Craig Docherty, CEO of Fusion Safety Management, discussing Accelerated Culture Transformation (ACTS) with organisational leaders, focusing on safety culture and leadership innovation

Press Release – Accelerated Culture Transformation (Safety)

“I remember the first fatality I ever investigated. It was a fatality that occurred in the UK when I was working in the US. It happened when an 18-year-old boy reached for a tagline under a load at the wrong time. The load released killing the young man. His name was Sam.” 

“When you do an accident investigation like this, you unpack the sequence of events leading up to the time of the fatality. What occurred, when, how and why. There are a variety of ways to unpack an incident, but in all cases, something occurs when you start to look closely.  You tend to start to see patterns or signals that lead to the event, some are obvious, some are not.” 

“I now know these not so obvious factors as weak signals.”  

Our Passion  

At Fusion our passion is improving how groups of people work. Specifically, we look at hierarchical and team-based safety related behaviour and what drives that behaviour.  

We have done a considerable amount of research on this, and what we do know is that a High Reliability Organisation or HRO culture is the leading model. In fact, the behaviours seen in HRO’s are those that Hudsen refers to when he talks to generative culture. 

More recent research in this field has identified High Reliability teams, or HRTs, as the key component in the development of this type of workforce culture.  HRT’s have learnt to work in a state of Healthy Unease, they have a Preoccupation with Failure – one of the 5 characteristics of High Reliability Teams (HRT’s) 

These teams use their Collective intelligence through a process of Sensing Weak signals, then Amplifying, Interpreting and Responding to what the weak signals are indicating. This new knowledge is exciting, but developing teams to function as HRT’s requires a shift in thinking.   

This is not about managing better.  

A Paradigm Shift  

Currently, Safety Systems are developed with procedures that provide a voice from the workforce. These management systems are put in place with the good intent of flushing out hazards before they turn into an event. Often people are encouraged to report hazards and near misses through layered management systems, however, prevailing leadership styles often send a different message. A message, that is conflicting, a message, that damages workforce confidence to speak up. This lack of workforce confidence limits the amount of data being received and acted on. Essential data that could prevent a workplace fatality from happening.  

The management of OSH needs to be balanced with the leadership of OSH.  

Accelerating a Culture Transformation through Safety, requires a paradigm shift of how organisations think and act at three key levels. 

At a Corporate Level – moving from an extrinsic focussed paradigm (compliance, avoid penalty, gain work) towards an intrinsic motivation, based on based on personal value and reflected in the organisational values. 

At an Individual level – from a command-and-control leadership paradigm towards a belief and expectation that everyone can contribute to collective leadership.  

At a Team level – shifting from a ‘not responsible perspective’ to one where Teams are harnessing collective leadership by Sensing weak signals, having the Courage to Amplify, Learn from, and Eliminate weak signals and hazards.  

These 3 critical paradigm shifts have been the motivation for the creation for of the Centre of Accelerated Culture Transformation or ACTS. 

Without the paradigm shift mentioned above, Organisational culture development efforts can often be embraced by Organisational leaders but lose momentum the closer you get to the front line. This is often frustrating to both Senior Leaders and to the Workforce.  

ACT(S) – An enabler of Collective Safety Intelligence 

The aim of the Centre for ACT (s) is to help organisations create teams that fully utilize their collective intelligence. These teams are known as High Reliability Teams.  

In these teams there is a willingness to transmit not only hazard awareness but weak signal information freely, allowing that team to act and avoid or counter situations that put the team at risk. The people within the team are engaged, there is a feeling of worthiness and fulfillment. 

There are many benefits from implementing an Accelerated Culture Transformation through safety, however, 2 stand out above all.  

  1. Accelerating the move from command & control style of hierarchical leadership to leadership that empowers the entire workforce.  Developing a Culture of Collective trust. 
  2. Accelerating the entire Workforce capability and confidence and to identify and amplify both hazards and weak signals. Unlocking Leadership Potential at all levels.   

Creating a collective trust culture encourages leadership at all levels.  

This is a game changer, not just for OSH performance, it becomes a strategic enabler.  It is the key to unlocking your full business performance; the actions taken to accelerate OSH Culture supercharge other aspects of business performance.  

Expect More  

If we leverage both workforce collective intelligence, in an age of technological advancements with generative AI on the doorstep, Zero Harm can be a reality.  We have never been in a better place to realise this.   

To achieve Zero harm, the emphasis on an organisation’s accelerating Safety Leadership must be at least equal to ensuring appropriate Safety Management Systems are in place.  

If I reflect to the fatality that occurred with Sam, I now cringe at the number of weak signal’s that must have been present, leading up to the incident.  

We need to expect more.  

 

Respectfully 

Craig Docherty  

CEO – Fusion Safety Management  

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