shaping safety culture through safety leadership

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Shaping safety culture through safety leadership

OGP

Shaping saety culture

through saety leadershipOGP Report No. 452


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International Association of Oil & Gas Producers

OGP

www.ogp.org.uk

Global experience

The International Association o Oil & Gas Producers has access to awealth o technical knowledge and experience with its members operatingaround the world in many dierent terrains. We collate and distil thisvaluable knowledge or the industry to use as guidelines or good practice

by individual members.Consistent high quality database and guidelines

Our overall aim is to ensure a consistent approach to training,management and best practice throughout the world.

The oil & gas exploration & production industry recognises the need todevelop consistent databases and records in certain elds. The OGPsmembers are encouraged to use the guidelines as a starting point or their

operations or to supplement their own policies and regulations which mayapply locally.

Internationally recognised source o industry inormation

Many o our guidelines have been recognised and used by internationalauthorities and saety and environmental bodies. Requests come romgovernments and non-government organisations around the world as wellas rom non-member companies.

International

Association

of Oil & Gas

P r o d u c e r s


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Version Publication History Date

1.0 First Publication October 20131.1 Minor typos corrected (p.10,16)

Shaping safety culture throughsafety leadership

Report No. 452October 2013


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DisclaimerWhilst every eort has been made to ensure the accuracy o the inormation contained inthis publication, neither the OGP nor any o its members past present or uture warrants itsaccuracy or will, regardless o its or their negligence, assume liability or any oreseeable orunoreseeable use made thereo, which liability is hereby excluded. Consequently, such useis at the recipients own risk on the basis that any use by the recipient constitutes agreementto the terms o this disclaimer. The recipient is obliged to inorm any subsequent recipient osuch terms.

This document may provide guidance supplemental to the requirements o local legislation.Nothing herein, however, is intended to replace, amend, supersede or otherwise departrom such requirements. In the event o any confict or contradiction between the provisions o

this document and local legislation, applicable laws shall prevail.

Copyright noticeThe contents o these pages are The International Association o Oil & Gas Producers.Permission is given to reproduce this report in whole or in part provided (i) that the copyrighto OGP and (ii) the source are acknowledged. All other rights are reserved. Any other userequires the prior written permission o the OGP.

These Terms and Conditions shall be governed by and construed in accordance with thelaws o England and Wales. Disputes arising here rom shall be exclusively subject to thejurisdiction o the courts o England and Wales.


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Overview 02

Section 1 Case for action 03

Section 2 What is Safety Culture? 04

Section 3 Elements of a Safety Culture05

Section 4 What is leadership?11

Section 5 Safety Leadership characteristics12

Section 6 Leadership in operations20

Section 7 The Way forward 23

Section 8 References26

Section 9 Additional resources27

Shaping saety culture through saety leadership

Contents

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The objective o this report is to raise awarenessamong leaders in the oil and gas industry o the waytheir leadership shapes Saety Culture. It explainswhat Saety Cultureand Saety Leadershipmean, andspecically describes the leadership characteristicsthat can infuence Saety Culture.

Every company desires sae operations, but thechallenge is to translate this desire into action. Written

rules, standards and procedures while important andnecessary, are not enough. Companies must develop aculture in which the value o saety is embedded in everylevel o the workorce.

We dene culture as the unwritten standards and normsthat shape mind-sets, attitudes and behaviours.

A culture o saety starts with leadership, because

leadership drives culture and culture drives behaviour.Leaders infuence culture by setting expectations, buildingstructure, teaching others and demonstrating stewardship.

A commitment to saety and operational integrity beginswith management. But management alone cannot drive theentire culture.

For a culture o saety to fourish, it must be embedded

throughout the organisation.(Tillerson, R., 2010)

Overview

A commitment to

saety should not bea priority, but a valuethat shapes decision-

making all the time,at every level.

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1. Case or action

Cultural actors infuence behaviour at all times and in everysetting, whether at home, in society at large or in a workplace. Anorganisations culture is passed on to newcomers and has strong eectson peoples conduct even when they are alone, ree rom the scrutinyo managers or colleagues. This encompassing eature o culture givesimportant leverage to managers seeking to infuence employeesmotivation and behaviour. It is also why a poor Saety Culture is soobvious when things go wrong.

A major incident is generally the result o a number o actorsinteracting in unanticipated ways. Many o these actors will bepsychological or behavioural, and are in turn infuenced by theprevailing Saety Culture. A strong Saety Culture is not in itsel anabsolute guarantee against incidents, but it is a barrier against thecomplacency, omissions and violations which are so commonly listedin incident reports as causal actors. A Management System that isnot backed-up by a positive Saety Culture might not give the desiredoutcomes.

Many oil and gas companies can be proud o their Saety Culture andthe results o their eort to reduce the number o incidents and injuries.But a Saety Culture is oten not uniorm throughout an organisation, andall companies have the potential to improve. Achieving and sustaining apositive Saety Culture is not a discreet event, but a journey.

A managers style o leadership and visible demonstration o theircommitment to saety through actions is important in shaping theorganisations culture. Improving Saety Culture requires determinationand stamina. Long-term ocus, commitment, and a willingness to walkthe talk are more infuential than campaigns and posters.

It is OGPs intention that this report will give oil and gas industrymanagers a better understanding o how to strengthen theirorganisations Saety Culture through their own leadership.

The accident can be said to have fowed romdecient saety culture, not only at the Chernobylplant, but throughout the Soviet design, operating andregulatory organisations or nuclear power that existedat the time. Saety culture requires total dedication,which at nuclear power plants is primarily generatedby the attitudes o managers o organisations involved

in their development and operation (p. 23).

(IAEA, 1992)

NASA saety culture has become reactive,complacent, and dominated by unjustied optimism.Over time, slowly and unintentionally, independentchecks and balances intended to increase saety havebeen eroded in avour o detailed processes thatproduce massive amounts o data and unwarranted

consensus, but little eective communication (p.180).

(Columbia Accident Investigation Board, 2003)

Government oversight must be accompanied by theoil and gas industrys internal reinvention: sweepingreorms that accomplish no less than a undamentaltransormation o its saety culture (p.217)...

Underscoring the sincerity and depth o their

commitment to embracing a new saety culture,company leaders will need to lead the eort toguarantee that risk management improves throughoutthe industry to ensure that the mistakes made at theMacondo well are not repeated (p. 247).

(National Commission on the BP Deepwater HorizonOil Spill and Offshore Drilling, 2011)


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2. What is Saety Culture?

Deal and Kennedy provide a succinct and simple denitiono culture as the way things get done around here (1982).A companys culture can be displayed through clear high-prole documents, that is, those designed to create anexternal image such as a mission statement, HSE policy, orannual report showing improvements in HSE perormance.However, an organisational culture is really demonstratedby what actually goes on inside an organisation to getthe work done. The way things get done around heremeans shared practices and communications, things we canactually see. Underneath lie more abstract characteristicso culture: values, belies, ideologies and assumptions, bothquestioned and unquestioned, conscious and unconscious.These shared internal characteristics o how an organisationgets things done can oten be dicult or those inside it to

name or recognise.A positive Saety Culture is a culture in which saety playsa very important role and is a core value or those whowork or the organisation. This contrasts with organisationsin which saety concerns are treated as marginal or anirritating diversion rom the real business. Building a SaetyCulture is a complex process, which is infuenced by anumber o actors, or example:

leadership commitment to saety; employee involvement and motivation;

employee values, belies, assumptions (aected by thenational or geographical culture o the workorce);

employee perceptions o saety at their workplace(saety climate);

myths and stories;

policies and procedures; supervisor priorities;

responsibilities and accountability;

production and bottom line pressures versus qualityissues; and

actions, or lack o action, to correct unsae behavioursand unsae conditions.

In a strong positive Saety Culture everyone eels responsibleor saety and pursues it on a daily basis; employees gobeyond the call o duty to identiy unsae conditions andbehaviours, and are comortable intervening to correctthem. For instance, in a strong Saety Culture any workerwould eel comortable walking up to the plant manageror CEO and talking about saety concerns. This type obehaviour would not be viewed as over-zealous but wouldbe valued by the organisation and rewarded. Likewise,

co-workers would routinely look out or one another andpoint out unsae behaviours to each other without any earo retribution.

Advantages oten associated with a strong Saety Cultureinclude: ew at-risk behaviours, low incident rates, lowturn-over o personnel, low absenteeism rates, and highproductivity. Such organisations usually excel in all aspectso their business.

Creating a strong and sustainable Saety Culture takestime and eort; it is typically a multi-year process. A serieso continuous process improvement steps can be ollowedto create a culture where leadership and employeecommitment to saety are valued as an integral part o dailyoperations (see or example OGP, 2010).

Saety Culture is, however, ragile. Many years o eort canbe negated by a wrong message.


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3. Elements o a SaetyCulture

This section provides guidance on ve elements thatcontribute to the development o a strong SaetyCulture. These elements, which help to describe whata Saety Culture looks like, are discussed in greaterdetail in the sections that ollow.

A strong Saety Culture is: An inormed culture the organisation collects andanalyses relevant data to stay inormed o its saetyperormance.

A reporting culture people are condent they canreport saety concerns without ear o blame.

A learning culture the organisation learns rom itsmistakes and makes changes to unsae conditions.

A fexible culture the organisation is able torecongure the chain o command i aced by adynamic and demanding task environment.

A just culture people understand the boundarybetween behaviours considered acceptable andunacceptable. Unacceptable behaviours are dealt within a consistent, just and air manner.

(adapted rom Reason, 1998)


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3.1 Elements o a Saety Culture: Staying Informed

Staying inormed helps to prevent complacency in theabsence o incidents. Sae organisations are constantlyaware that something could go wrong. Indeed, saety isrequently dened as the lack o bad events. It is oteninvisible in the sense that sae outcomes do not deviaterom the expected, and so there is nothing to capture theattention. I people see nothing, they presume that nothingis happening, and that nothing will continue to happenshould they continue to act as beore. This is misleading, aseort is required to create consistently sae outcomes.

Thereore, in the absence o requent bad events, andin an eort to promote and sustain awareness and asense ochronic unease, an organisation should createan inormation system that collects, analyses and sharesinormation about the human, technical, organisational and

environmental actors that determine the saety o the systemas a whole. This is not simply a matter o reporting injuriesand near misses.

The issue is more complex:

studies o accidents, both major and minor, routinelyshow that there was inormation available prior to theincident which, had it been reported and analysed,

would have enabled the incident to be averted. Inshort, there are always warning signs, weak signals.The organisations which are most committed to incidentprevention recognise this act and put a great dealo energy into collecting this inormation. Employeesin such cultures are also encouraged to report unsaeconditions, hazards, ineective procedures, processupsets, certain kinds o alarms and so on, in short,anything that could potentially lead to an unwanted

outcome(Hopkins, 2006, p. 4).

It is also important to exercise caution when simpliyingthe collected data or processing and making decisions,simplication means discarding some inormation asunimportant or irrelevant. But this is inherently dangerous,or the discarded inormation may be the very inormationnecessary to avert disaster (Hopkins, 2002, p. 9).

Organisations with a strong saety culture are reluctantto discard inormation and are attentive to weaksignals that something may go wrong.

The leaders in organisations with a strong saetyculture step away rom ocusing on a strategichelicopter view only and want to know more details

about the operations. The workorce is encouraged toobserve and to report weak symptoms o a potentialor a bad event.

Organisations with a strong saety culture employ morepeople whose job is to explore complexity and todouble check on claims o competency and o success.

Cost cutting organisations regard such peopleas redundant and work on the assumption thatredundancy is the enemy o eciency.

Mindul organisations treat redundancy as vital or thecollection and interpretation o inormation, which isnecessary to avert disaster.

Adapted rom Hopkins (2002)


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As it is not practical to investigate all reported events to thesame depth, it may be necessary to prioritise.

The ollowing parameters should be considered:

Risk assess the potential severity or requency othe event.

Improvement identiy high potential or improvement.

Theme are incident types or situations recurring inreported data?

Improving reporting, once appropriate systems are in place,relies on constantly engaging rontline employees to ensuretheir contribution to the learning and improvement process;it also requires the organisation to build and maintain anatmosphere o mutual trust.

To learn the most rom reporting systems and todevelop eective remedial actions two aspects must berecognisedthese are also an indication o the maturity othe saety culture:

Ensuring maximum independence o the investigation,even though this can be elt as a loss o control by linemanagement.

Actively involving line managementin transorming

recommendations into actions, and therebystrengthening their buy in. This will also help themrealise their role in ensuring saety in the uture.

3.2 Elements o a Saety Culture: Reporting

Organisations in high-risk industries are increasinglyembracing the potential to learn through incident reportingand investigation. Reluctance to acknowledge and discussincidents is likely to result in missed opportunities to avertuture disasters, and may be interpreted as a sign thatproduction is valued over saety.

A proactive approach to managing saety recognises thevalue o knowing what is going on inside the organisation.The continuous fow o incident reports, near misses andobservations o unsae conditions can provide indispensableinormation in understanding the boundaries o saeperormance and implementing corrective actions or saetycritical deciencies. But to be eective, a reporting systemmust be easily accessible and easy to use.

Under-reporting can occur when the means o reportingare too cumbersome and time consuming or there is a lacko trust between dierent layers in the organisation. Whilethe building o trust should be pursued, it may be necessaryto break this negative cycle by introducing condentialreporting systems where the identity o the reporter is onlyknown by a trusted body, usually in the HSE department.

Furthermore, the value o reporting must be visible through

improvement actions, dissemination o lessons learnedacross the organisation and direct eedback to the reporter.This requires sucient and competent resources readilyavailable to eectively investigate reported incidents.


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3.3 Elements o a Saety Culture: Learning

A learning culture is a natural extension o a reportingculture, because reports are only eective i an organisationlearns rom them.

An organisation with a strong learning culture collectsinormation rom various sources, distils and applies useullessons, shares knowledge and ollows up on lessons learned

by improving processes. A true learning organisation seeksopposing views or eective learning opportunities; it is opento bad news, and so inormation is not simplied or watereddown beore it is passed to managers. Reports are crediblebecause relationships and reporting systems are based ontrust and honesty. Because the organisation visibly respondsto reports, employees eel encouraged to report, resulting inan eective reporting culture.

Learning organisations are sensitive to lessons rom varioussources. One source o inormation is provided by internalreporting systems and systematic root cause analyses.Another critical source o inormation is to study incidentsexternal to the organisation. This is particularly important orthe prevention o low-requency high-consequence events,which may never have occurred within the organisation buthave occurred within the industry.

True learning organisations employ proessional sta whosejob it is to analyse inormation and take advantage o newinsights, they:

Identiy problems and lessons;

Develop plans with local managers to rectiy theproblems; and

Implement lessons learned across the entire organisation.

In this way the knowledge is shared and becomescommon organisational property, and the lessons areeectively embedded.

Learning organisations also avoid losing critical knowledgewhen key people leave because they make time to analyse,save, disseminate and build essential knowledge into their

improved practices.


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3.4 Elements o a Saety Culture: Flexibility

As Saety Culture relates to individuals andorganisations itis both attitudinal and structural. Flexibility in Saety Cultureallows an organisation to maintain eective levels o co-ordination and situational awareness in the sense that decision-making processes may vary depending on the urgency o thedecision and the expertise o the people involved.

A fexible culture is typied by the ability to change theorganisational structure rom the conventional hierarchicalapproach to a fatter operational structure, without losingquality o decision making or driting rom company corevalues and belies. A fexible culture is responsive, it involvesand adapts, and ocuses on whether people have the rightcapabilities to be involved in the issues at hand rather thantheir level within the organisation.

Not only does a fexible culture improve the ability to perceivesaety issues and recognise risks earlier, it enables theseidentied risks to be matched with appropriate actions. Afexible culture is one where the organisation and the peoplein it are able, encouraged, and recognise the need to adaptquickly and eectively to changing demands. This allowseach individual, regardless o their position, to assume anactive role in error prevention and incident management, asthey know they will be supported by the organisation.

It is crucial that a company recognises the range o skills itsemployees have and how to use those skills when required.Many people value the opportunity to show their skills tothe organisation, which in turn acilitates the organisationsfexible culture.

Organisations seeking to be culturally fexible need topractice their skills, and review actions taken in responseto threats and events, to ensure appropriate and eectivestructural fexibility was used.

A fexible culture is a culture in which an organisation:

is able to recongure themselves in the ace o high

tempo operations or certain kinds o danger; has the ability to rapidly alter its structure, typied by

moving rom the conventional hierarchical mode to afatter mode; and

has the right level o expertise to make assessmentsand decisions.

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3.5 Elements o a Saety Culture:Just

A just culture is a strong enabler or other elements o SaetyCulture. Clear expectations, consistent implementation othese rules, and air and balanced investigative processesand responses to rule breaking and/or errors provides allemployees with a strong message about their rights andresponsibilities.

Human behaviour can range rom gross negligence onone side o the spectrum to voluntary intent to damage onthe other; within this range organisational policy-makingapplies. Outside these boundaries intervention by thejudicial system is called or.

It is important to realise that these boundaries can beunclear. Apart rom specic issues, such as violence oralcohol abuse, the boundaries are constantly moving asacceptance criteria are continuously re-negotiated. Evenor seemingly obvious issues such as substance abuse,the action taken may vary substantially depending on theorganisations view on boundaries between individual andorganisational responsibilities. The organisation may chooseto discipline and punish substance abuse as an individualshortcoming or see this as an organisational responsibilityand choose to rehabilitate and support an employee indicult circumstances.

However, it is important that the boundaries establishedwithin an organisation are created and communicated withall employees, and are consistently applied.

Just Culture Model

Fuzzy boundaries

Normal Human Performance

Management System Controls

Gross Negligence Criminal Intent

Judicial SystemJudicial System

Fig. 1 Just culture model, adapted from Reason (1997).

Sh i f t lt th h f t l d hi

Sh i t lt th h t l d hi


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4. What is leadership?

A Safety Culture starts with leadership; leadership drivesculture, which in turn drives behaviour.

Senior management support of a Safety Culture often startswith providing resources, dedicated safety personnel,safety training and incident investigations. As more timeand commitment are devoted, a company may establish

safety management systems, set safety objectives andintroduce site-level mechanisms (e.g. hazard analysis,behaviour observation and feedback, incentive schemes,action item tracking systems, and safety committees). Furtherprogress toward a strong Safety Culture would be the use ofaccountability systems, which encourage the recognition thatsafety is everyones responsibility and not just the responsibilityof the safety department.

Over time the values and beliefs of the organisation will shiftfocus, from eliminating physical hazards to eliminating worksituations prone to human error by building systems thatproactively improve workplace conditions to the point wheresafety becomes a core value of the organisation and anintegral part of operations.

An additional ingredient is necessary for this to happen:the Safety Leader. Managers at all levels need to act as

Safety Leaders.Some people naturally demonstrate some of the personalitytraits we usually associate with a leader. However, this doesnot mean that everyone else cannot be a Safety Leader. Whatmakes a person recognisable as a leader has more to do withbehaviour, than personality.

Leadership that values both production and people has beenshown to achieve the best results (Blake & Mouton, 1964)in getting people to perform. In addition to this, to build astrong culture of safety leaders need to apply the followingleadership styles:

Transactional versus transormational: To put it simply

transactional leaders are managers; they set objectives,monitor performance, and make corrections as needed.Transformational leaders have a vision, and inspirepeople to go above and beyond their mere self-interestto achieve it (Nanus, 1992). While Safety Leaders needtransactional skills, without any transformational skillsthey cannot generate employee engagement.

Situational and contextual (Hersey & Blanchard, 2001):Good leaders adapt their style to the situation at the

time, and to the context the organisation is operating in(branch of industry, country and so on). This is also truefor a Safety Leader.


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5. Saety LeadershipCharacteristics

According to T.R. Krause (2005), there are sevenkey saety leadership characteristics and associatedbehaviours that can infuence Saety Culture:

Credibility what leaders say is consistent withwhat they do.

Action orientation leaders act to addressunsae conditions.

Vision leaders paint a picture or saetyexcellence within the organisation.

Accountability leaders ensure employees takeaccountability or saety-critical activities.

Communication the way leaders communicate

about saety creates and maintains the SaetyCulture o the organisation.

Collaboration leaders who encourage activeemployee participation in resolving saety issuespromote employee ownership o those issues.

Feedback and recognition recognition that is soon,certain and positiveencourages sae behaviour.

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5.1 Leadership characteristics: Credibility

Credibility can be viewed as a quality a person might attribute toanother ater observing their behaviour. Leaders begin developing trustby acting in ways that provide benets to their employees. A leaderscompetence alone, while necessary to enabling the development otrust, does not result in trustworthiness. Trust is extremely dicult to gainand very ragile; once lost it can be hard to recover.

Leadership characteristics that infuence the perception otrustworthiness include:

consistency

integrity

sharing o control

open communication

ability to admit mistakes

Strong Saety Leaders have a high level o credibility, people believewhat they say and trust them to tell the truth, even i it is unpopular orunlikely to be well received. Their actions are seen and perceived byothers to be consistent with what they say.

Some behaviours related totrustworthiness:

Admitting mistakes to sel and others.

Treating others with respect and dignity.

Representing and supporting the

interests o the group.

Giving honest inormation aboutsaety perormance, even i it is notwell received.

Asking or ideas on how toimprove perormance.

Following through on commitments.

Acting consistently in any setting andapplying saety standards.

Being willing to make saety relateddecisions that are unpopular.

Demonstrating personal concern orwell-being o employees, contractors,neighbours etc.



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5.2 Leadership characteristics:Action Orientation

A leaders role is not only to direct work andmonitor compliance with rules and regulations.A leader encourages suggestions, motivates theirsta and engages with the workorce to solvesaety issues. Leaders must be proactive ratherthan reactive in addressing issues and givetimely meaningul responses to saety concerns,

demonstrating a sense o personal urgency andenergy to achieve results.

Some behaviours related to action-orientation:

Integrating saety into business planning and decisionmaking, and challenging business decisions that maynegatively impact upon risks now or in the uture.

Intervening during day-to-day activities whenever saety

requirements may not be met. Knowing the signicant operational hazards and how they

are being managed.

Leading or actively participating in saety meetings, audits,incident investigations and incident investigation reviews,programs and campaigns.

Acting as a role model or reporting saety issues andnear-misses.

Actively sharing lessons learned, ollowing up on closingactions, and veriying eective implementation.

Creating opportunities to talk to employees and contractorsabout saety rules and their concerns.

Making visible worksite visits to stay inormed about thereality at the worksite level.

Supporting employees and contractors in their obligation tostop work when saety risk is considered unacceptable.



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5.3 Leadership characteristics:Vision

To create a strong Saety Culture in the organisation, managementneed to be able to visualise what excellent saety perormance lookslike and communicate this vision in a compelling way.

The very essence o leadership is having a vision:

The vision is the oundation on which an organisationalstrategy is built.

A vision ocuses on an organisational purpose:What are we here to do?

The vision also refects the values and the belies about how thesepurposes should be achieved.

Words are used to build a shared vision and to get the message acrossto other members o the organisation but actions are most important. Thisincludes demonstrating a willingness to consider and accept new ideas,

encouraging people to consider the impact o their actions on others,and using the saety vision and values to challenge and inspire people.

Some behaviours related to vision:

Recognising the gap between thepresent situation and the vision.

Taking accountability or the visionthrough actions.

Engaging others to relate their dailyactivities to the vision.

Articulating the vision clearly andorceully on every appropriate occasion.



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5.4 Leadership characteristics:Accountability

The strong Saety Leader establishes an eectiveaccountability system covering every position inthe organisation.

The accountable person:

is the one who assigns the work to theresponsible person.

is the one who is ultimately answerableor the completion o the task by theresponsible person.

must measure and evaluate perormanceo the responsible persons assigned dutiesagainst standards.

Accountability links responsibility to consequences:

Accountability = Responsibility + Evaluation

Consequences

Consequence management should be consistentthroughout the organisation, based on actsand careul analysis, rather than personalopinion or eelings.

...most supervisors today know that they areresponsible or saety, and they know whatthey should be doing, yet they do not doit. Why? Because they usually are not heldaccountable. That is, they are not measuredin saety (Dan Petersen, 1995).

Some behaviours related to accountability:

Dening and communicating clear saety roles andresponsibilities as well as goals & objectives or theiremployees against established standards o perormance.

Providing adequate resources and tools to support saety

perormance (physical resources and toolsequipment,materials, workstations, acilities; as well as psychosocialresources workload, schedules, training, relationships,and leadership).

Holding employees accountable or saety results, measuringand evaluating perormance:

Maintaining a strong ocus on perormance management.

Regular reviewing o employees perormance against set

goals and ollow up on actions. Using inormal and ormal observation when measuring

behaviours at the worksite.

Detecting and correcting undesirable behaviours and poorperormance early.

Reinorcing desired perormance:

Providing constructive eedback to employees on theirbehaviours and perormance. To be eective and increase

the requency o desired behaviours, eedback musthappen soon, be certain, signicant and sincere.

Including behaviours and perormance in decisions aboutperormance rewards, recruitment and promotions.

Celebrating and rewarding successul saety perormance.



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5.5 Leadership characteristics: Communication

The way leaders communicate helps tocreate and maintain the Saety Culture o theorganisation, and has a noticeable impact onperormance. In simple terms, leaders infuencethe behaviour o their teams by communicatingtheir expectations or saety and then explaininghow they and their teams will be held

accountable or their behaviour.

Eective communication is a two-way process thatinvolves sending a clear, unambiguous messageand obtaining eedback that that message wasreceived and understood.

Most communication in the workplace isoperational; a dialogue about daily tasks and

whether they have been completed. This typeo communication is vital to enable teams andindividuals to do their jobs saely.

Leaders also need to communicate the biggerpicture, that is, how the team contributes to theoverall goals o the organisation.

In order to be eective the leader needs tounderstand what their team wants rom

saety communication.

Some behaviours related to communication:

Clearly explaining what is expected o each individual andhow that relates to the wider saety vision and objectives o theorganisation. Saety should be communicated as a value, notas a priority to be traded o against cost and schedule.

Giving regular eedback and coaching on individualsperormance. A leaders timely, honest and constructiveeedback enables individuals to improve. The leader can setthe boundaries o what is and what is not acceptable risk.

Recognising individuals and showing appreciation or a jobdone saely, in order to ensure that the positive behaviouris repeated. Leaders should ask to hear about any concernsor challenges that the individual sees as preventing theirsae working, and commit to helping them address thosechallenges. The leader needs to ollow up on that commitmentor they risk losing trust.

Giving eedback to the team on how they are perormingagainst expectations, recognising success, but also addressingareas that are in need o improvement.

Communicating eectively to help the team understand thesaety objectives and the strategy o the organisation, and whyit is important that they play their part and work saely.

Providing opportunities or the team to get involved and gainreal ownership o saety challenges and solutions.

Adapted rom DAprix (1999)



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5.6 Leadership characteristics: Collaboration

Collaboration simply means working together. Leaders who encourageteamwork, and who ask or, and act upon, others input in resolvingsaety issues, create a greater sense o ownership.

A strong Saety Culture is one where people eel naturally motivatedto work saely; they do the right thing even when no-one is looking.By encouraging collaboration leaders can help to create a culture that

encourages real motivation.To work saely people need to:

be capable and competent; they need to know how to do the joband understand the hazards and risks, and the controls in placeto prevent harm.

have clear direction and support, and work in an atmospherewhere they eel trusted to take ownership o the task.

have a sense o community and eel part o a team that looks outor one another.

Collaboration should also operate across departments, or examplecloser co-operation between maintenance and operations ensures ashared understanding o problems and their solutions. Many incidentshave occurred because responsibilities have not been clear on jobhandover, or where it had not been dened who owned a task orwas responsible or implementing controls. Leaders have a role inencouraging cross-departmental collaboration, bringing teams togetherand encouraging discussion.

Some behaviours related tocollaboration:

Asking or, listening to, and showingthat one values others views.

Being open and honest about

perormance. Showing a genuine concern or

others well-being.

Encouraging the team to discuss saetyconcerns amongst themselves.



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5.7 Leadership characteristics: Feedback & recognition

Providing eedback and recognition or individuals and teams is apowerul tool or encouraging sae behaviour (and discouraging unsaebehaviour) and building a stronger Saety Culture. People need regulareedback and coaching on their perormance. Timely, honest andconstructive eedback enables individuals to improve. Giving eedbackis not simply telling people what you think o them, this can end upeeling like personal criticism and is very negative; eedback should be

based on indisputable acts.

Whilst eedback is best given on a one-to-one basis, recognition canalso be public. The individual needs to be able to link the positiveaspects o the recognition to the behaviour they have demonstrated,and this works best when it is close to the event (soon), and theindividual believes that recognition is consistently applied (certain).In this context recognition does not mean nancial reward schemes,it means leaders being prepared to identiy individuals who have

demonstrated sae behaviour (e.g. they stopped the job when theythought it unsae) and to recognise them in ront o their peers. Leadersshould also recognise team behaviour as this encourages collaborationand team ownership o saety issues (positive).

Some behaviours related to eedbackand recognition:

Focusing on the behaviour, simplydescribing what the person is doingand what has been observed, not aults

in the individual. Describing the impact that the behaviour

has, or could have, on others, and thepossible consequence or them, theircolleagues or the wider organisation.

Congratulating people or theirsae behaviour.

Involving people in new andexciting projects.




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6. Leadership inoperations

Many major incident investigations in recent yearshave reerred to managements lack o ocus onand understanding o asset integrity and operatingpractices as a root cause o the catastrophic personal,environmental and economic losses that ensued.

Operations carried out in the oil and gas industrypresent many potential risks to people and to theenvironment, some o which are inherent to theindustry. Thereore, it is essential that managementis committed to excellence in saety, operationalperormance and asset integrity as essential tools inpreventing incidents.

The best way or leaders to deliver that commitment

is through the utilisation o a capable, competentand motivated workorce that consistently executesoperational activities built upon sound engineeringand technical practices designed to enable sae,secure and environmentally responsible outcomes.

With strong leadership, companies can successullymaintain high standards in asset integrity and

operational control.

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6.1 Principles or leadership in operations

The primary goal o leadership should be theimplementation o a system that ensures both plant andequipment are correctly maintained and operated.Equipment should not ail or be operated in such a way asto cause or substantially contribute to a major incident. Theprinciples that support such a system are that leaders should:

understand the risks associated with assets undertheir control.

understand and validate how work is controlled andperormed within those assets.

learn rom incidents, both internal and external to thecompany, and act appropriately.

understand which indicators must be measured toensure they have a ull, clear operational picture

consistent with the liecycle o the asset. have mechanisms in place that allow operations to be

adjusted in response to internal eedback and inormationrom external sources.



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6.2 The role o leadership in assessmentand improvement

Operations integrity assessments should provide a rangeand depth o inormation about asset operability andmaintenance. They should also investigate how work isbeing perormed throughout the organisation, rom seniorleadership through the entire workorce. The process shouldbe careully assessed to determine i any risk, individual orcumulative, is being correctly and eectively managed in a

timely manner.

Measurement should be consistent with unambiguousstandards o perormance or condition. To assure themselvesthat any assessment programme is providing the requisiteoutput, leaders should check that the ollowing principles arebeing clearly demonstrated:

Operations should be assessed at predeterminedrequencies to establish the degree to which operationintegrity expectations are met.

The requency and scope o assessments should refectthe complexity o the operation, level o risk andperormance history.

Assessments should be conducted by multidisciplinaryteams including expertise rom outside the business unit.

Findings rom the assessments should be documented,prioritised and resolved in a clear timerame.

The eectiveness o the assessment process shouldbe evaluated periodically and ndings used tomake improvements.




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7. The way orward...

The extent o inormation available on Saety Cultureand leadership behaviour can be overwhelming. It isimportant or each organisation to identiy in simpleterms, the actions and behaviours that can positivelyshape an organisations Saety Culture. This is not anaction to be passed on to the HSE department, this is

everyones shared responsibility.One way to proceed is to consider the ollowingquestions with a view to taking the next step towardscontinual improvement in your own leadership behaviourand shaping the Saety Culture within your organisation.

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7.1 How strong is your organisations Saety Culture?

Having read the information provided in the SafetyCulture section of this report, consider the following:

For each o the ve elements, which points most struckyou as being key to nurturing a Saety Culture?

What eedback do you get when you raise these issues

with colleagues? What actors, actions or established process

demonstrate your organisations (unit/department)Saety Culture?

How satised are you with your organisations level omaturity and consistent behaviour on those actors youhave identied?

Which actors would be most important to address inan eort to enhance Saety Culture?

Do you need a ormal and objective assessment o theSaety Culture?

This can be done as a survey or interview study. Inmany cases, however, the inormation is alreadyavailable (e.g. in reporting databases, absenteeismand turnover statistics, culture surveys, perormance

reviews, behavioural saety observations, etc.).

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7.2 Know yoursel see yoursel as others see you

Having read the information provided in the Leadershipsection of this report, consider the following:

Which leadership characteristics do you considerto be particularly important in developing a strongSaety Culture?

How satised are you with your ownleadership behaviour?

What opportunities do you have to visibly show yoursaety leadership?

Do you use these opportunities in a consistent manner?

How can you do more?

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8. Reerences

Blake, R., and Mouton, J. 1964. The managerial grid:The key to leadership excellence. Houston: GulProessional Publishing.

DAprix, R. M. 1999. Face-to-ace: Communicating orleadership. International Association o BusinessCommunicators.

Deal, T. & Kennedy, A. 1982. Corporate Cultures: The ritesand rituals o corporate lie. Addison-Wesley.

Hersey, P. & Blanchard, K. 2001. Management oorganisational behaviour. Prentice Hall.

Hopkins, A. 2002. Saety culture, mindulness and saebehaviour: converging ideas?National ResearchCentre or Occupational Health and Saety Regulation:

Canberra. https://digitalcollections.anu.edu.au/bitstream/1885/41764/3/Working%20Paper%207.pd (accessed 18 July 2013)

Hopkins, A. 2006. WP 43 - A corporate dilemma:To be alearning organisation or to minimise liability. NationalResearch Centre or OHS Regulation: Canberra.

IAEA. 1992. The Chernobyl Accident: Updating o INSAG-1:a report by the International Nuclear Saety Advisory

Group (INSAG). Saety Series No. 75-INSAG-7.24.http://www-pub.iaea.org/MTCD/publications/PDF/Pub913e_web.pd (accessed 18 July 2013)

Krause, T. R. 2005. Leading with Saety, John Wiley & Sons,Inc., Hoboken, NJ, USA. doi: 10.1002/047178527X.

Nanus, B. 1992. Visionary leadership: Creating a compellingsense o direction or your organization. Jossey-Bass.

NASA. 2003. Columbia Accident Investigation Board Report.Vol. 1, Chap. 7, 180. http://s3.amazonaws.com/akamai.netstorage/anon.nasa-global/CAIB/CAIB_lowres_ull.pd (accessed 18 July 2013)

National Commission on the BP Deepwater Horizon Oil Spilland Oshore Drilling. 2011. Deep water: The Gul oil

disaster and the uture o oshore drilling. Report to thePresident. Chapter 8, http://www.oilspillcommission.gov/nal-report (accessed 18 July 2013)

OGP. 2010. A guide to selecting appropriate tools toimprove HSE culture. OGP-435. http://www.ogp.org.uk/pubs/435.pd (accessed 18 July 2013)

Petersen, D. 1995. Saety by objectives: what gets measuredand rewarded gets done; 2nd edition. Wiley.

Reason, J. 1997. Managing the risks o organizationalaccidents. Aldershot: Ashgate publishing

Reason, J. 1998. Achieving a sae culture: theory &practice. Work & Stress.12 (3): 293-306.

Tillerson, R. 2010. Transcript available online http://www.exxonmobil.co.uk/Corporate/news_speeches_20101109_rwt.aspx (accessed 18 July 2013).

Weick, K.E. 1991. The non-traditional quality o organizationallearning. Organization Science. 2: 116-124.



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9. Additional resources

OGP report No. 435, A guide to selecting appropriatetools to improve HSE culture(2010) provides urtherinormation about tools that can be used to improveHealth, Saety & Environmental (HSE) perormance.

It identies circumstances where certain tools areunlikely to be eective and may even be counter-

productive within a given organisational culture. Theidentied tools have been analysed relative to theorganisational cultures described in the OGP HSEculture ladder. The HSE tools most applicable or anorganisation at a particular cultural level are identiedand evaluated.

OGP Report 435 is available rom:

http://www.ogp.org.uk/pubs/435.pd

Antonsen, S. 2009. Saety Culture: Theory, Method andImprovement. Ashgate, London.

Hopkins, A. 2005. Saety, Culture and Risk: Theorganizational causes o disaster. CCH Australia.

OGP. 2005. Human Factors: a means o improving HSEperormance. OGP-368 http://www.ogp.org.uk/

pubs/368.pd (accessed 18 July 2013)

Petroleum Saety Authority Norway. HSE and Culture.http://www.ptil.no/getle.php/z%20Konvertert/Products%20and%20services/Publications/Dokumenter/hescultureny.pd (accessed 18 July 2013)

Shein, E. H. 2004. Organizational culture and leadership;third edition. San Francisco: John Wiley & Sons.

Weick, K. & Sutclie, K. 2001. Managing the unexpected:Assuring high perormance in an age o complexity.Jossey-Bass.

Energy Institute, 2008. Guidance on eective workplaceinvolvement in health and saety. http://www.energyinst.org/technical/human-and-organisational-actors/human-and-organisational-actors-workorce-involvement (accessed 13 August 2013)

Health and Saety Executive. Leadership and workerinvolvement toolkit. http://www.hse.gov.uk/construction/lwit/index.htm (accessed 13 August2013)

Health and Saety Executive, 2011. Leadership or the majorhazard industries. INDG277. http://www.hse.gov.uk/

pubns/indg277.pd (accessed 13 August 2013)


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