Newaz, M T; Jefferies, M; Davis, P and Pillay, M (2016) Using the psychological contract to measure safety outcomes on construction sites. In: Chan, P W and Neilson, C J (eds.) Proceedings of 32nd Annual ARCOM Conference, 5-7 September 2016, Manchester, UK.
Abstract
The influence of senior managers on safety management in the work-place has been the subject of interest to many researchers. Most research in this field highlights the role played by senior managers in establishing organizational safety policy and expressing safety as an organizational value. However, senior managers have little contact with workers at the construction worksite who instead take daily direction from lower-level managers. The influence of senior managers is indirect, as their safety actions and expectations shape the priorities and conduct of lower-level managers who, in turn, directly influence the way work is performed on site. As a result, the mechanisms of managerial influence on safety outcomes within organizations are poorly understood. Current researcher argues that there is a need to better understand the mechanisms by which senior managers articulate their safety obligations to lower tiers of management to ensure that supervisors' safety responses remain consistent with organizational safety commitments. This research uses the concept of the 'Psychological Contract', which is based on perceived mutual obligations between the supervisor and on-site safety behaviour. When using this concept to consider safety, it may be termed as 'Psychological Contract of Safety' and the impact of fulfilment or breach of psychological contract on general worker behaviour can be hypothetically compared with the impact of psychological contract of safety on workers safety behaviour.. This paper promotes the view that the safety behaviour of workers is shaped by the psychological contract of safety, which ultimately causes the outcomes of safety systems, e.g. leading and lagging indicators of safety. Accordingly, this paper proposes a model of the psychological contract of safety to measure the safety outcomes mediated by workers safety behaviour. This model has the potential to reveal the relationship between psychological contract of safety and safety behaviour and its effect on safety outcomes.
| Item Type: | Conference Paper (Paper) |
|---|---|
| Uncontrolled Keywords: | construction; psychological contract; safety behaviour; safety outcomes; workers safety. |
| Index terms: | safety behaviour, commitment, construction site, manager, organizational value, safety management, supervisor, psychological contract |
| Subjects: | occupational health and safety management, business, practitioner, psychology, work location |
| Topics: | Roles and Professions, Health and Safety, Organizational Design, Site Management |
| Descriptive scope: | 2 PC |
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