Qualities of an Excellent OHS Professional

Qualities of an Excellent OHS Professional

A classic by the late George Robotham – with a little help from me.

We were originally going to call it the “Perfect Safety Professional” but decided that “perfect” wasn’t the right word as perfection could never be defined or achieved. If you were perfect then you wouldn’t be quite real as it is our imperfections that give us character. Perfect in one environment may be totally useless in another. If you don’t want to read any further because you think that you are already excellent, then guess what – you’re not! so you should read on, for the key to excellence is continual improvement:

I do not generally refer to people who work in OHS as professionals, as being a professional implies application of a unique body of knowledge, I do not believe that a defined, unique body of knowledge yet exists in the OS side of OHS in Australia. When I did my tertiary study in Management of Organisational Change and Adult & Workplace Education I was surprised how robust the body of knowledge is in comparison with safety.

Defining the core body of OHS knowledge will make an enormous contribution to safety in Australia, if only a cursory approach is taken it will be regarded as a de facto standard and mislead badly.

Skills of the excellent OHS professional

• Interpersonal skills – Techniques such as reflective listening and appropriate self-disclosure can make a real difference. If you cannot get on well with people your technical OHS skills will go to waste.
• Communications skills – The biggest and commonest mistake is written communications that rave on to many pages, succinct written communications is the way to go. Not much use having a great message if you cannot get it across.
• Leadership – Some people say leaders are born, not made, I do not know about this but do know learning programs can enhance leadership abilities. The number 1 job of a leader is to transmit and embed high value standards. In modern business shared leadership is of more relevance than individual leadership.
• Get your priorities right – Recognise safety never has been and never will be the number one priority (you can say it all you want but is it – really?), safety must be fully integrated into other business functions with equal priority for all are interdependent and none can thrive without the other.
• Humility – Be humble and recognise the knowledge and worth of the front line worker, they are the only ones who know how things really happen
• Broad thinking – Think outside the square and challenge the status-quo
• Legislation – Recognise that while compliance with legislation is important it is only a minimum standard
• Pareto Principle – Remember the Pareto Principle, the 80/20 rule, identify the 20% of things you do that give you 80% of your results and concentrate on them
• A commitment to a continuous improvement philosophy and ability to implement Quality Management.
• Change management – OHS management is all about change management and generic skills can be learnt.
• OHS technical skills – Tertiary training is important but practical experience and critical reflection on practice is vital. Practical experience not only in safety but in management and getting your hands dirty
• Auditing – Well developed auditing questions are the important first step.
• Project management – OHS lends itself very well to a project management approach for major change.
• Learning – Avoid the lecture, use Adult Learning Principles & Process and promote interactive approaches and avoid “Death by Power-Point”
• Team-building skills – These essential skills can be learnt
• Time management skills – Relatively easy to learn this
• Sharing – “People support what they create” Not involving the workforce in decisions about OHS change is the road to disaster.
• Well developed bull-dust detector!

OHS Technical skills

Auditing

Facilitating learning

Interpretation of legislation

Safety leadership

Personal damage occurrence investigation

Undertaking safety research

Development and implementation of Safety Management Systems

Development and implementation of Safety Management Plans

Management of workers compensation and rehabilitation

Risk management

Industrial hygiene sampling

Managing safety responsibilities and accountabilities

Measurement, recording and reporting

Fire safety

Using job safety analysis to develop safe working procedures

Management of safety committees and health & safety reps.

Safety inspections

Contractor safety management

Provide advice and training on personal protective equipment

Some people see first-aid as part of the role, if one is not careful this can be a distraction from the main task

Note

A commitment to continuously learn in your speciality and related fields is vital

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George Robotham

George was a Legend in the Safety World who passed away in Sept 2013 but left us with a great legacy

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I have worked in OHS for most of my working life, many years in the mining industry including over 10 years in a corporate OHS role with BHP. Since leaving the mining industry I have worked in a variety of safety roles with a variety of employers, large & small, in a variety of industries. I was associated with my first workplace fatality at age 21, the girl involved was young, intelligent, vivacious and friendly. Such a waste! I was the first on the scene and tried to comfort her and tend to her injuries. She said to me “George, please do not let me die” We put her on the aerial ambulance to Rockhampton base hospital where she died the next day. I do not mind telling you that knocked me around for awhile. Since then I have helped my employers cope with the aftermath of 12 fatalities and 2 other life-altering events. The section "Why do Occupational Health & Safety" provides further detail but in summary, poor safety is simply very expensive and also has a massive humanitarian cost. My qualifications include a certificate I.V. in Workplace Training and Assessment, a Diploma in Frontline Management, a Diploma in Training & Assessment Systems, a Bachelor of Education (Adult & Workplace Education) , a Grad. Cert. in Management of Organisational Change and a Graduate Diploma in Occupational Hazard Management. I am currently studying towards a Masters in Business Leadership. Up until recently I had been a Chartered Fellow of the Safety Institute of Australia for 10 years and a member for about 30 years. My interest is in non-traditional methods of driving organisational change in OHS and I have what I believe is a healthy dis-respect for many common approaches to OHS Management and OHS Training. I hold what I believe is a well-founded perception that many of the things safety people and management do in safety are “displacement activities” (Displacement activities are things we do, things we put a lot of energy into, but which when we examine them closely there is no valid reason for doing them). My managerial and leadership roles in OHS have exposed me to a range of management techniques that are relevant to Business Improvement. In particular I am a strong supporter of continuous improvement and quality management approaches to business. I believe leadership is the often forgotten key to excellence in most aspects of life. I hold the Australian Defence Medal and am a J.P.(Qualified). I have many fond memories of my time playing Rugby Union when I was a young bloke.