How do you design a safety reporting system that encourages employee participation?

As a new Regional Safety Manager at Owens & Minor, I encouraged team members to view near misses as an opportunity to improve their environment, not a punitive event. While near misses are a great way to identify trends and build metrics around our SMS, they also allow team members to play an active role in upgrading their work area through work procedures, visual cues, and engineered controls.

As the coauthor of STEPS to Safety Culture Excellence, this system is critical for success. If you want employee participation in these systems, first ask, why aren’t you getting it in this or other areas? Here are the most common demotivators: 1. No clear definition. 2. Don’t have time to report. 3. Don’t know how to report. 4. No one will do anything with the report. 5. Something bad might happen to me for reporting. Rather than jumping to incentives, which can prompt a fiction-writing contest, look for evidence of these most common demotivators to reporting and work to negate their impact.

Usually companies expand their safety observations into several categories, not strictly confined to safety related Near Misses, BBO’s and Hazard ID’s. The observation system can also include process improvements, positive recognition, quality issues, and anything else the organization is seeking to optimize.

You should already have an idea of some of your safety issues based on past injuries, incidents, etc. Stakeholders should be all employees. EEs working in the field, on the floor, in a manufacturing environment will probably be reporting leading indicators/near misses, but you will still need leadership to advocate for the program. I will always focus on quantity first. Once you have the participation/quantity, you can start to focus on the quality and effectiveness of the safety reporting system.

One way is to ensure that there are no repercussions for reporting. When there is an incident reported we thank the individuals for reporting. From at-risk behavioral coaching to injury reporting is looked at as an opportunity to improve not blame.

Think about your target audience. The rush to digitise everything can exclude and even alienate the very people you need to engage with. For example is the target a group of tech savvy kids who have the latest iPhone, or are they most mid to late middle age tradespeople who use a 3310 and get up to turn the TV over still? Also how will you manage the data? And more importantly of it is reporting of unsafe situations, how do you ensure that they are dealt with and trends identified. These observations could very well come back to haunt a business that doesn't spot and deal with trends if an incident occurs.

I think that all methods should made available for use. A mobile app is your best bet. The caveat to this process is there are required fields within all of the methods. You need date of event, what type of event, location, etc. Without required field the process is too random and it cannot be responded to accordingly. For the types of events you have listed above, I would want/require all of these to be reported in a timely manner. Nobody is in trouble for reporting, we want to know so we can fix the issue.

This is perhaps the most important element, so it’s very critical to ensure easy accessibility to your reporting systems. Where financial feasible, seriously consider adopting an enterprise-wide EHS management software.

Choose safety information collection methods that align with your needs, such as paper forms, online platforms, mobile apps, or hotlines. Ensure they are accessible, user-friendly, and secure. Include feedback mechanisms and incentives to encourage reporting. Decide on report types like near misses, accidents, or hazards.

A great way to build policies and procedures is to involve various employees in the process and use their perspectives and expertise.

Establish your policies by defining clear guidelines for reporting, handling, and addressing safety concerns. Outline the procedures for submitting reports, the steps for investigation and resolution, and the roles and responsibilities of involved parties. Ensure policies promote transparency, protect anonymity, and encourage timely reporting. Regularly review and update policies to reflect changes in regulations or organizational needs.

Start by emphasising the importance of reporting hazards or incidents. For instance, a chemical plant worker discovered a leaking valve. If left unreported, it could lead to a major chemical spill. This demonstrates how their report can prevent potential disasters. Explain how to use the reporting system. Take, for example, consider the aforementioned scenario. In training, illustrate the step-by-step process of reporting such an issue, how to document it, whom to contact, the urgency of reporting considering the severity, etc. Consider an employee who hesitates to report issues due to a fear of blame. Share a story of an employee who anonymously reported an issue. This assures your staff that their confidentiality is secure.

Train your staff by providing comprehensive education on safety policies, reporting procedures, and the use of reporting tools. Conduct interactive workshops, simulations, or role-playing exercises to familiarize employees with the process and emphasize its importance. Ensure training addresses how to identify and report different types of safety concerns, reinforces confidentiality and non-punitive measures, and encourages proactive participation. Regularly update training materials and offer refresher courses to keep staff informed and engaged.

Likely the fastest way to lose your workforce is not communicating results. They need to see their inputs acknowledged and improvements made. We run a ‘Catch of the Week’ program to highlight examples of good reporting - this both provides visible feedback as well as an example of what to look for to others.

Monitor and improve your system by regularly reviewing data from reports to identify trends and areas for improvement. Gather feedback from users on the system’s effectiveness and any challenges they encounter. Analyze the response and resolution times to ensure timely handling of reports. Implement changes based on feedback and performance metrics to enhance the system's efficiency and effectiveness. Periodically audit the system to ensure it remains aligned with best practices and regulatory requirements.

Very often safety reporting systems are perceived as a requirement by central organization without added value for local sites. To engage the entire staff it is necessary to: - involving them in the design of the system (both in choosing information to be collected and the way how to collect them) - giving them something in return such as interactive dashboards and analysis that can help them in better appreciate the value of reporting in highlighting strenghts and weeknesses of sites or the entire organization

I agree with all that is said in this section. To note, you can actually make things worse by asking for the participation and do nothing about it, so do not do that. Employee engagement is a big part of any program that is related to culture and safety.

Engagement is not just involvement of the staff. Engagement is when the staff feels ownership in the process. If the staff is involved but their ideas/observations/opinions are not implemented/corrected/validated, they will become disengaged rather than engaged.

In my experience, when an employee reports a safety concern, it’s essential to provide them with timely feedback and inform them about the actions taken based on their report. You can structure your feedback by letting the employee know that the reported concern is being thoroughly assessed and that they will receive further updates as the situation progresses, by this you make them feel valued and involved.

Engage your staff by actively involving them in safety initiatives and fostering a culture of open communication. Encourage them to contribute ideas and feedback on safety practices and the reporting system. Recognize and reward proactive safety behavior and contributions. Hold regular meetings or forums to discuss safety concerns, share updates, and celebrate improvements. Provide opportunities for staff to participate in safety committees or working groups to increase their sense of ownership and involvement in maintaining a safe workplace.

Want to encourage safety reporting? - Offer multiple paths to reporting - Design for (optional) anonymity - Document every piece of feedback - Regularly publish the feedback for all to see - Recognize your safety champions - Evaluate the effectiveness of your program - Strive for continuous improvement in your reporting processes and systems

Trust is supreme. Employees need to trust that reported safety related issues will result in improvements, so following through with corrective or preventative actions are important.

One of the greatest barriers to reporting is often the lack of clarity over definitions for what is a safety event (e.g. incident, accident or near miss) and what isn't (e.g. a safety observation where nothing has happened). Very often, observations or suggestions for safety improvements do not get reported, where safety events are categorised. And, in some cases, it is these observations that could lead to more serious consequences. We have seen a greater increase in reporting by removing the ambiguity of classifying the type of event, and getting people to report based on the potential harm (L, M or H) that could be caused (regardless if any harm has actually resulted). This aligns better with the categories in our risk assessment.

Reporting systems fail when they punish the reporter. For example over reacting to trivial events and launching full root cause investigations with associated delays, costs and inconvenience. Firstly this discourages reporting and leads to incidents not being recorded that could indicate a trend and more serious management failing. Make sure that definitions of events are agreed and set in stone, don't allow a minor incident to be called hipo because someone thinks it is, have a specific definition for example "if this had injured someone would it be reportable?" (Other definitions available) and make sure the follow on is clearly defined and relative to the data.

In my experience, trusting my employees, listening to them & communicating openly with them added significant value to shaping my SHE Culture & the company culture as a whole. Giving them a voice & listening to that voice. When employees feel valued & respected, they tend to give more. Taking this step has granted me significant opportunities to partner with employees & build lasting, trusting rapport. Beyond making them feel valued, openly communicating with them also helped me enhance the company’s culture. When employees see things as a partnership with mutual benefit, they buy-in & go the extra mile to get the job done.