Safety Culture - East and West

SAFETY CULTURE - EAST AND WEST

Part 1 - Appreciating the West

My job is Health, Safety and Environment management in an international company in Russia. A few months ago it also could have been explained as bringing “western” safety leadership into the “eastern” culture.?

After 14 years of doing that, I can say that there are good things in both cultures. Also, like everything in life, every company and situation will have a mix of both.?

Russia is mostly an eastern culture when it comes to work ethics, and many reasonable safety things may seem wrong and disrespectful here.?

Like INTERVENTION. We try and try to promote that “you can speak up if your boss is doing something unsafe”... but initially it did not happen at all. Then it changed, at least in close communities with awesome leaders both from Russia and Western countries. Such as our offshore platforms and onshore plants.?

However, with every new Russian contractor, the story repeats. As we deliver the training, people will agree, but in reality? Intervention to management, especially top-management, will be very rare. “The leader is always right”. Or, “Intervening with a leader is disrespectful and not safe for a common worker”.? Obviously, this can end poorly for a leader, as the physics and unsafe conditions cannot read your badge.?

LEADERS are also above common people here. In a western culture, showing up without PPE at a working plant or a construction site will seem wrong, both from a safety and reputation point of view. It will be like “I do not respect your rules”.?

In here? I see many photos in the press, when a governor or a CEO visits worksites, being the only one without PPE. It is also publicly accepted that their vehicles can exceed the speed limit, and that they don’t need masks and Covid tests before entering the site. Most people won’t feel that it is disrespectful or wrong. It is just showing one’s leadership status to everyone. If you don’t behave like a boss, who will listen to you??

Another difference is INCIDENT REPORTING. Harmony and patronage are important values. For example, if a person is hurt, and they realize that it may get their boss in trouble, they are likely to report that it happened at home, making the incident investigation and improvement impossible. Again, this can be changed, as we see in my company and many others, but it does not change in one day.?

Part 2 - Appreciating the East

Western culture can be great for personal safety, but most of the world is “eastern”. Can we make sure that people work safely in organizations that prefer hierarchy to equality and harmony to honesty??

I believe there are several great features of a typical eastern company which can be used to promote health and safety at the workplace.?

RESPECT FOR LEADERS is one of the key things in eastern cultures. So when managers articulate the importance of safety and really “walk the talk”, most of the employees will follow and do the same. I have witnessed many safety leaders who started by following others, and then continued to rigorously improve safety after they had become managers.

DETAILED PROCEDURES are very important in an Eastern culture. I had a chance to compare Russian, UK and Canadian OHS regulations: the difference in the level of detail can be huge. Russian Work at Height Safety Rules are about 30 pages long, while the Fall Protection section of Alberta OHS Act almost fits on 13 pages. Long procedures are not always good when you need everyone to read them, but the attention to detail in “eastern” safety is excellent, and you almost always can find the guidance you need.?

IMPORTANCE OF BELONGING to a team also can help an OHS Professional to establish and sustain safety culture in an "eastern" company. I see many companies and teams who are proud of their safety performance, and personnel can be very motivated to sustain it, and to work more for their team benefit. Competition between teams also works, but you will need to watch for hidden incidents and near misses to ensure fair play.

REPUTATION - maintaining a good image is important for individuals and teams, and if safety is part of one's reputation, people will be motivated to invest in it. Visible safety KPIs work very well, especially if you use leading KPIs, such as number of inspections, training and safety meetings, instead of only counting incidents.?

Every cultural feature can have its upside and downside. Respect for leaders can turn into a cult of personality; detailed procedures can lead to bureaucracy; desire for a good reputation can motivate people to hide facts.?

But this does not have to happen. All those traits can be used for people's benefit and for safety culture improvement.?

Part 3 - Working together

I have been working in an international company in the Far East of Russia for my entire career. I started there in my early twenties, knowing nothing about safety, and became an HSE manager before I was thirty. All these years my key concern has been cultural difference. How do we merge, integrate and “marry” East and West, to ensure safe operations and company success??

So, here is what I have learnt.?

LEADERSHIP is very important. You need to work from top to bottom and make sure that managers and supervisors at all levels see the benefits of safe operations. “Western” desire for personal achievement + “Eastern” respect for leaders will then work together and you can grow many great safety leaders in your company.?

WATCH FOR: new people who come into leadership positions from other companies. A friend of mine once told me about a new director in his company, who failed to fasten his seatbelt when just arrived to work, and shouted at the driver for asking about it. Things like that can destroy an emerging safety culture very fast.

INTERVENTION CULTURE will be one of the most difficult things to create, but it will be a pillar of your safe operations if you succeed. “Eastern” people will be reluctant to write STOP-cards initially, because it will feel like slander or telling on someone, which is a very bad thing here. To overcome this, make sure that people about whom the cards are written are not persecuted and remain anonymous. Even one case can destroy trust! However, if the “Western” program promoting personal responsibility and intervention is successful, it will be greatly supported by “Eastern” desire to care about the community and talent for statistics collection and analysis.?

WATCH FOR: people feeling offended by a safety intervention. Teach how to intervene without hurting one’s feelings, and how to accept interventions.?

PAPERWORK shall be another focus for an Eastern + Western company. For example, Russian legislation still requires written logbooks and wet signatures for many safety records, including basic induction and training. It will be annoying for a “Westerner” due to inefficiency, and comforting for an “Esterner” as a traditional way to keep things in order. Working together, this can create: efficient ways of collecting signatures; smart systems to ensure easy location of records; good and interesting safety information on mandatory yearly training. If you shall meet each employee every year to get their signature in a safety logbook, use the time to inspire them about safety as well!

WATCH FOR: too many records tracking systems based on people's knowledge. Apply LEAN principles all the time, otherwise you may drown in paper.?

SAFETY MEETINGS can be really fun due to “Western” talent for presentation and debate and “Eastern” hospitality culture. You can make them a pleasant experience, offer food and tea, promote open discussions and let the participants choose the topics. As Covid-19 restrictions are over in many places, people will like to get together and improve their safety awareness in the process.

WATCH FOR: only management talking. If you see that employees are shy to speak up in front of the crowd, make time for discussions in smaller groups.?

AUDITS AND INSPECTIONS can become an inspiring and useful tool if you combine “Western” open attitude with “Eastern” love for routine and attention to detail. Create a schedule of various safety inspections to make them a company tradition, coach your staff to be open and fair, and you will get a very useful tool to spot hazards before they harm you.?

WATCH FOR: punishing people for poor inspection results. Focus on fixing the identified issues instead, otherwise you will get a pile of inspection papers with zero findings, as your staff will cover for each other to avoid trouble.?

SAFETY TRAINING can be another pillar of improving safety culture. For example, in the post-USSR world there are many legally mandatory safety training sessions. Some can be quite silly, like basic electrical safety that everyone shall pass each year. But here is where the “Western” approach to information sharing, social media and ideas promotion can help to make safety interesting.

WATCH FOR: sharing the information people will not really use. Meaning: don’t start delivering sessions about STOP-cards if you are not ready to put them in the workshop. Seems logical, but I have seen it too many times not to mention!?

I will stop here for now. This article was inspired by my breaking heart. I am not allowed to say why it is breaking, so I will just say THANK YOU to people who were my coaches, mentors, colleagues and friends all those years.?

The list of names would be too long, but if you are reading this and you once have spent some time making Sakhalin Energy a safer place together with me - thank you. This was a great experience, and I am definitely planning to use it further.