This is Your Wake Up Call!!!

Has your organization become forgetful or is it sleepwalking?

A delightful new book by Stephen Capizzano (2020), The Forgetful Organization, has some ideas that really make sense for those of us working to help organizations improve their safety performance and move towards Safety II.

has your organization become forgetful or is it sleepwalking?In this story, a wicked witch puts the princess and the whole kingdom to sleep for 100 years. They all have to wait for the arrival of the prince to kiss the princess and awaken everyone. As children, we all knew this story, but in this new book, Stephen Capizzano shifts the story to thinking about what happens in our organizations.

Are we in our organizations, walking around as if we are asleep? This idea of us walking around as if we are asleep is not new. The ancient Greeks talked about the caves of sleep and drinking from the rivers of forgetfulness. Are we sleepwalking deep in our habits and unaware of things going on around us?

Are we asleep in our old habits that we like and feel comfortable in? Do we like pushing the blame for problems off onto someone else? Do we like doing the minimum required for compliance? Isn’t just enough good enough? Do we really enjoy our dull safety meetings because it is a time for day dreaming about something else? Do we enjoy pushing back when something new comes into the picture like a new training program or improved safety procedure? Do we really love the “same old way?”

As we are sleep walking, 5,250 people died at work in 2018 (Bureau of Labor Statistics). The number of fatalities since 2008 has ranged between 4,800 and 5,250 people a year. Is that a habit we have become used to? The second highest cause of death for women at work is murder (453 in 2018). Is this another habit?

I used to be in the sleep-walking mode until we had a fire at a plant where I was the Plant Manager and I woke up. Maybe that was my handsome prince. Actually everyone woke up. We became a high-performance organization getting the fire out, the repairs made and starting up. Then our old habits reasserted themselves and most of us went back to sleep. But this jolt for me to wake up was so powerful I did not go back to sleep. I went on a quest to find out how we can all breakout of our old habits, stay awake and do extraordinary things together.

In this quest, I discovered many new things and created Partner-Centered Leadership, which I have discussed many times in these newsletters. One key element I found was that people want to be winners. Another finding was that we already know how to work at high levels of performance. We just have to wake up and help each other to shed our old habits. It is not a matter of scolding each other to do better. It is really just reminding each other that we already know how, so let’s do it. When we wake up, we use the natural processes of working together at a high level of performance. We do not need to go to special classes or workshops; we already know how to work this way as the fire crisis showed.

We already know how to:

  • treat each other with respect
  • help each other
  • listen together
  • tell the truth
  • share information
  • say we are sorry when we mess up
  • think and develop better ways to do things
  • work safely
  • remind each other to be our best

The key features for leaders to remember in Partner-Centered Leadership are:

  • valuing people, change and the future
  • seeing organizations as if they are living systems
  • recognizing organizations as complex, adapting, self-organizing networks of people
  • focusing on the open flow of information, building respect and trust
  • helping people to find meaning in the work itself

set a goal of where you want to beWhen we were able to shed our old habits at our Plant in West Virginia, injury rates dropped by 97%, emissions to air, ground and water as reported to the EPA dropped 95%, productivity rose by 45% and earnings rose by 300%. As I walked the plant for 5 hours each day we were reminding ourselves to shed the old habits and create a much brighter future.

We can all make the choice to wake up and create a safer, brighter future. Let’s remind each other and ourselves that we can wake up. We can each become the handsome prince that Stephen Capizzano talks about in his fine book.

Some interesting safety data

The Bureau of Labor Statics summary for 2018 shows that in 2018 there were 2,834,500 Recordable injuries. At an average cost of about $50,000, this amounts to a waste of over $1.1 trillion as well as a lot of suffering and sadness.

COVID-19

Returning to work during this pandemic seems to be the right thing to be doing, as long as we do our best regarding social distancing, wearing a suitable face mask, washing our hands, and keeping our hands away from our face. We also have to give our older people special care to protect them since they have such serious effects if they get the virus. Everyone needs to look out for each other and take the steps to do the best they can to work safely and keep everyone healthy. This is not down-playing the seriousness of the disease, but rather looking at a balanced approach where people also need to work and the businesses survive.

Your Workplace Safety Culture

Who says you can’t do it all?

LEADERS: You can have EXCELLENCE in all Four of the Legs on YOUR WORKPLACE’S SAFETY CULTURE STOOL! HERE’s HOW and WHY!

Understanding each of the 4 Legs of the SAFETY CULTURE EXCELLENCE STOOL – It’s Essential for Leaders!

workplace safety

Are you a CEO, an executive, or a safety leader in your Workplace? Regardless of the titles we hold or the initials that we give to Health, Safety and Environmental endeavors…it still comes down to people being in the workplace who are fully cognizant of and devoted to reducing the risks of harm to employees in that workplace – physical or psychological. And, the ability to instill mindsets with our people to “want to protect themselves” and “to go home at the end of the day with all their parts (legs, arms, eyes, ears) intact” – the behaviors they choose are critical, as are the behaviors our Leaders Expect, Embrace and Enforce.

OSHA tells us that despite new technologies, more mandatory training, more regulations, more policies and procedures, and yes, more compliance officers…the annual statistics for fatal injuries and recordable injuries on the job have hardly moved the needle. Similarly, the top 10 most cited violations keep showing up…Falls, Scaffolding, Ladders, Lock-Tag-Try, Powered trucks, Machine guarding and Hazard Communications/exposures. Why is that?

Why isn’t progress happening? (Experts tell us that genuine employee engagement is dropping while these statistics rise!)

In the past, we’ve talked about the 3-legged stool of Workplace Safety for which safety leaders must be focused, including:

  • Occupational Safety: Related to potential injuries from slips, trips, moving machinery, etc.
  • Occupational Health: Related to preventing latent, long-term effects from potential injuries like carpal tunnel, and effects of inhalations – asbestos being an example. (Now, of course, in the time of COVID 19 we have even more to concern ourselves in the Health-arena).
  • Process Safety Management (PSM or PSMS): Ensuring standards are complied with (OSHA) in many industries that handle hazardous substances (intended to prevent or minimize the consequences of a catastrophic release of toxic, reactive, flammable or explosive HHC’s from a process).

It is a big job – keeping people safe – regardless of which leg of the stool we’re particularly focused upon.

Yet, today, with this new decade of workplace violence rearing its ugly head, we know that we have to add a fourth leg to the Safety Stool. This 4th leg addresses the security/civility of our people – because diligent awareness to workplace violence prevention is required (to promptly address inside harassment/bullying and incivility or to thwart a provoked active shooter who enters the Workplace to do harm).

  • Social Risk: The fourth leg of the stool is what is called “Social Risk.” Another way to say it is the psychological harm that comes with repeated bullying, harassment, dysfunctional behaviors, (civility not being required), that leave workers dreading to go to work, or that increase the risk of home-growing an active shooter, or having a suicide or murder in your workplace, let alone the bad press that comes with a highly-publicized incident. Requiring a civil workplace is integrated here. Not paying attention to social risk manifests into psychological harm as the continuum of bad behaviors escalate in the workplace – and ultimately, can impact people in harmful ways. (Add COVID 19 to the mix and this 4th prong of Social Risk takes center stage.)

Roll it all up and what do you have?

The Safety Leadership Biggie: Workplace Culture.

SO…what can YOU do about this? How do you get out in front of it?

In the Professional Safety Magazine a couple years ago, a peer-reviewed article on safety culture showed that, “Leadership is the antecedent to safety culture and is essential for fulfilling the intent of OSH throughout industry. It is critical to the creation, support and drive of an organization’s safety culture.” Also, “Executives and Safety Leaders should understand the impact that their Leadership style can have on Safety culture.

We couldn’t agree more!

We look at the “whole organization’s culture” – including safety, security, civility, and the means and quality of engagement. Leadership makes the impactful difference. The OSHA general duty clause requires that employers provide a “safe workplace environment” for employees. There’s no doubt that a hostile environment/toxic workplace impacts the psychological safety of workplaces (i.e., bullying, harassment, sexual harassment, vengeful acts). There’s no doubt that disregard for OSHA regulations impacts the physical safety of the people in our workplaces. There’s no doubt that the security of our facilities and people’s awareness of intrusion/perpetrators intent to do harm, is critical. (i.e., workplace violence prevention/security vulnerability). There’s no doubt that when the above focus is absent, effectiveness plummets.

Leadership should hold the expectation that their people need to return home from work whole – no one harmed physically nor psychologically – and be willing to hold that principled-stand (always). From that public stance, leaders can move forward, choosing to live that value in their actions and making an effective difference. Engaging effectively with your people – at all levels is key to safety leadership.

CEOs, leaders, safety officers, team leaders set the safety, health, security and social-related culture, period. Leaders are charged to ensure that culture remains steadfast and promptly address the behaviors that bring down people and teams.

There can be no ignorance of, or turning away from, dysfunctional or unsafe behaviors that need to be identified and addressed, or safety rules that have been violated. Leaders are charged with enforcing the standards of the organization (and not selectively). A lack of engaged leadership and/or allowing incivilities lead to issues on several fronts – so every organization needs to be creating this authentic essence – across the board – across all 4 legs of the safety stool.

“It is too much,” you say? “You Can’t Do It All?”
Oh, Yes, YOU CAN!

If you consider two sides of the penny metaphor (Lincoln’s face side indicative of the people/psychological side, and the Lincoln Memorial’s facility side indicative of the safety/security side of the organization), then you can clearly see that the copper in the penny – that integrates both sides and throughout – is indeed, the LEADERSHIP component of the metaphor. That’s the leadership effect on workplace culture.

Leadership practices (i.e., level of engagement, degree of autonomy, enforcement of standards, clarity of focus, amount of collaboration, cohesiveness, support, communications/feedback, etc.) are key to an organization’s effectiveness. And leaders are just like that copper – they impact the whole enchilada – or, per the metaphor, the whole penny – the whole organization.

For us at NageleKnowlesAndAssociates.com, we look very closely at Leadership. It doesn’t take much to see when an organization lacks good leadership. It shows up in Safety compliance, in your entire stance on Safety and Health and Civility – across the board, in your overall culture, in security measures and in active shooter readiness, in workplace performance and results, in employee engagement, civility, turnover, involvement, participation, in awareness of what is happening within (i.e., bullying, harassment, cover-ups), and in leadership’s effectiveness to create, maintain and embrace the value of every person as an individual, thus enabling a positive and safe workplace culture. All of these can be changed for the better – and very quickly.

We Teach Leadership.

Guide to Reducing the Risk of Workplace ViolenceWe teach how leaders (up and down the organization) can get it all done – by understanding first, how to lead and to know and follow the tenets of authentic Leadership, including embracing the Engagement Diamond© – a leadership process of Richard N. Knowles and Associates. And, we also teach (every level of your organization) how to effectively engage the people you’ve hired to work together in your organization to do their work with the highest attention to safety, security, civility and effectiveness. It can be done! (We’ve proven that over and over again).

To this point, we invite you to connect with Amazon to order up a copy of our Amazon best-selling book, “Guide to Reducing the Risk of Workplace Violence – the absolute essentials.” In it we address the entire spectrum of workplace violence – the culture that extends from the psychological aspects to the physical aspects to the Leadership aspects, and to the active shooter aspects.

It is a safety/health/security/civility spectrum and it translates both to the Professional Safety Magazine article and to what we do for Leaders and their Teams, in their Workplaces every day.

We invite you to peruse our website: NageleKnowlesAndAssociates.com or call us at 716-622-6467 and we’ll engage in the essential Leadership conversation with you – call for a free conversation now. (Soon…You Can Do it All!)

We Need More Partnering…COVID-19 and All

The Problem – Fractured Organizations

more partnering is needed in businessesThe COVID-19 pandemic, the return to school questions, the protests and riots in so many of our cities, the bitter political campaign, the demand for using the “correct” words, are driving people crazy. The COVID-19, the questions, the anxieties and concerns, spill into our workplaces causing a lot of uncertainty and stress. We see this happening every day. Our businesses, our schools and hospitals, our governments, and not-for-profits, at all levels, are struggling. Changes and pressures are coming faster and faster.

So many of us seem to be trying to cope by withdrawing into our shells and trying to push the turmoil all away. The trust levels among all the various groups is very low. So many loud voices are pushing their version of the “truth” that it is almost impossible to find the truth.

Mary Eberstadt, in her 2019 book, Primal Screams, suggests that people are basically social animals and that many of our connections are broken. With all these, many have lost their sense of identity. Social distancing and COVID-19 concerns, changes in how family’s function or not, changes in where people live and work, changes in the way the strife in our society are making us feel isolated and lone.

At work, many of us do not feel psychologically or physically safe. The COVID-19 and other distractions pull us away from focusing on our work. This can lead to arguments, bullying, injuries, and incidents, as well as to lower productivity. Not only are these problems distracting us, they are very expensive for the business. For example, if we just spend the equivalent of one day a week for each employee trying to solve all the issues raised by these problems, that would amount to 20% of our payroll costs.

Pulling Together and Partnering are Needed.
We Can Each Make a Difference!

We can make choices about how we agree to work together, and build a community that is safe and productive.

We can choose to:

  • Be respectful of one another.
  • Listen to each other.
  • Learn from each other.
  • Look out for each other and be our brothers’ and sisters’ keepers.
  • Learn from our successes and our mistakes.
  • Give each other the benefit of the doubt and not jump to judgement.
  • Talk together about how to improve our jobs.
  • Talk about our differences and figure a way through them.
  • Be aware of people who are bullying or harassing others and speak up about this.
  • Create a safe space where it is okay for people to ask questions and provide feedback.
  • Help each other to be successful.

make good choices in your business while under pressureIn thinking about your own place where you work, what do you suppose it would be like if you did some of these things? Do you think that you could begin talking with others about the COVID-19 challenges and building a more respectful environment? What do you think it would be like if you could openly talk together about the important issues like workable, social distancing and improving the safety of your job?

What would it be like if the managers and supervisors openly shared more information about these issues, as well as about how the business is doing? Would talking about how other businesses are handling these issues be helpful? What would it be like if you felt you were in an environment of trust? What would it be like if people really asked important questions and talked about them?

Hopefully, the people in upper management will be asking you for your honest opinions and really listen.

Each person can make a positive difference, if you decide to do it. It is a matter of will. If you do not step forward to make our workplaces safer and more productive, who will?

There are people with whom you can partner and begin these focused conversations. These do not have to be big projects. Start small, start slowly and it will spread it as it grows.

Change happens one conversation at a time!

I would be glad to talk with any of you about building Partner-Centered Leadership with you. Please call me at 716-622-6467.

Highly Participative Leadership produces the best results

A 19-Year Case Study

On Tuesday, August 18, 2020, from 4:15 to 4:45 PM, I will be making a virtual presentation at the AiCHE 16th Global Congress on Process Safety. The paper is a 19-year case study demonstrating a successful plant leadership transition that improved process safety performance.

highly participative leadership process produces much better results that the top-down management processWhen I was transferred to the DuPont Belle, West Virginia plant in 1987, the Total Recordable Injury Case Rate (TRC) was about 5.8 and emissions to air, water and ground, as reported in the EPA Toxic Release Inventory (TRI) annual report, was over 6,000,000 pounds/year. Within three years, both of these had dropped by about 95% to a TRC of about 0.3 and a TRI of about 275,000 pounds/year. Emissions to the environment is one way to measure how well the process safety is working; the better the process safety work, the lower the emissions to the environment.

I was using a highly, participative leadership process I called Partner-Centered Leadership for Occupational Injuries and Health, as well as for Process Safety; this was a highly integrated process with just about everyone involved, and consciously working together to make our plant safer and have less impact on the environment. When I was transferred by DuPont in 1995 and replaced by a traditional plant manager using a top-down driven management process, things changed.

The process safety work was pulled away from the occupational safety and health effort and taken over by the managers. The occupational safety and health work continued to be led by the first and second level supervisors using the Partner-Centered Leadership approach. The highly participative leadership approach and the top-down management approach were running in parallel (the same business conditions, the same regulatory pressures, the same people, the same community). The occupational safety and health performance stayed at a rate of 0.3 or better for the next 15 years.

But the five different plant managers who came in during that period gradually cut back the process safety management resources and effort. They cut back on the manpower, allowed work-orders to pile up, stretched out the inspection intervals, ignored feedback from the operators and mechanics about the deteriorating conditions, etc. The TRI emissions rose by about ten-fold to over 2,500,000 pounds/year.

transformation can happen in the workplaceThe process safety management collapsed in January of 2010 with major, accidental releases to the air and river and they had a man get killed with a phosgene release. When the US Chemical Safety Board investigated in late 2010, they reported that while the occupational safety and health performance was the best in the DuPont Company, the process safety management had fallen apart and the plant was not even using the DuPont standard procedures. This was a sad commentary about how far things had fallen.

This 19-year case study clearly shows that a highly participative leadership process produces much better results that the top-down management process.


An Online Course Offering

Beginning August 24th, I will be presenting a six-week course on Leadership and Using the Process Enneagram©. The Process Enneagram© was a key leadership tool I used when I was at Belle. I have used this tool successfully around the world with people in all sorts of organizations and businesses in the 25 years since I retired from DuPont. Wherever I have used it in my consulting, safety and total performance has improved.

This Online course is the first in a series to teach about leading and using the Process Enneagram©.

If you are interested in taking the course, please go to my web site, RNKnowles and associates.com, and sign up. Or, call me and I’ll answer your questions. I’ll be using Zoom for the calls. This is important work.

Workplace Safety…When Tempers Flare

We are currently living in really tense social and political times.

when tempers flare at work risk of injury goes upYou can’t turn on the news or check your Internet homepage without sensing the depth of the issues that our country is experiencing. Whether it is returning to the workplace amidst COVID-19 rules, political protests, religious non-tolerance, or negative nightly news events – we’re experiencing a wide berth of dramatic events. And each of us has an opinion, a response, a way that we individually see these events and cope with this discord.

However we cope, we need to do our best to keep it out of the workplace, because when we allow the national scene to externally influence our internal emotions, then our emotions, in fact, can impact our safety and the well-being of others.

Whenever we are distracted by emotions, the risk of an injury or incident goes up, we become less able to concentrate and our minds get (emotionally) preoccupied. Our emotions can be influenced from a host of negatively-impacting ways; in turn, we can be hair-triggered to respond in negative ways. Today, we are especially challenged.

Below is a list of things that add to one’s emotional trigger points and what we can do when emotional overload pushes tempers to flare beyond the threshold level in our workplaces.

When tempers flare, adrenaline flows – it cranks up your heartbeat and breathing rate and primes your body for a fight response. This is NOT GOOD in our Workplaces! When tempers and emotions flare, regardless of the impetus, then the focus on safety takes a back seat. Emotion takes over. That is when you and your coworkers are exposed to higher risk and become most vulnerable to the unexpected.

So what just set you/him/her off?

  • Someone hell-bent on bringing the national scene/election/politics into the workplace, and you vehemently disagree with their view? (Workplaces should be neutral places).
  • Someone unable to keep their personal views on national, regional, or local events to themselves…to which you disagree?
  • Someone unable to contain negative views about another’s race, gender, ethnicity, etc.? (Even when it is well known that what you think about a person/group of persons doesn’t matter when you come through the workplace door – if you’re going to collect a paycheck, you have to find ways to constructively work together with “all” people, regardless of your personal feelings. We’re all in this together, whether we like it or not.)
  • Something else? Something that has become habitual? Like… bullying, intimidation, harassment or someone purposely pushing your buttons, again? And now they’ve crossed the line!
  • You woke up angry and carried that into the workplace? Maybe you were stressed out before you came through the workplace door and you’ve taken it out on your mates.
  • You’re tired? Maybe you’re tired of people taking shortcuts in the workplace and endangering others; maybe you hate that immature horseplay that may be happening, and that your supervisor seems powerless to address it.
  • You’re an old-timer and could care less about the poor example you’re setting? (Don’t think people don’t see this.) Maybe you’re impulsive or maybe you just don’t give a darn. Maybe, because of the way you/he/she is behaving, that you/he/she has now not only lost the respect of coworkers, but the unexpected safety lapse is fully lurking around you; someone can get hurt…it is in the law of probabilities.
  • Maybe you have just had a long, hot day and you are bone-weary?

Are you about to lose your temper (for whatever reason)? Cool it!

a moment of patience at work saves a lot of regretIt doesn’t have to be that way! Take a timeout!

  • Cool Off: Take a walk around the building or around the block.
  • Take Two: Two minutes and think it through. Try to remove your emotion from this situation.
  • Ask to have a private talk with your supervisor about your concerns: Make sure he/she fully grasps the situation and why what is emotionally happening is impacting safety and the workplace environment. Talk it through.
  • Recognize that the actions of all of us have an influence on the safety-mindedness of other workers, particularly newcomers.
  • If cornered, avoid responding to the aggressiveness of another: Don’t escalate the situation. (Walk away…it’s okay).
  • Learn some work-group de-escalation processes, like our Stop-It Process – where one group code-word can quickly cool the ardor and bring harmony back.

Tame Your Temper: Because anger can be powerful, managing it is sometimes challenging. It takes plenty of self-awareness and self-control to manage angry feelings. It is hard, but you’ve got it in you!

Self-awareness is the ability to notice what you’re feeling, thinking, and why. Little kids aren’t very aware of what they feel – they just act it out in their behavior. That’s why you see them having tantrums when they’re mad. Adults (like workers in our workplaces) have the mental ability to be self-aware. If you’re still throwing tantrums, it is time you got some help or leave the workplace. When you get angry, take a moment to notice what you’re feeling and thinking.

Self-control is all about thinking before you act. It puts some precious seconds or minutes between feeling a strong emotion and taking an action you’ll regret.

Together, self-awareness and self-control allow you to have more choice about how to act when you’re feeling an intense emotion like anger.

The Safety Bottom Line: Our workplaces have to be as free as possible from the external emotional factors of the outside world. We’ve got enough to worry about internally – within our workplace walls.

Anytime tempers flare (as a result of any impetus – national, regional, political, or internal frictions) or when aggressive, bullying, intimidating behavior is not appropriately addressed, the risk of incidents increase. Hostile workplace and workplace violence potential increases, as does the potential liability for employers who have a duty to employees to provide a safe work environment, free of abuse and harassment.

Emotion-based discord is a health and safety issue. Supervisors need to be vigilant, “clued-in” and able to address such heated times with calm and genuine concern. Emotions can occur inside or outside the workplace and can range from simple disagreements that escalate to temper tantrum level, to threats and verbal abuse, to physical violence. (All no-no’s in the workplace!)

Thousands of people are exposed to workplace tensions each year…as well as the macro-level national concerns.

The advice is solid: Cool It! Don’t let tempers flare and emotions get elevated in your workplace…where severe consequences can ensue. Nope! Walk away – It’s okay!

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