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performance management |
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coaching & performance development |
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employee motivation & engagement |
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improving sales performance |
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better customer service |
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better workplace safety |
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team building |
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case histories - safety culture
British Paperboard: Turning round the safety culture
British Paperboard, concerned at the safety performance being delivered by its safety management system at one of its plants, (which had the highest accident rate anywhere within the British Gypsum group) assigned Quo to help re-energise safe behaviour.
Several problems were contributing to the unsatisfactory performance: widespread supervisor/ employee conflict, low levels of participation in employee consultation and routine unsafe practice in many safety critical areas. Tellingly, the vast majority of unsafe behaviours were performed through choice not through a lack of training – people were competent but were not sufficiently motivated to perform safely as a matter of course.
Working in partnership with the management team we created a programme that shifted the culture from one where employees were effectively blamed for committing errors and violations to one in which employees were reinforced positively for the performance of safe behaviours.
The new approach changed the emphasis on measuring the absence of accidents to an emphasis on measuring compliance with safety critical behaviours. We helped train all managers and employees in the principles of behaviour change and introduced a mechanism to reward and recognise good safety practice.
The dramatic success of the programme - the accident frequency rate declined by 80% - led to its extension to other mills and plants within the group, including six UK recycling plants and in their packaging manufacturing operation in Northern Ireland.
