If It Feels Like Blame and Shame…It Is
Latest article By Phil La Duke on his blog http://philladuke.wordpress.com/
"One of the chief criticisms of Behaviour-Based Safety, that it blames workers for injuring themselves, isn’t taken all that seriously by its proponents; it should be. Read this article to find out why. And let me know what you think"
Blame isn’t pretty
A few weeks ago, I posted “A @#$@ Storm In Texas” a commentary on how alarming it was that The Boston Marathon drew so much media and public attention while the explosion of a fertilizer plant in West, Texas garnered almost no attention outside the professional safety community. In the introduction that is required when sharing a link in a LinkedIn discussion thread I made the comment that it was time for Safety professionals to “step up or shut up”. My comment was directed at those safety professionals who, for years, had been bragging up the decrease in worker injuries and “flat” fatalities as if they had single-handedly had ushered in a Golden Age of worker safety. My contention was that if one claims credit for one circumstance (in this case safety improvements) one must shoulder the blame for circumstances that are disastrous. I didn’t even imply that safety professionals were responsible for these disasters, and most safety professionals didn’t take it as an accusation.
Read the whole article: http://philladuke.wordpress.com/2013/05/12/if-it-feels-like-blame-and-shameit-is/
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