? So I think one of the things that we have done and I've got a team of we call them organizational safety business partners, and they go onto site and part of their job is to verify compliance, obviously. So we conduct internal audits to verify that we are legally compliant in terms of the Occupational Health and Safety Act and do we have the risk assessments, all of that stuff. But another large part of it is that they go onto site and they spend the day engaging with the employees, and you know there's no better person to tell you what really goes on site than the actual people that are doing the job. You don't need to look to the contract manager, you don't need to engage with the client, but go to the person that is holding the broom, that is holding the mop, and ask them to tell you what's going on on site, what are the challenges that you're experiencing. And so, first of all, just the fact that they are seen and that they're seen as being a valuable contributor to me understanding, help me understand what's going on on your site. So you don't go in there as the safety expert, but you go in as the person who wants to know how does it work here? Who instructs you? What are the things that happen when you are instructed to do something? Who do you talk to? And so just by having those kind of conversations and letting them know that it's actually also okay to say I don't know, or I actually don't know who I should speak to, and so through that process, then you can go and say, okay, well, let's go and call Frank, the supervisor, and ask Frank who you should be speaking to if you've been instructed by the client to do something. So it starts off, I think, with just breaking down barriers. And certainly, in my experience, the minute that you use the words health and safety, or occupational health and safety or HSE, it's like the shutters come down with people. I think they think that we're talking about neuro-linguistic science. But if you just relate it back to you, the person, and you go, how does it make you feel? I see that you aren't wearing your safety shoes. Is there a reason why you're not wearing your safety shoes? We have to seek to understand before anything, before you can judge, before you can give instruction, before you can say no, this isn't right, you should be doing it. This way is to try and, I think, understand what's gone on, because half the time you'll find that the person hasn't been issued with safety shoes or, because of socioeconomic circumstances, their cousin's daughter died and so they lent their safety shoes to their cousin who needed to have a good pair of shoes to go to their daughter's funeral.

Balancing Practice and Procedure in Safety

Speaker 3 21:47

There's all sorts of factors that influence how people show up in the workplace and how they relate to their job, how they relate to their colleagues, how they relate to what they've been instructed and how they find their voice. How they relate to what they've been instructed and how they find their voice, because if you can't connect with them on a human level, like just so, how's it going? Tell me, how's the job. You know no one's going to confide in you in terms of where they really find themselves, and so it's just to make it about you and me. Let's have a conversation, let's understand how things are going, and with it there comes the opportunity for them to be complaining about other things that aren't necessarily health and safety related. You know, I should be earning more, and there's all of those factors that come in, but ultimately it's about establishing a human connection and just going.

Speaker 3 22:41

You are the expert.

Speaker 3 22:42

You work on this site every single day.

Speaker 3 22:44

I don't know this site.

Speaker 3 22:51

Walk me around, Show me what you do, tell me how things work and then slip in the occasional.

Speaker 3 22:54

Did they do a task risk assessment with you?

Speaker 3 22:55

Did you understand what that task risk assessment was about? Or do you understand why we're asking you to wear this specific type of PPE? It's completely to take the fear factor out of it and just make it part of it, because they do it every day, unconsciously. We go into that environment and we see, oh my word, I can't believe you're doing that job, but they do it every single day and we're the ones that can create the unnecessary drama around it because we're not used to that environment, but they have developed that intelligence to navigate their way around it. And our role really is that we have practice and we have procedure, and we mustn't mistake the two, because practice is what we habitually do, but procedure is done with intention and sometimes practice can become procedure. But let's sense check ourselves to make sure that the habitual practice is the way that we should be doing things, and if it is the way, then let's normalize it and make it a procedure that everyone then understands I need to be part of that procedure and that procedure will keep me safe.

Speaker 1 24:08

I love that and I'm going to ask you to repeat that a little bit, actually. So I mean, there's a whole lot of words here that you're using that are magic to our ears. So practice and procedure. So explain, explain to me again. So practice is the habits that we form around tasks.

Speaker 3 24:26

It's habitual practices around what we do around tasks okay. So it's ways that we work that we've either learned by observation from others or someone has said this is the way that you do it, and sometimes practice is the right way of doing things. But it's almost informal. But then sometimes there is more thought, goes into a procedure. So with a procedure, we generally tend to be a little bit more analytical. Well, let's have a look at the environmental hazards, let's understand the scope of work, let's understand the equipment that's available, and so it's a little bit more intentional because it seeks to create not just safety but also think it's procedure and you're like there's elements where it's right, but we haven't thought, maybe, about the environmental hazards. So let's not just take practice and go, but we've always done it this way, it's right. Let's also look at the practice and go. Okay, but what are the things we're missing in the practice that converts it into a procedure that we know we've taken a more holistic look at the task to be performed and we factored in all the things that could potentially go wrong. And that's for me.

Speaker 3 25:50

In our business is trying to always say because cleaning is aside from the other oldest profession of the world is the oldest profession, good point. Good point, cleaning is we all do it and so. But there is a science to it as well, you know. And then you have people to say, oh, don't overcomplicate it, and you're like no, no, we must consider what is procedure and what is practice, and sometimes they are not dissimilar. But procedure just formalizes the riskier parts of it. It's a little bit more intentional and it's a little bit more consistent, but it doesn't mean you disregard the practice.

Speaker 1 26:30

I think that's just probably one of the best descriptions of workers perceived versus workers done. And how do we cross over those? And you're right, sometimes they should. One should inform the other and back and forth, absolutely.

Speaker 3 26:49

I think safety professionals sometimes want to dismiss practice and go no, no, no, there's a procedure. Yeah, we've got a 25-page risk assessment. You need to do it like that. And it was interesting a few years ago I went to a conference a safety conference with one of the big mining houses and they had all of their contractors and subcontractors in a room for a day and I think that they really are looking to address the culture of having contractors and subcontractors in that kind of environment, because it has the potential to be extremely toxic. So there were some very interesting discussions and one of the most fascinating ones that I heard that I just absolutely loved, because the mining and the oil and gas industry they're very rigid in terms of the way they think that safety needs to be delivered and executed. And, if you give me the truth serum, it's all about bonuses and not always about putting people at the center of the decision-making process. I'm just going to own it. So we're with you on that one. Go for it. You've extracted it out of me.

Speaker 3 27:59

But an interesting thing that someone from the mining house actually said, and it was such an epiphany for me. He said you know, the concept of the risk assessment came about out of the oil and gas in the mining industry and it was formulated by engineers, and we think that something that engineers have designed and put into place to manage hazards and risks is something that an everyday person needs to understand. And if you take a cleaner who might have a grade 10 level of education, who's got very low levels of literacy English is most certainly not their first language and you sit them down in front of a risk assessment that's got 25 columns and you need to assess the implication, we are over-engineering this thing and we are so, in that process, overlook the instinctive knowledge, experience and practice that comes from the people who've done this job. We've just got to tap into those people and let them explain to us what are the environmental factors and the other things that we need to consider in order to make sure that it's done safely every single day.

Speaker 2 29:10

That's brilliant. You know, we so often talk about doing the best risk assessment of the three questions you ask yourself in your head what am I going to do? What could go wrong? How do I stop it? Yeah, because then you're thinking you're not going. I've signed a piece of paper and we've worked in countries where the working language is English, the procedures are English, the risk assessments are English, but the guys doing the job don't speak a word of English. But they know they have to sign the piece of paper. So they won't go out until they've signed the piece of paper. But they have no idea what that piece of paper says. But they've done what's required. They've complied.

Speaker 3 29:49

It's a case of tick-bite fever. It's such a terrible disease, that tick-bite fever, where we just tick the box.

Speaker 1 29:55

Terrible disease. It's up there with CMA Cover my ass.

Speaker 3 30:03

Yeah, it's up there with CMA Cover my ass. Yeah, it's terrible. And you know, I think that's the problem with the compliance world is that and I think that safety professionals almost need to own it as well is that we have become a little bit like that where we do want to cover our ask on some level and we do want to just tick the box, because sometimes I think it's easier to do that than to really engage with the human beings that stand behind the work and understand what needs to be done and how it needs to be done safely, and it's just easier to fill in a form and go super, shown you off, you go go forth and conquer and do it safely.

Speaker 1 30:39

You know, I feel that there's a false economy in that as well, which doesn't get considered. So by having all these procedures and I'm not there is a good argument to having a checklist, having a procedure.

Speaker 3 30:53

It all needs to be there.

Speaker 1 30:54

I mean, I like the airline pilot who does his checks and balances before we take off, absolutely right, helicopter. Even more so if I see him actually ticking a bit of paper. I'm happy, all right, because I yeah, no, it brings it does bring, come it does yes. However, there has to be.

Understanding Human Factors in Safety

Speaker 1 31:11

If that is the only part, or if that is the only element that's seen as being safe, then we're going to lose, because you need to have and coming back to a few things that you said, it all starts with the conversation, absolutely everything, nothing in this world happens without it, right? No, even if it's just in your own head, as Nuala just said, what am I about to do? Am I going to get hurt? How can I stop that from happening? Or anybody, the environment get hurt, whatever the case may be? So it's always these conversations that have to happen and stepping back a little bit further, things like asking questions for which we have no answers, and even if you do have the answer, pretend you don't, because we want to hear what the person on the ground is saying, because that's where the knowledge and the wisdom is, you know.

Speaker 3 32:07

Absolutely, and if you empower people at that level, if they feel that they have a valuable contribution to make, you have got a change agent fired up and ready to go, because suddenly they are not just a low-level employee who is unseen and has no voice. Suddenly they are recognized, they are acknowledged, they are seen and their contribution is valued. And isn't that what we all want as human beings at the end of the day is to be seen and to be recognized as having a contribution.

Speaker 1 32:44

We're creatures of community, even though there's a lot of, and hence why there's challenges in the world, because we're moving away from that. In many lands it's a little bit more individualistic, and particularly in the Western world, and there's consequences to that. And if we can get people people like to belong and by being heard and by helping, asking questions and being curious is a good step towards feeling included and belonging. And it's a natural human trait to want to do that and to be part of something and not just, as you say, some commodity. It's just like when you hear these and our assets do X, y, z.

Speaker 3 33:32

People are not assets, they're humans, they're people, the human capital, the human capital.

Speaker 1 33:40

I just envision a truck with bars on it, like it's just like sheep, which is I don't like seeing sheep in those conditions either, but they have to get around sometimes. But you know what I mean. So, yeah, it's just, we're human beings and it doesn't matter.

Speaker 2 33:55

And the scary thing is is that we've all. We've all I mean, you think of even the journey to zero. At some point in my career I've been part of this. Oh yes, that's a fab idea. We've run programs on it, Until you learn that actually you're setting people up for failure. So do we have the capacity to unlearn and relearn and to challenge the status quo and what we're doing right now to be able to say exactly that, no, it's not human capital, it's not our greatest asset. We are human beings. We don't have soft skills. We have skills. We want to stay safe every day. But we're going to be setting ourselves up for failure if we're aiming for zero in anything because we're human ourselves up for failure if we're aiming for zero in anything because we're human.

Speaker 3 34:43

It is such a fatal misconception out there that is still so prevalent about the quest for zero, and even in my organization, at a board level, our health and safety performance gets discussed and the lost time, injury rate, and that word zero slips out of people's mouth more often than I care to admit. And it's so offensive because, first of all, it makes the assumption that no one ever learned anything from an incident, and sometimes an incident really is hugely valuable. It's unfortunate, but it brings with it so much that could potentially change the way we do things for generations to come and that it also, to your point, underlines or undermines the fact that human beings are human beings. We make mistakes. It's the nature of the beast that you're dealing with. And if you are dealing with and this is an example I've used in our business you're dealing with, and if you are dealing with and this is an example I've used in our business that when we were owned by Compass Group, uk, european organizations, let me tell you, have a different appetite for risk to African companies. They just are scared of their own shadow, let me tell you. So everything can be in a padded cell and be safe, and Europeans can have a very low risk appetite, and so I'll never forget, we had a visit from one of the regional MDs and we were in one of our kitchens and one of the employees was, I don't know, spraying something and it was blown out of context completely. And it was, yeah, it was blown out of context completely and it was just an opportunity to turn a non-event into a crisis.

Speaker 3 36:25

And at one stage I had a conversation with him and I just said let's just be clear about the situation of these employees. So they go home at the end of their shift in a taxi that that's licensed to carry maybe 12 passengers, but there's probably 19. If you're lucky, there's brakes, four tires and a steering wheel not always a given no ventilation in that vehicle. They all miraculously make it home. They then go home and they might share a two-bedroomed shack with six other people. They cook on a paraffin stove, they have candles, they have gas, they have no windows for ventilation, and the next day they travel to work in the same unsafe circumstances.

Speaker 3 37:18

And you want them to forget that environment that they have spent the last 10 hours in and come to work and suddenly be risk averse where they know that they need to put the mask on, do the three-point inspection and everything, because they're going to be spraying oven cleaner. I said we've got two worlds here. We can't superimpose first world standards in a second or third world environment. You need to understand the context that your people come from, because that is ultimately how they are going to decide whether or not they're going to do a task. We can't persist with the narrative that it's okay to have double standards, that in the work environment you must be absolutely Mr Safety, you do everything right, but your home life is very unsafe and it's okay to be like that. And that's the reality we have in this country is that we want first world safety standards in the workplace but go home to your unsafe living conditions, it's fine.

Speaker 1 38:17

I mean, I've worked also. We've all worked a lot around Africa and other countries as well, because it's not just in South Africa, it's in many, many countries around the world, and that can be Latin America, that can be in all sorts of places in Asia where this similar scenarios arise, and it is amazing, I mean. Firstly, I think one of the joys of working in those places is that we can share some of the knowledge that we have. Yes, and it makes a difference to their home life, because they do go home and go. Oh, maybe I need to think about this a little differently, because part of it is there was no one to tell them any different. Any of us. We're all going to keep doing what we do, coming back to practice, until there's some other vision, if you like.

Speaker 1 39:04

And so the number of times over the years where we've been told you've changed my life and I've gone home and I've told my wife that we're not, we're going to put that outside and let's cook at least outside, not inside with this thing, right, and they look at you and go. We had no idea how unsafe this world is. Now there's an awful lot of you know, there's lots of opportunity, and there's also circumstance where, well, that's just how it is. We're here to survive, and you're so. I mean, I'm living in this, I have to be careful. This European sort of world, yeah, and I roll my eyeballs constantly at what people complain about.

Speaker 2 39:44

However, I know yeah, don't worry, karen, I'll give an example for you. So I was visiting Karen in Scotland, one of my favorite things in the world is going on a swing. I love swings and I will get that swing to the maximum height possible because it is so much fun. You feel like you're flying.

Speaker 3 40:04

You'll walk over the bar, you'll swing yourself over.

Speaker 2 40:07

I did when I was younger, Not so much at this age. I think I'm a bit more nervous of that one now. But now I go and we find this playground and I go. Is that a swing? It was a bucket seat with a safety belt.

Speaker 1 40:21

Oh, is that a swing? It was a bucket seat with a safety belt.

Speaker 2 40:22

Oh no, Just in case.

Speaker 1 40:23

Oh yeah, A safety belt on it? Yeah.

Speaker 2 40:25

Yeah, no, you couldn't. Actually I could not, as an adult, physically swing myself. So there's no core development, there's no understanding of angles and triangles, there's no cognitive development around risk perception, because I had to. If I wanted to swing on that, I would have had to ask Karen to please come and push me in my bucket seat with my safety belt on in the playground.

Speaker 1 40:50

No, no, that's so sad, yeah, and it's all over the world.

Speaker 2 40:57

But you also take away the learning, and I think we try sometimes even when we see this on sites, we see safety professionals doing that as well. We're trying to take away the risk to such a degree that we stop people thinking, we stop people learning. Because if everything's being put in place where we don't actually have to think and I think, laura, you said that earlier around that innate practice and ability and human skill that we have, then are we surprised that people don't question, because we've almost taken that right away from them by suffocating them in process and procedure and safety belts and bucket seats on playgrounds safety belts and bucket seats on playgrounds.

Speaker 3 41:41

Yeah, and you want a level of risk exposure is not a bad thing, okay, because how do you test your own risk appetite? How do you be able to go? This doesn't feel safe. I'm not so sure I should be doing this. If all of that is just removed from your environment Because you so sterilize the environment in which you find yourself that you then have no ability to establish what your risk appetite is, and I think that's a dangerous place for any person to be, because you lose that instinct to go. This doesn't feel right. I don't think I want to do this.

Speaker 3 42:16

And, over and above everything else, you need to give employees agency. And, over and above everything else, you need to give employees agency. So you want to be able to give employees all the best knowledge that you can to make an informed decision about whether or not this is a task that they should be doing and are they doing it correctly. But ultimately, you have to give them agency to make that decision, because you disempower them if you take that agency away from them, but also you remove the opportunity to learn from. Okay, I shouldn't have done that. That was not a cool thing for me to do, and I think that I mean I'm no learning expert or specialist, but I think that there can be no greater lesson than the lesson you've learned yourself. We never learn by observation from others. We don't always go oh shame, george put his hand on that hot stove and oh it hurt, and you just go and do the same thing later or handle a hot pot. The unfortunate thing about incidents is they are so extremely valuable to the person who's experienced it.

Speaker 1 43:16

I suspect that's always going to be the challenge, because of what you said and because otherwise parents would never have to say to their children don't do that right, because at the end of the day, I've already experienced that, so you don't need to. It never works that way, does it? We still have to do it ourselves. However, I think we do need to be clear that that doesn't mean that we give license to break rules intentionally oh no. To break rules intentionally, oh no. So there's a balance here of learning and how we respond to those learning moments, as we, as whoever is responsible or leading or whatever the case may be, how we respond makes an enormous difference to what happens next. Absolutely so blaming fixes nothing. We kind of know that right.

Speaker 1 44:00

So it's not about blaming. It's going back to all of those things before. How do we have helped people to be seen? How do we ask questions? Well, let's be curious about why somebody did something the way that they did it, because there might be a really valid reason for it. But we may be able to educate them and to say there's also equally valid reasons why you don't do it that way. And so it's that interplay between this. I love this practice and procedure All right it is.

Speaker 3 44:32

And procedures if you create an environment where procedures are understood as not a tick box exercise but as really adding value, I think that creates the structure within which you allow then people to exercise experience and agency in a safe environment. Because while I sound loose with the procedures, let me tell you I am the procedure queen. I have a great level of love of them and I must tell you it's a big joke in our organization because no one likes writing a standard operating procedure. I'll put my hand up and say, yes, let me do it. I think, with all things, employees, structure is a good thing you know, and so if you can create structure that allows people to know what are the boundaries, what is safe, what is not safe, and also create that flexibility to bring in innovation and conversation around, could we do it differently and therefore do it safer as well as more efficient. I think procedures give you that space. I think some businesses see them as restrictive, but for me, I think that they create the right space for the right conversations and the right practices.

Speaker 1 45:42

I love that. Yeah, that's a really lovely retake or, you know, reframe of procedure. Yeah, yeah, I mean, we drive cars in a certain way. There's rules of the road and there's people who break them. We know that. I will say one thing up in this land, it is quite nice driving on the roads.

Speaker 3 46:04

Yes, there's people. Mostly you don't want to hear what I muttered to myself on the way to work this morning.

Speaker 1 46:09

Oh, I can imagine I've been down 79s and all sorts of things for many years, so it's fine Just uncool, uncool. It's terrifying, and there's some places where I never want to drive and I just get out and go. Thanks, universe, I've got here, like that's okay too, yeah.

Speaker 3 46:27

India. Was that for me? When I went to India on holiday, I was like, oh, I'm just not going to be observing anything, I'm just going to be studying my palms quite quickly.

Speaker 1 46:36

Yes, yes, and I can remember getting across the road in China at some point and I got to the other side of the zebra crossing, which is just really not there for any good purpose, right?

Speaker 1 46:47

Well, unless you get hit, then it's your fault. But apart from that, so when you get to the other side you kind of almost kiss the ground. You wouldn't want to, but you know what I mean. But yeah, it's amazing, amazing. That has been an amazing conversation. So I'm trying to think how do we wrap this up with a really oomphy question rules, and I'm kind of thinking the last one, because we had a whole list, but we're not going to go through any of them, except maybe the last one. What do you think knows the very last one? Yeah, the. What advice would you do? You think, or do you want the magic question?

Speaker 2 47:20

I think oh gosh.

Speaker 3 47:24

Do both, do both. They say yeah, I'm so curious.

Fostering Safety Culture Through Empowerment

Speaker 2 47:29

Let's do the advice and then we'll do that. We'll finish on the magic question Okay, so, okay. So here's the, here's the advice one. What advice would you give to emerging leaders in high pressure industries on building and sustaining a culture that prioritizes both safety and performance?

Speaker 3 47:49

I think don't be afraid to go down to the grassroots to understand exactly what goes on. I think never be the person, the leader, who sits behind the desks and formulates a strategy that someone 12 layers below you is going to make a life or death decision about, without you understanding what their circumstances are. I think that would be an important thing for me. I think you have to understand the industry from the grassroots up. I think you can't go from the top down and want to understand. You've definitely got to go down to a site level, stand shoulder to shoulder with those employees and understand what it is you're asking them to do, and I think as well. Certainly you're not always popular when you are the person who's wanting to drive the safety agenda in an organization and it's an uncomfortable place to be and you need to be comfortable with that being unpopular, because you're not always going to be liked. And if you're going to be that person who wants to be liked all the time, I don't know in my experience how far that will get you, because you can't be the pick-me girl. You know, pick me, pick me. I want to be liked all the time. Sometimes. You've got to be clear in terms of there are going to be some non-negotiables and it's important.

Speaker 3 49:22

My boss always says to me he says oh, you're the. I've had two bosses. One says to me he says oh, you're the. I've had two bosses. One says to me you're the conscience of the organization and the other one accused me and I took it as an absolute compliment, as being the moral compass of the organization and safety is a calling. Okay, it's an absolute calling. I don't think anyone rushes into it without really wanting to put themselves at the front of that and go. I'm so committed, I'm going to make some really unpopular decisions, but in that is to embrace the learnings that are to be had, because sometimes there's big incidents and sometimes there's small incidents, and I think that just wanting to see and understand is a valuable tool that you will use time and time again is not to only focus on the big things but look at the small things as well, because there's a trend there and that trend sometimes is really important for you to see.

Speaker 2 50:21

I mean, for me, I think what stood out really there is. It's not always being popular, because I love to be the happy bunny, I love to bring all the positivity in the world to the companies that I work with, and it's amazing when you see people going from that reaction of yes, you're always bringing the positivity and all of this until I see something that I am going hang on, somebody's going to get hurt here. And then it's like that complete, serious, stop the job. We need to have a conversation. And it's like what? You are actually stopping the job. It's like, well, yes, because now it's not a time to have a warm and fuzzy conversation, it's time to actually get serious and get real. And you're right, it's not always popular, but that's okay. Um, and that's getting getting to the grass.

Speaker 2 51:11

Be shoulder to shoulder with people who are doing the work, that is beyond invaluable. And, and something we often try and express to our clients, is that when we come in to try and understand what's going on in your organization, what is your safety culture, what's stopping people speaking up, there's no silver bullet, there's no quick fix. When we get to spend time in the field with the people who are doing the jobs. That is where we can get the greatest insights. To then say this is how you can improve your organization. Yeah Right, so if you were granted one miracle that would change safety culture in the industry, what would that miracle be?

Speaker 3 51:59

Oh, that's such a hard question.

Speaker 2 52:03

You know it's a good question when there isn't an instant response. Yeah, that is a hard question. You know it's a good question when there isn't an instant response.

Speaker 3 52:07

Yeah, that is a hard question. What is the miracle? So I think the miracle that I would want is for I'd want employees to understand that they are as responsible for their own safety as their employer and that their ability to execute on that responsibility is dependent upon them being able to speak up for themselves. Empowering individuals to be able to speak up for themselves, I think, is yeah, for me, that's a deal breaker for me, I think it's such an important thing that is.

Speaker 2 52:48

I think the one thing that we wish for everyone is that they have that ability and that they are empowered to speak up, and we know that that starts levels up and flows throughout the organization. So, yeah, I love that that it's empowering people to speak up and I think, to get that right, we do as individuals, as organizations, as companies need to hold up that mirror and say what are we doing to create that environment or what are we doing to hinder that environment?

Speaker 3 53:21

And are we comfortable with the other voice in the room? Because I don't think we always are comfortable with that other voice, and so we, as organizations do need to say let's embrace the other voice that comes through, the voice that says oh, I just don't know if we should be doing this work. The best systems, procedures, have wonderful PPE. You can have every T crossed and every R dotted, but you can still have incidents, and so it is about empowering individuals to take responsibility for their safety and to be able to speak up when they know that what they are asked to do or the places where they are delivering their job is not right and it's unsafe.

Speaker 1 54:09

I couldn't agree more. And I think to add to that is how do we? I think there's a recognition about vulnerability. So the vulnerability because to speak up is an incredibly vulnerable act, absolutely, and I'll also say for the person that's listening, they have to understand what vulnerability is. So we will do work with leaders on what is vulnerability and for some people, just going into a room and saying hello, my name is, is hugely vulnerable, hard and then go up to I want to challenge the system like that's seriously vulnerable. So, added to that, if we can help people understand layers of vulnerability within the organisation from a human perspective not so much the asset perspective, if you know what I mean that might go a long way towards helping people to feel safer to speak up.

Speaker 3 55:17

And to recognize the courage it takes to speak up Absolutely Is to recognize it because it is courageous. It is because you do make yourself vulnerable when you speak up and so, when you have the courage to do so, to have an organization that recognizes acts of courage and supports it, I think, is also hugely empowering.

Speaker 1 55:42

That just made me think. Instead of saying, give me the good observation card of the day, or whatever it is, why don't we celebrate acts of courage?

Speaker 2 55:51

Yes, that's brilliant. We're going to start a whole movement.

Speaker 3 55:55

Absolutely the courageous queens. That's what you can rebrand as.

Speaker 2 56:01

Oh, I love that.

Speaker 1 56:03

We're looking at how we can do that Exactly.

Speaker 2 56:10

So that was a very deep, meaningful conversation that started after the miracle question. So a lighthearted question because when we first joined, you said you know, putting on a headset makes you feel like you should be on a plane going somewhere. Yes, so if you could go anywhere on a plane right now, where would you be off to and why I?

Speaker 3 56:31

would probably want to go. I think I'd probably choose a place like Bhutan Nice.

Speaker 3 56:39

So, far away and I think they've got ancient traditions that are still in play. I don't think that they. I think there's a lot of the history that has been preserved and elements of that culture which just are thousands and thousands of years old. And I think, to be able to go to a place that's so very different to your own experience, you become so immersed in it, You're so deep in it. Everything is so unfamiliar that every sense is triggered and alive and I think it's wonderful to be in a place like that. When I went to India on holiday, that was as far removed as I could possibly get from my own suburban life here in South Africa.

Speaker 2 57:28

And.

Speaker 3 57:28

I just loved that experience of being exposed to something that was just so culturally diverse and rich and so other that it just you looked at everything with brand new eyes, you know, and I think to go to a place where you just you're like, oh my God, that's amazing, oh, they do it like this, I think it's so wonderful, so that would be it. I think, to go to a place where you just you're like, oh my God, that's amazing, oh, they do it like this, I think it's so wonderful, so that would be it, I think.

Speaker 2 57:49

I love that because it brings us back to that beautiful curiosity. Yes, stunning reference, full circle.

Speaker 1 57:55

Full circle. Personally, I just want to go somewhere where it's 24 degrees.

Speaker 3 58:00

Yeah, okay, I hear that, and you've got a long way to go. Your winter is only starting, so we send you abnormally warm weather, which would be uncool as well from a sustainability perspective.

Speaker 2 58:16

Yes, it would We'll just have to get you back here to South Africa for a bit at some point. That's the plan. That is the plan.

Speaker 3 58:29

Yeah, you can live a swallow existence have the best of the.

Speaker 2 58:31

European summer and then come south for ours. There we go. Exactly Well, Laura, that has been a delightful and insightful conversation and I am so glad that I finally got you and Karen to meet and that we get to put this beautiful conversation out and hopefully get to challenge people, inspire people to embrace curiosity, to listen, to get shoulder to shoulder with the people on the ground and just look at maybe doing things a little bit differently. That creates a safer, healthier and more fulfilled work environment.

Speaker 3 59:08

Absolutely. It's been wonderful ladies, you made it a great experience and, yeah, it's always nice to exchange ideas with like-minded people. You don't look at you like you've got five daisies growing out of the top of your head because you're saying things that most people think are just weird.

Speaker 2 59:26

All you're saying is that most people are thinking, yeah, all that exactly.

Speaker 1 59:34

Yes, let's embrace both. Yes, exactly.

Speaker 3 59:38

All right, lovely Thanks ladies. Thank you, lara, take care ladies.

Speaker 2 59:49

Thank you, Lara, Take care. Thank you for joining us today. It is always lovely to have conversations that matter To learn more about creating a culture of safety and care. Please visit our website, safetycollaborationscom to access our show notes, resources and guides. Leave us a message via the message us section on the show notes page and we'll get back to you.

Speaker 1 1:00:07

You can also join our community on social media by following us on our LinkedIn pages Safety Collaborations Karen Avari and Noorla Gage, and on our new Safety Collaborations social channels YouTube, facebook and Instagram. Our handle handle safety collaborations is much the same. Sharing is caring. Follow us on your favorite podcast platform. Leave us a five-star review would be awesome. Doing these things helps us to grow and share our collective conversations. Till next time stay safe and stay well.