Importance & Dimensions of Management Involvement in Successful Occupational Health and Safety

Senior management in companies with successfulobjectives of each individual. Performance
health and safety programs assume ultimateappraisals should be utilised to hold management
responsibility and initiative to ensure thataccountable for accomplishment of specific health
workplace safety is entranced in all activities ofand safety targets and objectives in
the company.predetermined timescales.
Management involvement as a contributor to aResource Allocation
successful occupational health and safety programIt is a fact that the introduction of a safety
takes on a number of dimensions. Thesesystem will require the allocation of a number of
dimensions include visible felt leadership, culturalscarce resources to this function. The justification
alignment within organisations, appointments andof this allocation should be done by conducting a
responsibilities, resource allocation, setting ofcost benefit analysis based on financial and non
objectives and targets and compliance.financial factors. The safety management system
Visible Felt Leadershiprequires a wide variety of resources that needs
The concept of visible felt leadership is theto be effectively allocated and sustained for the
foundation of many successful world classorganization to obtain continuous improvement of
organizations. The basic principles are managementits efforts. If it is clear to all the interested and
that is seen to be involved in the day to dayaffected parties in the organisation that the
activities of the workers. This activity is a meansallocation of these resources adds value to their
by which the managers in the organisationspecific activities and this value can be quantified
influence the attitude and behaviour of theor justified in financial and non financial terms the
company. It is this behaviour that will influence thesafety management program will have a
success of the health and safety managementsignificantly bigger chance of being successful.
systems in the company. Leading by example isSetting of Objectives and Targets
an essential component of a successful safetyIn any successful management system the
management program. The commitment andsetting of effective objectives and targets forms
conformance to rules and regulations forms thethe basis of the success. The setting of goals and
basis of any safety management program.targets create a common focus provided that all
Management can not be exempted fromthe role-players take ownership of the objectives
compliance to any safety requirement in theand targets. This can normally by achieved by
organisation. Visible and continuous managementmeaningful involvement of the role-players in
compliance and involvement to the requirementssetting the objectives and targets. An effective
of the safety management standards is a criticalgoal setting guidelines is that goals must be
success factor. The involvement of employees inSMART goals. What this SMART goal setting
decision making can be effected by elicitingacronym actually means is that the safety goals
potential solution form employees before criticalin the organization should be Specific, Measurable,
decisions are made. This will not only create visibleAttainable, Realistic, and Task orientated.
management involvement, but will ensure thatEfforts without goals and targets do not set
employees will take ownership of the decisionsdirection, therefore the safety management
when they have to implement it. In addition to thisprogram should describe a system how these are
involving a vertical slice of employees in the riskdetermined and communicated effectively to all
assessment process is a basic requirement foremployees in the organisation.
the success of this critical part of the safetyCompliance
management system.In most countries of the world it is generally
Cultural Alignment within Organisationaccepted that once a safety rule is made it should
The health and safety policy of the organisationbe complied with. A significant problem that
forms the basis of setting the basic frameworkcommonly occurs in the industrial environment is
for ensuring that cultural alignment in thethat non conformance to safety rules are not
organisation can take place successfully. It isfreely reported. This lack of reporting can be
important that the policy is issued andattributed to a number of factors, however a
communicated at all levels of the organization. Thelarge portion of the under reporting is as a result
commitment of the Chief Executive Officer mustof the blame fixing culture associated with the
be reflected in the content of the policy as thissafety environment. In order to improve reporting
determines the organisational climate. Theof deviations and not conforming, a blame free
organisational climate forms the basis for theenvironment should be created. This can only be
formulation of the values sets within theachieved by full participation and involvement of all
organization. The alignment of the commitment tolevels of management. By creating a blame free
the safety and health of the management teamenvironment, employees will feel free to report
with that of the employees and otherrisks and hazards identified in their own work
stakeholders will only be possible with consistentenvironment. In order to demonstrate the
and continuous management involvement in theimportance management attribute to these
safety management system of an organisation.reports, all the report received should be
This should be reflected in the policy.investigated as soon as possible to determine the
The training of managers and employeesfundamental contributing factors. The purpose of
regarding the risk profile of the company and thethe investigation must be to determine the action
hazards associated with their work can be utilisedthat must be taken to remove or prevent the
as an effective tool to align the cultural alignmenthazards from occurring in future and not to
within the organisation. Training and awarenessidentify a culprit.
programs should include focussed training ofConclusion
management, supervisors, safety representativesMost best-practice studies agree that strong
and other workers about their individual roles inexecutive leadership as a contributing factor to
the safety management system and how nonsuccessful health and safety performance is
conformance in one area can influence thebased on management involvement and support
effectiveness of the rest of the safetyat all levels on the organization.
management .system.By its very nature, management involvement that
Appointments and Responsibilitiescuts across organizational boundaries, such as is
In order to ensure that it is possible and probablethe case with health and safety management, is a
for managers to be actively involved in the daycomplex and delicate business that needs care
to day activities of a safety managementand attention to achieve success.
program a certain number of critical appointmentsHealth and Safety program success can become
must be made where line managers arean issue unless there is strong, effective senior
responsible for specific safety activities.management support and a shared vision. To
In order to facilitate this, the organizationalachieve this, the health and safety program
management structures should be so designeddecision makers should be from the senior
that it will be possible to allocate these duties in amanagement team and should be required to
practical manner to line managers. Thedefine the targets and objectives based on
appointments should clearly allocate duties andperformance-based evaluation methods. Creating
responsibilities stating the scope, duties andbuy in from senior management in such a manner
authority towards the safety managementthat it will result in visible felt leadership by the
program. It is critical that the expected outcomesworkforce are essential to the successful
of the activities are contained in targets andimplementation of a health and safety program.