Rewarding culture is good and safety culture rewards should simply be recognition among their peers. However, we need to identify what to be rewarded... Let's take an example:
If Company rewards LTI free days – means bounty for shutting the mouth off. Who does nothing, makes no mistake. This kind of rewarding encourages hiding small injuries and no reporting of near misses. Who does nothing or who hides truth can be rewarded?
Vice versa, when Company rewards hazard & near miss reports and visible contributions to improve workplace safety, true face of current Safety Culture comes out. Honesty, Responsibility and Visible Contributions for safety should be crowned.
Truthfully, I was handing over gifts such as souvenirs, shirt and watches to my employees 5 years ago for LTI achievements – oh, our employees worked 1.000.000 man-hours LTI free, here is your leather jackets… bla bla bla… Yes, LTI record was fantastic but it felt me something wrong when I heard about some injuries at workplace which weren’t notified later.
It was difficult to accept the Truth, but helpful for me, Company and employees and together we have improved rewarding Culture. Reward leading indicators such as identifying potential hazards and risks, not lagging indicator Zero.
Always remember: When your money runs out, safety culture should not stop.
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Ganjiguur Bukhbat
TheSafetyPoster.com
