People, Guns and Sandpits
Sean 'The EQ Commando' Foley
Emotional Intelligence & Resilience Trainer/Coach/Mentor.
I share this simple story when working with frontline construction teams to highlight the personal responsibility aspect of owning and positively contributing to behavioural safety culture and following on site safety protocols.
In the military we had a clear understanding and a shared ownership of the critical safety culture in high stress environments.
Whenever we go out on patrol we were required to load up our weapons systems and make them ready for action.
That meant a lot of times you had bullets in the breach with everyone being only a safety catch and a trigger finger pull away from firing.
On return to our confined living bases we would go through the unload and in the perfect world an experienced or senior ranked individual would oversee and check each person ‘clear’.
Most of the time we would go through the process ourselves and our buddy would check us ‘clear’.
Our leadership knew we were well trained and committed to the project so they trusted us to do our best, step up and follow the system.
However, every time we went through the unload process our weapons were pointed into a sand bank designed to catch any stray bullet from the unlikely event of an ND or Negligent Discharge.
Why did we ‘clear’ each other but still keep weapons pointed into the sand?
Because safety isn’t a choice it’s a commitment by each individual to go through the processes to the best of their ability.
However humans - by design - are fallible and when fatigued, stressed or dis-engaged will make mistakes.
We had a deep professional and personal commitment to each other’s safety so we wanted to check each other ‘clear’. We also knew that robust processes and systems help to support our commitment and the sand pit was our last safety net.
Everyone knew that no matter what happened as long as they pointed their weapon into the sand no one would die.
Layers of support (safety-awareness development, safety training, individual, buddy pairs and team responsibility, Key influencers over seeing and in support and of course sand pits) made it easy for people to step up and be responsible for everyone’s safety.
It was our choice to support our leaders in a culture where we took responsibility to do our best to keep everyone safe by design not by accident.
What do you think? Is safety a choice? Does the analogy work for you?
I'd love to have your input.
Like, comment and share as you see fit.
Best,
Sean.
Managing Director / Owner - Hydromar Ltd - Waterjet Cutting | Waterjet | Profiling | Engineering | CNC machining | Project management
6 年Just seen this one Sean, As you know ex - military also but had never looked at this in this way. As you say despite all the training, system etc. S**t happens - we are humans not robots......but if you can have systems in place that cater for that ( the sand) then you keep everyone safe. Too often I have seen organisation work on the basis of, we have a system and you need to stick to it..that's it's. In my book that's not realistic ....the key for me is finding the balance between a level of unreality and the completely paranoid! Great post as usual.