R & D Engineer

If Dilbert is any indication, apparently it's "Lynch the Management".

Publish everyones salary.

I have heard something similar to this idea expressed before. Did you mean that all staff and executives should have their salary published and a comment that their responsibility for other peoples safety should be proportionate to their salary?

I would vote for that.

Under our current OH&S legislation supervisors who are aware that a problem exists and fail to act on it before an injury occurs are liable to the point where it could be a jail/gaol sentence.

How is that for a novel idea, exploitation and responsibility rolled into one position description.

BAB

Define Protect the employee's?

Try this recent thread http://cr4.globalspec.com/thread/24423?frmtrk=cr4sd#newcomments

Hi astur,

If you are charged with the task of making your facility/operation virtually accident free.....then I feel your pain. It is a daunting task filled with pitfalls and compromise..especially if you have to deal with OSHA or a similar organization (term used lightly).

I agree with Laughing Jaguar that input from machine operators is very useful in implementating safety features. But, if your operation is Very hell bent on production at all costs (which most are these days), and your operators are held at gun point, some of their suggestions may not be the Best solutions to safety and instead based on the "best" way to make the machine produce. I'm sure you realize this already, but they are still a good source for ideas.

Just be careful about going too far above and beyond the safeties that were "built into" the machines, unless they are very old. We created safety features on our automatic screen printing machines that allowed operators to add ink while the machine was running with "no possible way" to get hurt. OSHA showed up and evidently, scared the living S*^t out of the upper management because they made us remove all of the spiffy safety gear we had added because it wasn't "original equipment" and therefore broke some pathetically stupid rule. So operators suffered and production declined.

I don't believe it is possible to achieve the perfect safety environment because unfortunately you can't fix "stupid". But if your company leaders have enough cahonies to stand up to some of the really sad "rules" of the government funded so-called safety groups, then your obvious and superior remedies will get you as close as possible. Don't back down and fight the good fight!

Good luck to you.

Jeff

I think you need to elaborate on your question some more.

If you have an excelllent safety culture already, then what is that you feel you are lacking?

There are three things that can be wrong within a company:

The System is wrong.

The Process is wrong.

The employee needs more training.

When you take your walks around the company look and listen for the things that seem to be areas of concerns to the employees. Then plan your safety meetings around those concerns while they are still fresh.

You can also go outside the company and addresss issues that are present in the home and on the road. They don't have to be issues that only concern the company's operations. For example, an employee getting into a car accident and disabled is still not going to be a part of production every bit as much as if they were hurt on the job.

It has been mentioned before, pump the employees for information. You probably have a Suggestion Box, get the approval and offer a safety incentive award to anyone that can come up with the best safety suggestion and award it quarterly. That will make them start looking for things to improve on as long as the incentive is attractive enough for them to bother. You have to implement their suggestions, otherwise they will think their input is not being taken seriously and the incentives won't be enough for them to bother anymore.

< great ideas as to how to reach this goal>

Put up Posters which blare out:

Look Before you leap

You will never be the same without a finger-a toe-an arm------

Protect YOURSELF- who else will?

there are few things must be done in order to have world class performance.

first of all make advantage of the "good safety culture" established in your company and you can make some initiatives such as

- establish weekly tours involving all the emolyee going inside the plant and check for the good as well as the inadequate conditions. then set a team (which is not safety team) to rectify these problems.

- try some innvoations while making safety propaganda inside the company e.g. you can use some technological approaches e.g. plasma screens to demonstrate 24/7 safety videos.

- make safety forum (internal) and involve all levels of the prganization including the contractors to (step up) your performance and listen to their ideas and comments.

these are just few ideas but generally the keywords that you have to stick with are involvment and motivation of your work force in order to reach a goal of self sustaining safety perfromacne. and again this as per your assumption of having a good safety cuture.

Really we need more information.

Do you mean a "world class" manufacturer? (As separate to world class safety performance or world class environmental performance or world class management.)

In the case of "harm free", it seems that you are talking about factory safety, but could be talking about environmental outcomes of your plant or even "social" outcomes like quality of life for your employees.

Either way, you need to establish for yourself what is "world class" and describe what a "world class" organisatoin would look like, then assess your plant against those expectations.

We are going through similar classification of part of our organisation right now for manufacturing and some other features. We have aligned to a report that ranks features on a scale from "world" class, then "national" class, then "regional" then city, then village.

Village type is typified by small business, home or family based with poor srtuctures. World class is current recognised best (public know) practice. (We are also investigating using a sixth unachievable/nirvanah state.)

Once you have such a scale for each feature of your system, you can then assess your performnce and determine where your gaps lie, then determine strategies to overcome the shortfalls.

Remember that the scales need to be re-assessed each year or so as other businesses are also improving, so merely sitting back on your laurels will mean that you will slip backwards in the rating.

By the way, welcome to the membership of this forum. Great place to visit and share information/questions.

Apply for ISO9001, general QMS. Then apply for ISO14001, environment managing system. Then apply for ISO18000 for work safety.