Barry Spud’s Hazard Control Tips

Barry Spud’s Hazard Control Tips – The Hierarchy Of Hazard Control

Barry Spud tells: “The Hierarchy of Hazard Control (I call it the “HOHC”) is the one of the main weapons, in the Safety Crusader’s arsenal, in the war on lost time injuries. It takes a certifiable Safety Expert like myself to know when elimination of the hazard is just not practical or possible. It’s then, and only then, that we must implement accepted engineering control practices (I demonstrate this in the photograph below). If management really cared about safety, and gave me an unlimited budget, I could have constructed a bridge over this hazard – but I just cannot get them to listen.

Of course, in this example, less experienced Safety People, like yourselves, would probably have suggested lower order controls  from the HOHC such as implementing banana peel avoidance procedures, substituting with an orange peel or the wearing of ice cleats and padded trouser seats. Trust me, I have tried all of these methods and my data indicates only a 63.563% success rate.

I don’t expect you be be as skilled and experienced in safety as me until next week, but hope my insight takes you one step closer to your goal of achieving nothing (I call that “Zero Harm”). Call me next time you make a mistake and I’ll be sure you get all the blame you deserve. Getting a perfect safety culture is simple – its 64% compliance, 19% choice and 28% common sense”

See Barry’s other tips: How to Safely Pick Up Chicks and A Revolutionary New Online Safety System and I cant believe that nobody was seriously injured

The inspiration for this article: Max Geyer’s piece “WHS Legislation is NOT about Safety it’s about Culture”.

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Barry Spud

Safety Crusader, Zero Harm Zealot and Compliance Controller at Everything Safety

Latest posts by Barry Spud (see all)

• Dumb Ways to Improve Rail Safety - August 13, 2019
• Even Safety Is Fallible - August 11, 2019
• Christmas light safety - October 8, 2018
• Take 5 for Safety: Five Minute Daily Safety Meetings - August 12, 2018
• And Safety Wonders Why Nobody Zero Hates It Anymore - November 17, 2017

What is a Safety Spud? Lets look at a few more spud head activities in risk and safety: 1. Coming on to site saying there is a safety issue when in fact there’s no such thing, it’s a political issue. 2. ‘Falling apart’ when people make choices that we think are stupid because they won’t do as we ‘tell’ them. Then we put on the angry face and think that overpowering others creates ownership. 3. Putting on the zero harm face, presenting statistics, knowing it has nothing to do with culture, risk or safety. 4. Putting on the superman (hazardman) suit and pretending to be the saviour of everything, this is good spud head cynic stuff. 5. Thinking that everyone else is a spud head except me. 6. Thinking there’s such a thing as ‘common’ sense and using such mythology to blame and label others. 7. Accepting safety policies and processes that dehumanize others. 8. Blaming, ego-seeking, grandstanding and territory protecting behind the mask of safety. 9. Thinking that risk and safety is simple when in fact it is a wicked problem. Denying complexity and putting your spud head in the sand. 10. Continually repeating the nonsense language and discourse of risk aversion that misdirect people about risk, safety, learning and imagination.