Wamuziri, S (2008) Improving safety performance in construction through cultural change. In: Dainty, A (ed.) Proceedings of 24th Annual ARCOM Conference, 1-3 September 2008, Cardiff, UK.
Abstract
This paper provides an evaluation of safety culture in the UK construction industry. Firstly, an overview of recent changes in accident statistics in the industry is given. Analysis of safety data collected by the UK’s Health and Safety Executive (HSE) reveals that safety performance in UK construction appears to have reached a plateau. In fact, the fatal injury rate appears to have gone up in the last two years. Future improvement of safety performance therefore remains a subject of current debate. It is suggested in this paper that future improvements in performance are likely to come not from more legislation or simply changes to management systems. Rules, regulations and managements systems have their role to play in improving safety performance. However, on their own they are inadequate to bring about further major improvements in safety performance which are required in the industry. It is postulated in this paper that a major cultural shift in attitudes is still required in the industry. The concept of safety culture is discussed in this paper including an assessment of its main characteristics. Research on safety culture in aviation, mining, nuclear and offshore sectors is assessed with a view to drawing important lessons for the construction industry. Results of a pilot survey to assess the characteristics of safety climate and culture in a large UK contracting organisation are provided. The results reveal a clear divergence in attitudes and views of managers and employees in this particular organisation. It is concluded that the safety climate or culture of an organisation can be assessed and changed over a period of time. A toolkit to assist in this process has been developed and published by the UK health and Safety Executive. However studies are required to develop this toolkit further to take into account the regulations, risks and management systems that are specific to the construction industry.
| Item Type: | Conference Paper (Paper) |
|---|---|
| Uncontrolled Keywords: | accident statistics; health and safety law; safety climate; safety culture |
| Index terms: | injury, management system, health and safety, safety climate, aviation, safety culture, legislation, manager, health and safety executive, survey, drawing, regulation, mining, safety performance, statistics, contracting organization, cultural change, toolkit, construction industry |
| Subjects: | health safety and environment, software systems, management, political science, industry analysis, health conditions and diseases, geotechnical engineering, sociology, occupational health and safety management, practitioner, mathematical modelling, data collection methods, legal systems, technical documentation |
| Topics: | Engineering Principles, Research Practice, Health and Safety, Governance, Roles and Professions, Design Practice, Legal Issues, Organizational Design |
| Descriptive scope: | 5 PCTEA |
N.B. Descriptive scope is a count of how many of the five facets of empirical research are indicated by the words used in title, abstract and keywords. It is not intended as a judgement on the research; merely a count of the kind of word we would expect to indicate Phenomenon, Concepts, Theoretical framing, Empirical techniques, Analytical techniques. If all five are present, then a code of “5 PCTEA” will indicate this. If you feel the coding for this record is questionable, we welcome discussion around the terms we matched or the way we categorized them. The facet you would expect may not be coded, or a facet may be coded inappropriately. This can also bear on a larger question, of which facets should be treated as defining in construction management research. Please get in touch, and we will look at it. More details here