I grew up in a small town with an economy based on manufacturing and logging. Work accidents were a way of life; unfortunate, but hey, it’s dangerous work so the occasional accident was to be expected, nothing you could have done about it. It was this attitude I carried into the workplace, that everyone should just be careful but workplace accidents were going to happen. Sure there were safety posters, safety floor mats, and seemingly unobtainable accident prevention goals with no clear way to meet them, but that was the extent of my job safety involvement.
Years later my employer, a large American electric utility, became increasingly concerned about the high rate of accidents we were experiencing and took a new approach to safety. The company dedicated itself to achieving zero accidents not with some trendy management philosophy, new tracking software, another committee, draconian workplace rules, or other such nonsense, but instead by simply getting everyone to actively think and talk about safety continuously. Most disruptive to the status quo, every meeting regardless of the setting, topic, or work group, was to start with a safety moment, not a long, rambling dissertation or a toss-away platitude, but a quick discussion to get everyone thinking and talking about safety as part of the daily work routine. The company-wide expectation was that every task could, and would, be completed safely every time; that achieving a goal of zero accidents was in fact realistic and achievable. Management demonstrated support for this effort by incorporating these topics into their meetings and communicating the goals of the effort repeatedly to the workforce. Skipping the safety topic in a meeting was simply not allowed.
The resulting improvement in safety was dramatic, even for cynics like me who had seen safety program after safety program come and go with little lasting results. In two years, the number of OHSA recordables dropped 25% and lost workday injuries by 40%. Safety was discussed in ways it had not been before. Workers, supervisors, managers, and contractors all felt free to raise issues without fear of reprisal or peer pressure to ignore or accept safety issues. The openness resulted in risks being identified, near accidents discussed to prevent reoccurrence rather than hidden, and a wholesale changing of the culture which resulted in further safety improvements.
This blog is dedicated to providing tools to help companies and workers achieve an open, collaborative, no accident mindset that results in everyone going home safely at the end of the day. Key to this change in attitude is what I call them Zero Moments. A Zero Moment is not a pre-job brief; pre-job briefs are critical to workplace safety but play a different, task specific role in the workplace. Zero Moments are one to two minute talks about a specific safety topic, why the safety topic is important, how to identify the danger, and how to proactively address the hazard. The meeting leader, whether a manager, supervisor, foreman, or individual contributor, is expected to deliver the talk, but all present are expected to actively listen and contribute. EVERY meeting lead by the company, regardless of work group, visitors present, or location, should start with a Zero Moment and this expectation must be clearly communicated across the organization.
To get companies on track with Zero Moments, this blog is pleased to present over a year’s worth of weekly Zero Moments. Pick a topic from the list and publicize that topic as the Zero Moment for the week. Repetition builds retention of the lessons learned. Quiz employees in the hallway, let it be known that everyone is expected to know that week’s Zero Moment. Zero Moments are not a magic formula, but a tool to establish a daily, participatory attitude of safety in the workplace.
