You have to hand it to Safety, no greater industry for entertainment, mythology, gobbledygook and cleaning up bank accounts.
All you need to do is: create more regulation and legislation that no one understands, a curriculum that convinces people they are lawyers and police, create a monopoly of standards, concocts a host of pyramids, curves, swiss-cheese, matrices, swms, bow-ties, endless acronyms, HROs, BBS, injury counting, check-listing, safety software, endless safety ego podcasts, and top this off with gobbledygook language like: secrets, codes, cultural solutions, silver bullets, psychosocial ‘hazards’, playbooks, differently that’s not different, heroes, S1/2, sexy safety, pickles, meerkats, hazardman, dumb mums for safety, sensei safety, gurus, geeks, safety gimps, stars, brain blobs, fur-balls for safety, Indiana jones of safety, super heroes, zero, beyond zero, zero plus 1, 1% safer etc.
And this is just a list off the top of my head. The list is crazy.
All of this is clear evidence for an industry that doesn’t know what to do, that loves the word ‘professional’ and feeds off itself to the ring of cash registers.
More entertainment in all of this than a circus!
So much noise with so little substance. So much distraction from the basics of: learning how to listen, walk and observe, helping care and creating ethical ownership in tackling risk.
If you actually took an inventory of all this safety nonsense and noise, you could work out that Safety is not a business for safety, it’s a business for business! And in an industry that doesn’t cultivate critical thinking, empowers the cash clean up.
How easy is it, selling products to an industry that doesn’t know how to do the basics of safety, a sure recipe for raking in the dollars.
Where else could you find such a captive audience indoctrinated with nothing, seeking something from nothing, and walking away with nothing, happily rejoicing about zero till the next time? Or, create a safety award program to dish out zero awards for in-group back slapping selling a new brand.
However, If you are interested in the basics: listening, helping, tackling risk, conversation and care, perhaps you might like a free book (https://www.humandymensions.com/shop/) or a free course (https://vimeo.com/showcase/4233556) (https://vimeo.com/showcase/4883640 ), to get you started.
Dr Rob Long
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- The Global ‘Zero Event’, This is Safety - September 24, 2023
Gregg Ancel says
Safety is only by agreement when every one agrees to work safe.
And when there is clarity in communication from your foremen to the worker addressing work tasks and identifying and eliminating the hazards presented daily in the workplace
Rob Long says
Yes Gregg, and when you look at all the silly noise listed in this blog, where is the clarity in communication? and what is coming down in pressure to the foreman/middle manager? Zero, probably. All accidents are preventable? Probably. Safety is a choice you make? Most likely. Psychosocial illness are ‘hazards’ definitely. mental health is a ‘hazard’, absolutely. A lot of pressure on a middle manager to filter out all this nonsense and connect with the basics. Especially when Safety is busy policing.