A safety share: the one about giving into invisible pressure.

Ouch. I've spent the last week hobbling around on a sprained ankle, an accident that happened out running the South West Coastal Path lunchtime last Friday. It's a quick run I've done countless times, so why did it happen and what's it got to do with safety?

The situation was, I happily had a meeting canceled round lunchtime and a precious 30 minutes before my next call with my buddy Tom Eastup . So, a real time pressure as I wasn't going to keep him waiting. I've done that run enough times to know that I can be done in 30 mins, albeit in good conditions. Last Friday, with Storm Kathleen, the conditions were NOT good. Fields waterlogged and churned up by cows, even the paved sections were sketchy.

Here's where the invisible pressure came in. I know I can take 5 minutes off that run by cutting across a steep downhill across the fields. No dramas on a dry day, but a bit daft given the conditions. I'd run this route with Dan Squires back in October and we clocked the time on Strava. He doubted I could do it in under 30 minutes. So being competitive (we're old school friends - this nonsense has been going on between us for 40 years...), I chose to cut the corner, in spite of the conditions - because of an invisible pressure that I put on myself.

Predictable outcome then - slippy as anything down cow pat alley and I went over on the ankle (which I've broken at least once mountaineering and climbing). Then 10 minutes lying in cow pats wincing with my leg up, telling passers-by: "It's OK, I'm fine!", before hobbling back to make the call on time with a sympathetic Tom.

Back at work this week, I've had the privilege of working with a group of Frontrunners in a safety-critical transport infrastructure operator, where we've recently designed and now launched a 'Big Conversation' with their front-line staff, through which they're now talking about and improving safety behaviours around this very topic: If safety comes first, then how we deal with the invisible pressures that might cause us to rush, cut corners and potentially be unsafe?

It's a great conversation, that's getting right to the heart of safety behaviours and why people might not, in the pressure of the job, actually act safely, and what we might to to help ourselves do the right thing around safety, even in the face of operational pressures, and the pressures we put on ourselves because of what's going on in our heads.

Wish I'd paused for a split second and thought that through myself last Friday.