Celebrating safety as a core value

Submitted by Keith Robinson, Director of Health, Safety & Environment



Keith Robinson

This week (May 1–7, 2011) is North American Occupational Safety and Health Week, an entire week in which governments, employers, and workers throughout North America take time out from their normal activities to promote the importance of preventing injury and illness in the workplace and at home. This observance raises some questions: Why is safety such a big deal? Why spend so much time, money, and effort on something that doesn’t add to the ”bottom line”?

During the 1930s, it was common to “budget” for employee deaths during major construction projects. For the Empire State Building, it was anticipated—and accepted—that one person would be killed for every floor completed. That’s 102 deaths! Fortunately, according to official records, only five workers lost their lives. Today, even planning for five deaths is unacceptable. What’s changed in 80 years?

I think that there are two major differences. First, in today’s society, everyone recognizes the value of human life. Morally, protecting every worker is the right thing to do. As we’ve recently seen in the case of the Upper Big Branch mine explosion, society does not accept “profit over people.” Public outrage will force companies into compliance, or out of business.

Paying careful attention to
health and safety in the field

Second, organizations now recognize that it makes business sense to protect qualified and trained workers. Even short-term losses of workers injured on the job and at home adversely affect the organization’s ability to deliver a quality product or service in a reasonable amount of time. As deadlines and margins both become tighter, preventing worker injuries directly impacts the bottom line.

So, how do companies prevent injuries, protect employees, and do it in a cost-effective manner? I mean, it doesn’t do any good to implement programs and systems that cost more than an organization’s profits. It’s done by making safety a core value of the organization—creating the attitude that injuries are unacceptable. This involves educating employees to recognize the hazards that can result in injuries, and empowering them to implement controls to prevent those injuries. It also involves the creation of “safety accountabilities” throughout the organization—identifying the actions that each level within the company must do to maintain a safe work environment, and holding those levels accountable for completion of those activities. 

Happy NAOSH Week!

This is the journey that Stantec is currently making. The Health, Safety & Environment Department (HSE), under the direction of senior leadership, is creating and implementing the tools and systems that will educate and empower our employees. Additionally, HSE is conducting training for all levels of leadership to provide the skills necessary to manage our jobs safely. This investment of important resources (time and money) is critical to the development of safety as a core value, and will result in a significant return on investment: a happy, healthy, and safe work force who will deliver a quality service on time. We have certainly made safety one of our core values at Stantec and are doing everything we can to be a leader not only in the services we provide, but also in keeping our most valuable resources—our employees—safe.

And isn’t that what it’s really about?