Ep. #43 - James Kell with Scratchie: Rethinking Motivation with Self Determination Theory

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In this episode of The Crude Cast, Travis sits down with James Kell—carpenter turned entrepreneur—to explore how motivation, recognition, and psychology can reshape safety and productivity across industries. Drawing on his journey from construction to building Scratchie, James introduces listeners to Self-Determination Theory—the idea that autonomy, competence, and relatedness drive people to thrive. Together, they discuss why behavior-based safety often falls short, how small acts of recognition spark big changes, and how organizations like McDonald’s and oilfield operators alike are applying these insights to create safer, more connected workplaces. Whether you’re in oil and gas, construction, or any field where safety and culture matter, this episode offers a fresh take on building engaged, high-performing teams. 

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Transcript

00:00:10 [Speaker 1]
Yeah.
00:00:10 [Speaker 1]
So, a little bit about me.
00:00:12 [Speaker 1]
Went through, like, a two year college program.
00:00:15 [Speaker 1]
Been working in oil and gas for fifteen years.
00:00:18 [Speaker 1]
Did, offshore auction.

00:00:21 [Speaker 1]
Now I'm onshore doing gas and then some, like, kinda pipeline transportation type stuff.
00:00:28 [Speaker 1]
And, kinda just wanna give back to the industry and help new guys and take kind of a holistic approach to the people that work in our industry.
00:00:42 [Speaker 1]
And then how do we make ourselves, like, in your case, your product, you know, maybe it doesn't and I haven't looked too closely at it, but maybe it's more and you can see if it's for the larger super majors, or is it for smaller company?
00:00:56 [Speaker 1]
Yeah.
00:00:57 [Speaker 1]
Just so how could we kinda make an impact in oil and gas and then take that out further into the trades and different industries?

00:01:05 [Speaker 1]
So

00:01:06 [Speaker 2]
Yeah.
00:01:07 [Speaker 2]
Well, I come to that this in a similar guise to you, and that is I really wanna help people.
00:01:14 [Speaker 2]
It's not a pitch, for what we do.
00:01:17 [Speaker 2]
Of course, I'm passionate about what we do, and I'm biased in that sense.
00:01:20 [Speaker 2]
If people never, use Apple, but they take some tips, and and that improves their their productivity at work.

00:01:30 [Speaker 2]
It sort of does everything.
00:01:32 [Speaker 2]
It improves the well-being of the people working.
00:01:36 [Speaker 2]
It makes them enjoy their work more, makes them more productive, you know, workplaces like it.
00:01:42 [Speaker 2]
So then it's like, if I can help with a few things that I've learned and they never touch the product that I have, I'm perfectly happy.

00:01:50 [Speaker 1]
What is your background?
00:01:53 [Speaker 1]
You kind of you were on the auction side, and now you're kind of doing this, safety app software to help, like you said, productivity and safety.
00:02:05 [Speaker 1]
Is that right?

00:02:07 [Speaker 2]
Yeah.
00:02:07 [Speaker 2]
I started, as a carpenter.
00:02:10 [Speaker 2]
Actually, my dad and his dad and his dad and so on were builders.
00:02:14 [Speaker 2]
So it's been a long line of builders.
00:02:17 [Speaker 2]
So I was working at sort of 14, 15 on the school holidays as a builder and all the rest of it.

00:02:22 [Speaker 2]
I never actually made a particularly good carpenter, to be honest.
00:02:26 [Speaker 2]
But, you know, I was in the family, progressed through the company.
00:02:30 [Speaker 2]
And what I noticed, And as a, like a midsize company, it had revenues of about $200,000,000 a year.
00:02:39 [Speaker 2]
So not a small company, not a big company, kind of like a family owned, you know, company.
00:02:45 [Speaker 2]
And so we had at any one point in time, we had a few thousand workers.

00:02:51 [Speaker 2]
We had about 200 managers.
00:02:53 [Speaker 2]
So just to give you an idea of the scale of the company, we needed a safety manager at back at, you know, at one point.
00:03:00 [Speaker 2]
And I could have gone out to the recruiters and found one, but my mentor at the time had said it's always better to promote from within.
00:03:07 [Speaker 2]
So I put the word out internally.
00:03:09 [Speaker 2]
So anyone interested in, becoming a safety manager, I'll get the education piece sorted.

00:03:15 [Speaker 2]
Like, I'll help you out there, but, you know, who who who's interested?
00:03:19 [Speaker 2]
And this subform and by the name of Gary Mansfield, expressed interest.
00:03:25 [Speaker 2]
And I'd I had a mate actually who was working as a laborer with him, sort of like an undercover because I was sitting there with his mate of mine.
00:03:33 [Speaker 2]
And, he said, this guy's really good, really good.
00:03:36 [Speaker 2]
And so I was like, cool.

00:03:38 [Speaker 2]
Met him.
00:03:39 [Speaker 2]
He became the safety.
00:03:40 [Speaker 2]
He smashed it out the park.
00:03:41 [Speaker 2]
He was a great safety manager.
00:03:44 [Speaker 2]
But his path to coming to the safety management role was he was a, professional musician.

00:03:49 [Speaker 2]
He was gigging for ten years.
00:03:51 [Speaker 2]
Like so it's completely non normal, like, a lot of safety nerds.
00:03:57 [Speaker 2]
It's odd.
00:03:57 [Speaker 2]
I'm about to get hated on by half an inch dude.
00:04:00 [Speaker 2]
But a lot of a lot of people who do safety, are certain type of certain mentality.

00:04:07 [Speaker 2]
So he didn't fit that mold.
00:04:09 [Speaker 2]
So we looked at safety and construction at the time, and we're it's so wrong because it's so focused on the negative.
00:04:15 [Speaker 2]
It's like, how can you ever get that dopamine hit going when you get ignored when you do the right thing?
00:04:22 [Speaker 2]
And then as soon as you do the wrong thing, you get smashed.
00:04:25 [Speaker 2]
And it's like, what's that?

00:04:26 [Speaker 2]
Can't be right.
00:04:27 [Speaker 2]
It's like, we're not psychologists, but that just can't

00:04:30 [Speaker 1]
be right.

00:04:30 [Speaker 2]
Like, you know, Apple at the time was coming to Australia, and they were building their Apple stores.
00:04:35 [Speaker 2]
And they and their first Apple store was in George Street in Sydney.
00:04:39 [Speaker 2]
And we bid for it.
00:04:41 [Speaker 2]
And Apple said, if you really want a good chance of getting this, you've got to be innovative and, because we're Apple.
00:04:47 [Speaker 2]
And so we thought, what can we do with safety?

00:04:50 [Speaker 2]
And and that's where Gary and I were like, let's try rewarding people for being safe.
00:04:54 [Speaker 2]
And we so we looked at other industries, oil and gas, mining, you know, construction, like the dangerous industries, which is typically where most of the safety kind of innovations come from.
00:05:05 [Speaker 2]
We didn't have much.
00:05:06 [Speaker 2]
We had Skinner's, you know, behavior based safety, which wasn't great, which has kind of been disproven.
00:05:13 [Speaker 2]
But we sort of thought maybe something like, you know and so we created these scratch cards.

00:05:19 [Speaker 2]
And, and when people saw evidence of good, safe work, they'd be given a scratch card that scratch it.
00:05:25 [Speaker 2]
They'd win $10.20, $50 or something.
00:05:27 [Speaker 2]
So that was stoked because it's their their supervisor was giving them recognition, and then they were winning something, you know, enough for lunch or a beer or something, you know, whatever they want.
00:05:41 [Speaker 2]
And so it was a lot of admin because it was paperwork, but it was a good idea.
00:05:45 [Speaker 2]
And then we found sort of ten years later, we've been just progressing with this, and we came across this body of knowledge called self determination theory.

00:05:54 [Speaker 2]
And that's really the the mother load of where we're at.
00:05:59 [Speaker 2]
It's a really simple theory.
00:06:00 [Speaker 2]
I can explain it to you if you like.

00:06:02 [Speaker 1]
Yeah.
00:06:02 [Speaker 1]
Please.

00:06:04 [Speaker 2]
So So self determination theory says that there's three psychological needs that each and every one of us have.
00:06:11 [Speaker 2]
And if we can get it right, then we thrive.
00:06:14 [Speaker 2]
And if we get it wrong, then we suffer.
00:06:16 [Speaker 2]
And those three psychological I need to feel autonomous.
00:06:20 [Speaker 2]
I need to feel like I am in control of my choices, my life.

00:06:26 [Speaker 2]
That's the first one.
00:06:27 [Speaker 2]
The second one is I need to feel like I'm good at something, that I'm competent.
00:06:31 [Speaker 2]
And to be recognized to be competent is great.
00:06:34 [Speaker 2]
The third one is I need to feel related.
00:06:36 [Speaker 2]
I need to feel like I'm relating to other people.

00:06:39 [Speaker 2]
And so if you apply those those three questions, autonomy, competence relatedness, if you apply that rule across various aspects of work safety, you go, it's nothing like that.
00:06:52 [Speaker 2]
Like, autonomy, not at all.
00:06:54 [Speaker 2]
It's like, do this or your or your toast.
00:06:58 [Speaker 2]
Competence, well, it only looks at you when you're not competent.
00:07:01 [Speaker 2]
It's exactly the opposite.

00:07:03 [Speaker 2]
And then relatedness, there's this huge disconnect between managers and or management and worker because, you know, they get the posters saying zero harm, and they get all this stuff.
00:07:13 [Speaker 2]
And the worker just goes, that's not for you.
00:07:16 [Speaker 2]
That's not for me.

00:07:16 [Speaker 1]
It's not for you.
00:07:17 [Speaker 1]
It's a bunch of BS or lip service or something.

00:07:19 [Speaker 2]
Bunch of BS.
00:07:20 [Speaker 2]
Yeah.
00:07:20 [Speaker 2]
Right?
00:07:21 [Speaker 2]
Really, like, the first priority is to cover legally that company's ass, really.

00:07:27 [Speaker 1]
Yeah.

00:07:27 [Speaker 2]
And then if it aligns at some point with me, the worker, that's a bonus, but it's really not what it's designed for.
00:07:33 [Speaker 2]
It's designed to cover them legally, and the worker knows this.
00:07:37 [Speaker 2]
And so there's this disconnect.
00:07:38 [Speaker 2]
So there's lack of relatedness.
00:07:40 [Speaker 2]
So manager and worker start to disconnect.

00:07:43 [Speaker 2]
So then when you can spot people doing the right thing and call them out and give them a concrete all of a sudden, those three things, autonomy, competence, and relatedness, get turned in the right direction.
00:07:59 [Speaker 2]
Let's say, a supervisor or a manager spots a worker doing something like sweeping up.
00:08:05 [Speaker 2]
Now that worker has decided to sweep up.
00:08:08 [Speaker 2]
So autonomy, high.
00:08:10 [Speaker 2]
Competent, well, the managers just called him out and said, mate, you've just tidied up that area.

00:08:16 [Speaker 2]
Nice work.
00:08:17 [Speaker 2]
So there's a level of competence that is being recognized.
00:08:21 [Speaker 2]
And then relatedness, well, when a manager comes and says, hey.
00:08:24 [Speaker 2]
You've done well.
00:08:25 [Speaker 2]
Here's a here's a prize.

00:08:27 [Speaker 2]
Obviously, that's really good for reconnecting workers with managers.
00:08:31 [Speaker 2]
What we found interestingly was because this was so sensitive, we're so psychologically sensitive to this sort of stuff.
00:08:38 [Speaker 2]
You didn't have to give a lot of money.
00:08:40 [Speaker 2]
It's like $10.20, $50 from time to time, and you get this massive, massive, change in kind of behavior and all sorts of stuff.
00:08:51 [Speaker 2]
So yeah.

00:08:52 [Speaker 2]
And so that's why, McDonald's took us up not so long ago.
00:08:56 [Speaker 2]
So completely outside of construction

00:09:00 [Speaker 1]
Yeah.

00:09:00 [Speaker 2]
Oil and gas and mining and those sorts of industries, I said, no.
00:09:04 [Speaker 2]
No.
00:09:05 [Speaker 2]
No.
00:09:05 [Speaker 2]
We know that this we measure everything.
00:09:07 [Speaker 2]
We're McDonald's.

00:09:08 [Speaker 2]
We didn't really have to sell it.
00:09:10 [Speaker 2]
We just they said, yeah.
00:09:11 [Speaker 2]
Yeah.
00:09:11 [Speaker 2]
Yeah.
00:09:11 [Speaker 2]
We know what you're doing.

00:09:12 [Speaker 2]
This is good.
00:09:13 [Speaker 2]
Let's go.

00:09:14 [Speaker 1]
So this is something that what is the product or service, I guess, to be more specific?
00:09:21 [Speaker 1]
I I saw an app.
00:09:23 [Speaker 1]
So is it, like, how does this get to the end user?
00:09:27 [Speaker 1]
How does the manager take it and bring it to the the employee?
00:09:31 [Speaker 1]
Or

00:09:32 [Speaker 2]
Yeah.
00:09:33 [Speaker 2]
Our product is just I guess what it is is the mission, autonomy, competence relatedness.
00:09:40 [Speaker 2]
So you don't have to have our product to do it.
00:09:42 [Speaker 2]
Our product just makes it easier to do.
00:09:44 [Speaker 2]
And, you know, it turns it from being a nice idea to something that can be done and measured and everything else.

00:09:50 [Speaker 2]
Okay.
00:09:50 [Speaker 2]
So, yeah, it's an app.
00:09:52 [Speaker 2]
It's $5 a user a month.
00:09:54 [Speaker 2]
So it's not it's a trivial cost in terms of, if it pushes up your your productivity by even two or 3%.
00:10:02 [Speaker 2]
Like, it's just like, those sorts of numbers are crazy

00:10:05 [Speaker 1]
Yeah.

00:10:06 [Speaker 2]
In terms of what it does to your bottom line when you're when you're getting two and higher productivity out of your workers.
00:10:11 [Speaker 2]
And at the same time, they're happier because, you know, they're finally getting recognized for some of this good stuff that they do.
00:10:18 [Speaker 2]
You know, you're you're having that.
00:10:20 [Speaker 2]
And, yeah, it's an app, and they have it on their devices.
00:10:24 [Speaker 2]
In some in in a lot of industries, oil and gas is one of them.

00:10:27 [Speaker 2]
Actually, quick service restaurants is another one.
00:10:30 [Speaker 2]
You can't have your device, on the job.
00:10:32 [Speaker 2]
Okay.
00:10:33 [Speaker 2]
And so we're developing well, we've you can do the convo card, which is like a hazard ID or sort of prework kind of, method.
00:10:44 [Speaker 2]
So we've got that.

00:10:45 [Speaker 2]
Yeah.
00:10:45 [Speaker 2]
We do that before work.

00:10:46 [Speaker 1]
Like a safety analysis.
00:10:48 [Speaker 1]
Serenity.
00:10:49 [Speaker 1]
Yeah.

00:10:49 [Speaker 2]
Yeah.
00:10:50 [Speaker 2]
Before you surrender your device.
00:10:52 [Speaker 2]
And then the actual rewards can be remote, so you don't need your device.

00:10:56 [Speaker 1]
But, yeah.
00:10:57 [Speaker 1]
So you came to what other things did you try?
00:11:05 [Speaker 1]
Like, if people are saying, we are not sure if this works or, like, we do like we're gonna try something that kind of fits this kind of platform or system.
00:11:17 [Speaker 1]
What other things have you tried that, like, didn't work?
00:11:22 [Speaker 1]
So, you know, it was just kinda saving people time for, like, oh, we gave we, the employee of the month stuff, the the lot like you said, it doesn't have to be a large amount of money.

00:11:34 [Speaker 1]
It's a small amount of money.

00:11:35 [Speaker 2]
That's a good question.
00:11:36 [Speaker 2]
The the we heard that a lot in the early days.
00:11:38 [Speaker 2]
There's there's a here's a couple of things that we were told in the early days.
00:11:43 [Speaker 2]
They should be doing anyway, so why should we give them extra for doing something that they should already be doing?
00:11:49 [Speaker 2]
And our response to that was, how's that going for you?

00:11:55 [Speaker 2]
And they're like, oh, they're not doing it.
00:11:57 [Speaker 2]
And it's like, that's our point.
00:11:59 [Speaker 2]
Yeah.
00:11:59 [Speaker 2]
That's our point.
00:12:00 [Speaker 2]
Do you wanna keep flogging that dead horse?

00:12:03 [Speaker 2]
Do you really think that your method just keep doing more of whatever it is you're doing is going to magically have a different effect?
00:12:12 [Speaker 2]
And the other one was, what if I them and then they start doing it and then I don't reward them, won't it be bad?
00:12:22 [Speaker 2]
And our point was, we'll just just keep rewarding them.
00:12:26 [Speaker 2]
It's like it's like, don't what is it is about removing it down the track?
00:12:31 [Speaker 2]
You know?

00:12:32 [Speaker 2]
So there's a few things that are kind of really interesting.
00:12:35 [Speaker 2]
The other psychologically interesting thing is we are really bad at wearing other people's shoes.
00:12:42 [Speaker 2]
You know, all of us, you, me, all of us.
00:12:45 [Speaker 2]
And so ourself in the place of someone else.
00:12:48 [Speaker 2]
And so we talk to managers and say, this is gonna be really effective for the workers.

00:12:53 [Speaker 2]
Workers are gonna love this, and they're gonna respond in a good way.
00:12:56 [Speaker 2]
And you're gonna get a lot out of them, not in a in this sort of, hard capitalist sense, but it just in a case of you're going to get a lot out of them because they're going to be motivated and, you know, really like this.
00:13:08 [Speaker 2]
And they said, yeah, I don't think cash rewards are really good idea.
00:13:12 [Speaker 2]
And so we'd say they go $10.
00:13:15 [Speaker 2]
Like, it's just not enough.

00:13:16 [Speaker 2]
And so, well, if you are, you know, on a Saturday morning and you buy a Lotto card and you scratch it and you win $10, do you feel disappointed?
00:13:25 [Speaker 2]
And they're like, oh, no.

00:13:27 [Speaker 1]
You know?
00:13:27 [Speaker 1]
Double down.
00:13:28 [Speaker 1]
Buy more.

00:13:30 [Speaker 2]
It's a really interesting thing is that it we have a hard time putting ourselves in other people's, shoes.
00:13:37 [Speaker 2]
And so, you know, this is a a classic case.
00:13:40 [Speaker 2]
And as soon as they get it going, of course, they see the the benefits of it.
00:13:44 [Speaker 2]
One of the other things people would say is, it's okay if it's rewards.
00:13:48 [Speaker 2]
We've got it sorted.

00:13:49 [Speaker 2]
We get, a voucher to the hardware store once a month, for somebody who's done a good job.
00:13:56 [Speaker 2]
And it's it's like, well, that's actually a step in the right direction.
00:13:59 [Speaker 2]
Actually, it's, you know, great.
00:14:01 [Speaker 2]
It's better than nothing.
00:14:03 [Speaker 2]
What psychologically, what's most potent is when you get rewarded when it happens.

00:14:09 [Speaker 2]
You don't want to be rewarded two weeks later because there's no connection between your what you've done and the reward.
00:14:18 [Speaker 2]
If your boss spots you doing something, goes, that's awesome.
00:14:22 [Speaker 2]
More of that.
00:14:23 [Speaker 2]
Here's the scratchy.
00:14:25 [Speaker 2]
You get this dopamine.

00:14:26 [Speaker 2]
You get dopamine, serotonin, you get all the good surge in those hormones.
00:14:31 [Speaker 2]
And that's fertilizer to behavior and to habits and things like that.
00:14:35 [Speaker 2]
Oxytocin as well.
00:14:36 [Speaker 2]
So you get this kind of connection too with your boss.
00:14:39 [Speaker 2]
You're feeling great.

00:14:40 [Speaker 2]
You feel you feel like a legend.
00:14:41 [Speaker 2]
That needs to happen as the, action that's favorable happens.
00:14:47 [Speaker 2]
Yeah.
00:14:48 [Speaker 2]
And so that's so giving a a voucher once a month.
00:14:52 [Speaker 2]
Firstly, the other thing is that people's they say we give it once a month, and it's like, when did you last give it?

00:14:58 [Speaker 2]
I don't know.
00:14:58 [Speaker 2]
It's like, oh, well, Betty was away on holidays, and that was in the top or in she we didn't have the keys.
00:15:05 [Speaker 2]
So that was last month.
00:15:06 [Speaker 2]
Month before, I was super busy on a Tuesday.
00:15:09 [Speaker 2]
So it's like, okay.

00:15:10 [Speaker 2]
We get busy.
00:15:11 [Speaker 2]
You know?
00:15:12 [Speaker 2]
And so you really need tools that can make sure that this sort of stuff happens.
00:15:16 [Speaker 2]
And you can measure per day who's giving awards for what, you know, by whom.

00:15:21 [Speaker 1]
Is this a top down?
00:15:26 [Speaker 1]
Or is this I've seen some kind of reward systems where you can go employee to employee or what's the sure look like?

00:15:36 [Speaker 2]
Scratchies are top down.
00:15:38 [Speaker 2]
So their managers to workers saying, well done, they can give turbo scratches, which are cash, or they could just give a scratchy, which is points.
00:15:47 [Speaker 2]
Right?
00:15:48 [Speaker 2]
Points are still good.
00:15:49 [Speaker 2]
It's recognition.

00:15:50 [Speaker 2]
It's like all sorts of stuff.
00:15:52 [Speaker 2]
They've got a leaderboard so you can beat your mate.
00:15:54 [Speaker 2]
You know, there's all that sort of

00:15:56 [Speaker 1]
Gamification.

00:15:57 [Speaker 2]
That happens.
00:15:57 [Speaker 2]
Gamification.
00:15:58 [Speaker 2]
That's what's what it is.
00:16:00 [Speaker 2]
We also have a convo card.
00:16:02 [Speaker 2]
So convo cards are bottom up reporting.

00:16:06 [Speaker 2]
A lot of them, a worker will see something and will think, the management needs to know about this or something like that.
00:16:14 [Speaker 2]
And so it's basically in Instagram, but, you know, you take the photo, you can transcribe, you can say, you know, you could talk to it and it'll transcribe.
00:16:24 [Speaker 2]
And then you can say whether it's safe to work or not.
00:16:27 [Speaker 2]
And if it's not safe to work, manager hears about it immediately.
00:16:30 [Speaker 2]
We use AI to give a, a summary of all the combo cards that get created in a workplace.

00:16:37 [Speaker 2]
So you really kind of, sense of of what's going on amongst the workers in a workplace.
00:16:44 [Speaker 2]
And then the stuff that it's, you know, you can't work here, I can't work here now, that sort of stuff floats immediately to the top so they can get action.
00:16:53 [Speaker 2]
So that's bottom up reporting, and then we have shout outs, which is worker to worker.
00:16:59 [Speaker 2]
You know, when workers are doing something well, and that's points only, they go, you know, Joe's just kept this area tidy.
00:17:06 [Speaker 2]
He's amazing legend.

00:17:09 [Speaker 2]
You know, that sort of thing can also That's between workers, so it's nice to receive that from your from your colleague.
00:17:15 [Speaker 2]
But the system, figures out and sends that some of those ones up the line to get rewarded.
00:17:22 [Speaker 2]
So a manager can see some of these shout outs and go, oh, yeah.
00:17:25 [Speaker 2]
That's a turbo scratchy.
00:17:26 [Speaker 2]
You know?

00:17:26 [Speaker 2]
And so they get another reward for that.

00:17:29 [Speaker 1]
Cool.
00:17:30 [Speaker 1]
Is this I mean, you you said it was deployed with McDonald's.
00:17:35 [Speaker 1]
So this is something that is like I hear people use the term enterprise.
00:17:40 [Speaker 1]
So this is like and is level.
00:17:43 [Speaker 1]
Like, larger corporations can use this and everything.

00:17:47 [Speaker 2]
Yeah.
00:17:47 [Speaker 2]
Yeah.
00:17:48 [Speaker 2]
It doesn't it's not limited.
00:17:49 [Speaker 2]
We've got a free forever model with this new release where any, if you've got 10 or fewer people, then you can just use it.
00:17:59 [Speaker 2]
And it's like you don't, you know but if you want reporting and you want sort of more than one site and you want more than 10 people, then, of course, you go to the pro model, which is $5 a year or a month.

00:18:11 [Speaker 2]
And then enterprises just have a different way of engaging with these things.
00:18:16 [Speaker 2]
You know?
00:18:17 [Speaker 2]
They'll say, I need to develop up a business case.
00:18:20 [Speaker 2]
And so once they've developed up the business case, then so it's just a different process.
00:18:26 [Speaker 2]
So we do have an enterprise way of selling, but it's pretty much the same.

00:18:31 [Speaker 2]
Right.
00:18:31 [Speaker 2]
Right.
00:18:32 [Speaker 2]
Like, you've just gotta believe the fact that if you use self determination theory in the workplace, you're gonna get all these benefits.
00:18:43 [Speaker 2]
You're gonna get a safe place.
00:18:44 [Speaker 2]
Your mental well-being is gonna improve Your retentions your your employee retention is gonna improve.

00:18:50 [Speaker 2]
Productivity is gonna improve.
00:18:51 [Speaker 2]
Like, there's all these things.
00:18:53 [Speaker 2]
And then you go, how much?
00:18:54 [Speaker 2]
$5 a user a month?

00:18:56 [Speaker 1]
That's pretty affordable, really.
00:18:58 [Speaker 1]
Yeah.
00:18:59 [Speaker 1]
Is this, something that you have to be trained on?
00:19:06 [Speaker 1]
Would someone come to your site and roll this out, or is potentially this something you can kind of pick off the shelf and and take it away to your team?

00:19:15 [Speaker 2]
Off the shelf and take it away.
00:19:17 [Speaker 2]
The training is it's not so much training.
00:19:21 [Speaker 2]
It's understanding that controlling language is not what you you don't wanna use this to control.
00:19:27 [Speaker 2]
You don't wanna say do that, and you might get a scratchy.
00:19:31 [Speaker 2]
Like, that works against like, we we are so fickle with how we get motivated.

00:19:38 [Speaker 1]
We wanna do behavior based safety, and then we do a quota on how many observations and stuff.
00:19:45 [Speaker 1]
You know?
00:19:47 [Speaker 1]
As soon as they we want you guys, the employee, to do it, but then the employee doesn't do it.
00:19:54 [Speaker 1]
So now we have to measure it and require it and yeah.

00:19:57 [Speaker 2]
Totally.
00:19:58 [Speaker 2]
That's where b BBS fell over.
00:20:00 [Speaker 2]
Exactly.
00:20:01 [Speaker 2]
But, what you want to do is recognize autonomy when it's a decision that's being made, you know, that's you're in support of.
00:20:12 [Speaker 2]
So someone's keeping their area tidy.

00:20:14 [Speaker 2]
If they're if they're you can see them sort of putting safety issues, things, you know, or they've come up with a good idea, they've done something like that.
00:20:23 [Speaker 2]
Then you've got if you reward that, then there's the autonomy that gets rewarded.
00:20:28 [Speaker 2]
So autonomy is, super important.
00:20:31 [Speaker 2]
So that's that's really the training that would happen.
00:20:34 [Speaker 2]
It's more about understanding that don't hold this over someone.

00:20:40 [Speaker 2]
You've got to recognize autonomy.
00:20:41 [Speaker 2]
Don't be controlling.

00:20:43 [Speaker 1]
How do you see you talked about this sounds like a very transparent I mean, if you're having people take pictures of safe or unsafe things in the workplace, you're kind of putting the employee position to reveal certain things about the worksite and kind of maybe rat put blame on a different employee even though they might not know they're doing it, a manager potentially taking disciplinary action against those findings.
00:21:16 [Speaker 1]
So how do you get buy in from the employee that this is something that's gonna be beneficial for them?
00:21:24 [Speaker 1]
And then how do you coach the managers to find that line between taking action and rewarding employees?

00:21:33 [Speaker 2]
That happens now anyway.
00:21:35 [Speaker 2]
People can make photos of take photos of anything they like pretty much.
00:21:41 [Speaker 2]
And so you've got whistleblowers.
00:21:43 [Speaker 2]
You've got this sort of behavior that happens anyway.
00:21:45 [Speaker 2]
So if they wanna rat out an employee or if they wanna do something like that, you can do that now.

00:21:52 [Speaker 2]
Our tool doesn't make it any easier in that sense.
00:21:55 [Speaker 2]
What it does do is it keeps that inside the company.
00:22:01 [Speaker 2]
So if they're doing lots of convo cars photos, that's owned by the company.
00:22:07 [Speaker 2]
So that's the first thing.
00:22:08 [Speaker 2]
The Second thing that's kinda related to that is that some people said, wait.

00:22:13 [Speaker 2]
But if we know about this, sometimes rather not know about it, you sort of say to yourself, I can see where you're coming from, but it's a dangerous path to go down If you'd rather not know certain things, like if you'd rather your employees or your workers don't tell you about things, it's not a great path to what you want is for is to encounter things.
00:22:36 [Speaker 2]
It's similar to what we found with near misses.
00:22:39 [Speaker 2]
Remember in the the, Heimlich kind of era where they he had that pyramid that's so seductive.
00:22:45 [Speaker 2]
You sort of see the pyramid in near misses and fatality and 301, and it just makes so much sense.
00:22:53 [Speaker 2]
Yeah.

00:22:54 [Speaker 1]
We're loading up the bottom of the pyramid.

00:22:57 [Speaker 2]
Yeah.
00:22:57 [Speaker 2]
And it's a shame that it's just wrong, but and I'd I'd be happy to debate that, with anyone.
00:23:03 [Speaker 2]
The thing with that is there's really relation between you want to encourage, people to report near misses.
00:23:11 [Speaker 2]
In the Hanlik sense, a near miss is a kind of a bad thing because 300 of them equal a fatality, so reduce the near misses.
00:23:20 [Speaker 2]
So that encourages people to not report them.

00:23:23 [Speaker 2]
And so that's going the wrong way.
00:23:24 [Speaker 2]
You want people to say, you know, this happened, and you want that honesty and for people to go, okay.
00:23:30 [Speaker 2]
Cool.
00:23:31 [Speaker 2]
Thank you.
00:23:32 [Speaker 2]
Near miss.

00:23:33 [Speaker 2]
Well done for spotting it and for dealing with it.
00:23:36 [Speaker 2]
Like and that's what combo card does.
00:23:37 [Speaker 2]
What you don't is it's very, very easy to turn your head the other way when you see something that's, like, a bit sketchy.
00:23:45 [Speaker 2]
Actually, got

00:23:45 [Speaker 1]
to encourage people to report on it.
00:23:47 [Speaker 1]
We're we're leaving the the company and the organization up to, for better or for worse, their own devices.
00:23:56 [Speaker 1]
I mean, this isn't something you provide as far as, like, you probably do some rudimentary coaching, you know, if you're doing some onboarding with them about, like, you just said, the the psychology and employee relations is that, but not not any extensive training.

00:24:12 [Speaker 2]
Stuff.
00:24:13 [Speaker 2]
No.
00:24:13 [Speaker 2]
It's it's, micro training.
00:24:15 [Speaker 2]
So, you know, they see my moving head on a video and they get the tips, you know.
00:24:22 [Speaker 2]
So there's really it doesn't take much.

00:24:24 [Speaker 2]
It really is for them to understand that don't use this as a controlling weapon.
00:24:29 [Speaker 2]
Use it as an encouraging tool, to reward and to encourage and that sort of thing.
00:24:34 [Speaker 2]
There's plenty of other parts of work that if you don't comply, especially safety, if you don't comply that you've had of the law, you know, there's all sorts of negativity.
00:24:44 [Speaker 2]
So we're not against that necessarily.
00:24:46 [Speaker 2]
We're just saying that the positive piece.

00:24:49 [Speaker 2]
And, actually, if you balance it out with some positivity, you get this disproportionate improvement in productivity, safety, all sorts of other stuff.

00:24:58 [Speaker 1]
Does this require I'm just thinking on the back end for, like, IT folks or something.
00:25:05 [Speaker 1]
Does this integrate with, like, any specific platform or software that might be a hindrance for people adopting it?

00:25:12 [Speaker 2]
Yeah.
00:25:13 [Speaker 2]
We're open API.
00:25:14 [Speaker 2]
So we anyone has APIs, which is most major, software platforms we can integrate with.
00:25:22 [Speaker 2]
And an example of that is, there's a SafetyCulture is a company that is actually Australian, safety platform.
00:25:29 [Speaker 2]
We're not a safety platform.

00:25:31 [Speaker 2]
So, we're a rewards and recognition platform that just happens to work really well in the safety domain.
00:25:37 [Speaker 2]
It might be customer service.
00:25:39 [Speaker 2]
Like in McDonald's, it's not so much safety as it is customer service or anything, cleanliness, all those sorts of other areas.
00:25:47 [Speaker 2]
Where it's really good for safety is that a lot of these safety platforms are kind of boring.
00:25:54 [Speaker 2]
God love them.

00:25:55 [Speaker 2]
Database driven sort of, compliance focused stuff.
00:26:00 [Speaker 2]
So no workers want them on their devices.
00:26:03 [Speaker 2]
And, you know, they can't be forced to have an app on their device unless the workplace provides the device, and there's all these other things as well.
00:26:10 [Speaker 2]
Sure.
00:26:11 [Speaker 2]
They don't have the app on their device, and they don't want it.

00:26:15 [Speaker 2]
Whereas with Scratchy, because this is the app that they win rewards, then they're like, okay.
00:26:21 [Speaker 2]
I can have that app on my phone.
00:26:23 [Speaker 2]
There's something in it for me.
00:26:24 [Speaker 2]
You

00:26:24 [Speaker 1]
know?
00:26:24 [Speaker 1]
Right.

00:26:25 [Speaker 2]
We all operate on that principle.
00:26:26 [Speaker 2]
It becomes a a really great way to like, a Convo card.
00:26:30 [Speaker 2]
This has an ID, which we're talking about, that can go directly to the safety platform.
00:26:36 [Speaker 2]
And in fact, the supervisor or the manager might get four or five of these convey cards as a summary, and it's like a Tinder swipe.
00:26:44 [Speaker 2]
They can accept them into the safety platform or they can reject them.

00:26:49 [Speaker 2]
And so they're sort of like half filled in already by the time they get to the safety platform.
00:26:54 [Speaker 2]
They've got, you know, who, what, when, where.
00:26:58 [Speaker 2]
They've got the image.
00:26:59 [Speaker 2]
A lot of that data is already filled in with one swipe of their, finger to accept, and it goes into the safety platform.
00:27:07 [Speaker 2]
So there's a lot of things, like, with HSI done safe and those sorts of platforms, you need to add a bit more context to it.

00:27:15 [Speaker 2]
But instead of it being a job where sort of takes them twenty minutes and it's like, when am I going to find the time to do that?
00:27:22 [Speaker 2]
80% of it's filled in already.
00:27:24 [Speaker 2]
And so it's like a two two or three minute job just to fill in the additional context, and they're done.
00:27:29 [Speaker 2]
And then you can do that platform.

00:27:30 [Speaker 1]
And you've done it.
00:27:32 [Speaker 1]
You've done a great job lining it all up out for us.
00:27:36 [Speaker 1]
So

00:27:37 [Speaker 2]
Yeah.
00:27:37 [Speaker 2]
Yeah.
00:27:38 [Speaker 2]
No.
00:27:38 [Speaker 2]
It's it's really good.
00:27:40 [Speaker 2]
I'd say if if someone I mean, you they could always download it and try it.

00:27:44 [Speaker 2]
I would recommend a bit of reading on self determination theory if someone was interested, and they didn't wanna didn't wanna do anything else.
00:27:54 [Speaker 2]
It's really worth reading.
00:27:56 [Speaker 2]
It's really good for your life.
00:27:57 [Speaker 2]
It's not so it's like not just work, like, but family and, you know, if your kids or your your wife or whatever, to be able to understand that autonomy, competence relatedness is, like, so important in each and every one of us to encourage autonomy.
00:28:17 [Speaker 2]
You know, it's a nice little reminder.

00:28:19 [Speaker 2]
It's something that we probably already know to a degree, but we just need to be reminded of these things.
00:28:26 [Speaker 2]
So self determination theory is really, really worthwhile.

00:28:29 [Speaker 1]
Well, when you talked about those three points, thought of the most rewarding teams that I have been on, and they've all been you have autonomy.
00:28:43 [Speaker 1]
You know, your supervisor is very willing to, if you have an idea, to do a little bit of the legwork, figure out if it's gonna be good or bad, and then execute it, and then do the post mortem, see if it actually was a good idea or not, you know, so you grow.
00:29:01 [Speaker 1]
Yeah.
00:29:01 [Speaker 1]
What you know, that group, you know, that's always a challenge, you know, as far as getting people to work in close quarters to get along.
00:29:10 [Speaker 1]
And when all of those people get along, you have great managers and you have autonomy.

00:29:15 [Speaker 1]
It's like, man, it's a it's a powerhouse.

00:29:18 [Speaker 2]
It's a powerhouse.
00:29:19 [Speaker 2]
Yeah.
00:29:20 [Speaker 2]
It really is.
00:29:21 [Speaker 2]
And it doesn't need I think people mistake some of these things for being friendly or being nice, or it doesn't need that.
00:29:29 [Speaker 2]
Like, you can get these high performance teams that it's really, full on and you've got, like, these massive, goals and all all the rest of it.

00:29:38 [Speaker 2]
You can still be working on autonomy, competence, and relatedness.
00:29:42 [Speaker 2]
Again, it's a case of having super high performance and getting the best out of people, getting people feeling good, heading to work, going, oh my god.
00:29:50 [Speaker 2]
This is full on, but we'll get there, you know, because of those three things.

00:29:54 [Speaker 1]
Yeah.
00:29:54 [Speaker 1]
I just from what you've told us today, I think someone should I know I'm gonna look at it because there's if you come from a culture or still in a culture that is using behavior based safeness sounds like something that people would want to do versus being required to do.
00:30:14 [Speaker 1]
You know?

00:30:14 [Speaker 2]
Yeah.
00:30:15 [Speaker 2]
No.
00:30:15 [Speaker 2]
Skinner had a lot.
00:30:16 [Speaker 2]
He contributed a a great deal.
00:30:18 [Speaker 2]
He's actually mentioned in self determination theory.

00:30:22 [Speaker 2]
They talk about sort of the history of SDT and, of course, Skinner and behaviour based safety features.
00:30:28 [Speaker 2]
It's a, you know, they go Freud, Adler, Jung.
00:30:31 [Speaker 2]
You know, they go through all the greats.
00:30:34 [Speaker 2]
He really did a lot, but there's just there's been a lot that's happened since Skinnier did that body of knowledge.
00:30:40 [Speaker 2]
And like you say, Prager's principle and self determination theory, these things are, like, really, really good.

00:30:47 [Speaker 2]
Yeah.
00:30:47 [Speaker 2]
Worth looking at.

00:30:49 [Speaker 1]
Where can people find more?
00:30:51 [Speaker 1]
What's the website or how where do they get it?
00:30:54 [Speaker 1]
What's it available?

00:30:55 [Speaker 2]
Scratchy.com, with an I e, Scratchy.
00:30:59 [Speaker 2]
And, yeah, they can, we'll be releasing, our latest release, which has got the free forever offering in the next few weeks.
00:31:08 [Speaker 2]
So we're just actually beta testing it with, McDonald's here in Sydney.
00:31:13 [Speaker 2]
And, yeah.
00:31:14 [Speaker 2]
So we'll be in The US very shortly, but, they can express interest.

00:31:19 [Speaker 2]
They can go over to scratchy.com and put their name down, express their interest.
00:31:23 [Speaker 2]
And then as soon as it's released in, various states in The US, we'll, we'll let them know.

00:31:29 [Speaker 1]
Just to kind of think out loud about that, is there is this, like, English only right now?
00:31:37 [Speaker 1]
What's what would be the path for for potential other languages or countries?

00:31:42 [Speaker 2]
It's gonna go multilanguage.
00:31:43 [Speaker 2]
It will be, Spanish and Arabic are the first two.
00:31:48 [Speaker 2]
Nowadays, it's actually not difficult to go multilanguage, but we actually, for the industry in the English speaking countries.
00:31:55 [Speaker 2]
It's like those other countries where that's the mother tongue.
00:31:58 [Speaker 2]
So, yeah, we're going multi language, this later this year.

00:32:02 [Speaker 1]
Oh, okay.
00:32:02 [Speaker 1]
Cool.
00:32:03 [Speaker 1]
Well, awesome.
00:32:04 [Speaker 1]
Yeah.
00:32:04 [Speaker 1]
That sounds sounds great.

00:32:07 [Speaker 1]
Super excited for you guys, and hopefully, you're successful.
00:32:09 [Speaker 1]
And, I mean, like I said, I I'm planning on getting on there and seeing what it's all about and putting my name in the hat to see when it releases in The US.
00:32:18 [Speaker 1]
So super excited

00:32:19 [Speaker 2]
for you.
00:32:19 [Speaker 2]
I look forward to your feedback, Travis.
00:32:21 [Speaker 2]
That'll be great.
00:32:22 [Speaker 2]
Cool.
00:32:23 [Speaker 2]
Well, thanks a lot, your time.

00:32:25 [Speaker 2]
And, yeah, if I'm in Alaska at some point, which I really definitely wanna head towards, then I'll let you know.

00:32:30 [Speaker 1]
Okay.
00:32:31 [Speaker 1]
Sounds good.
00:32:31 [Speaker 1]
Thanks, James.

00:32:32 [Speaker 2]
Cool.
00:32:33 [Speaker 2]
No worries.
00:32:33 [Speaker 2]
Pleasure.
00:32:34 [Speaker 2]
Have a good one.