Safety Incentive Programs

[LJel]

Hi:

I'm currently looking into changing our company's H&S incentive program. It's kind of negative right now and the employees aren't buying into it. I want to do something more along the lines of positive reinforcement for safety behaviour.

Does anyone have any ideas, or using something that's working?

Thanks,
Lissa

[CLaRose]

Lissa,
Changing a negative safety culture to positive is a challenge, but it can be done. Everyone wants recognition for doing a good job, and part of a good job is following the expectations of your company's safety program.

Supervisor buy in is key. A culture shift always comes from the top down. It would be a good idea to consult the supervisor(s) on what they think is important as a reward to their workers as well as why the current program is failing.

Once you have gathered this information, turn it on to the workers. The best way to get buy in is through involvement. Ask what kind of rewards they would value (leave early on a Friday with pay, restaurant certificates....). Use what they suggest, and let them know what you can't do if the suggestions are unreasonable. If they see that their voices are being heard, they will be more susptable to participate.

There will be the one that fight the system, but their peers that are getting incentives will be the advocates for the change.

I think that your primary focus should be on the WHY before the HOW.
You will make this work. Change is difficult but inevitable.

CLaRose

[Rebecca]

We just started this safety incentive program called "We Celebrate Safety". We (our safety team members) randomly go out into the work environment unexpected to find an employee performing a safe act. We look for something unique rather than just the usual required safety practices. Example, one employee was caught helping another employee move an empty pallet. Both employees were awarded. We award them on the spot with a sticker that says "Celebrate Safety" and a small token like a candy bar or pack of gum. And, their name gets put into a monthly drawing for a gift card to a local restaurant. Employees that are "caught" are listed or pictured on a bulletin board to recognize their safe behavior. We are hoping that everyone will catch on to the idea.

[Gary Webster]

Hi Lissa,

Try looking at http://www.billsims.com/ for your program needs.

Thank you,
Gary Webster

[Russel]

Safety Incentive Programs can be very tricky. You don't want employees to not report accidents so that they can be awarded. Also Incentive Programs can cause poor relations amongst the employees. If your award program is based on awards after so much time without a accident, employees can get angry with someone for taking their award away.
I like the idea of spot checks and awarding people when you see them doing something great for safety. Having contest, having them make safety suggestions.

In a past company we had a safety incentive plan that if we went so many hours without a lost time accident the entire company would receive a jacket. When a lost time accident was incurred, employees were angry at this employee. Even though this information is confidential, employees in many cases see the accident happen.

You do not want to implement something that will cause the employees to stop reporting because than you wil see your safety record go up and have many accident/incidents take place. Why???? The main reason for reporting an accident is to prevent it from happening again.

[Safety4me]

We have a safety incentive program and it goes like this. Injury free for 5 years you get recognition plus an award. It goes in five year cyles, for example 5, 10, 15 so on. If you have a injury you start again from the year you was injured.
We have an annual meeting once a year with the whole district attending and this is when the awards are presented. Our department makes a big deal of these presentations and rightly so. This seems to work really well but personally I would like to see more rewards or recognition without having to wait 5 years.

On edit...Happy New Year everyone!!

[djohnson]

Hey Safety4Me, do you find that employees will not report injuries due to the fact that a 5 year cylce is a long time?

I have found that when you reward people for not getting injured then the injuries are never reported. The Safety program will look very good on paper but it actually is no better then before.

I also like the idea of rewarding people for performing safe acts. This rewards people for "doing" a safe act as opposed to "hiding" a bad one.

[Sal _Turco]

I have worked for organizations that have worked with and without incentive programs. I did find that there was more incentive not to report incidents and near misses when only using an incentive program.


What people do want is recognition. Unfortunately companies have safety committees who perform inspections pointing out ‘what’s wrong" as opposed to what is right.


People need validation and encouragement & it is true supervisory staff are key, however, buy in, true buy in from senior management is pivotal, not just lip service. Actions peak louder than words


Safety culture development is a tough one. Some companies pursue behaviour based safety models and others use metrics and incentive programs. People and work environments are so varied, so you would probably have to choose elements from each.


I know one company that issues safety sheets with their paystubs. These sheets typically contain good information about the company, it’s performance and tips. The safety manager then walks around the facility the week after and asks questions of their staff, if they are able to answer his questions, he pulls out a twoonie and hands it to them. For this organization, that is just one toll they can use to help motivate their employees.

Another organization enlists the participation of their president for work place inspections. That is, once a year, the president goes out for an inspection. This event sends a very powerful message throughout the organization. Again, this is one more thing that someone can do to assist in developing a safety culture.

Folow through and communciation back to the entire organization is so important. People want to be kept informed and know that any suggestions they may have are listened to and provided feedback.


Happy New Year

[Safety4me]

Hey Safety4Me, do you find that employees will not report injuries due to the fact that a 5 year cylce is a long time?

I have found that when you reward people for not getting injured then the injuries are never reported. The Safety program will look very good on paper but it actually is no better then before.

I also like the idea of rewarding people for performing safe acts. This rewards people for "doing" a safe act as opposed to "hiding" a bad one.

Honestly, we don't have a problem with employees not reporting injuries. Forms have to be filled out for compensation etc. so it would be quite hard to hide being injured.
We even have employees/Supervisors reporting near misses. I should mention as well that we also have safe Crew/Supervisor awards that go in two year cyles. This award goes to the crews that have no injuries in this period.

[djohnson]

Safety4Me, it sounds like your program works very well for your company. Especially if you have people reporting near misses.

[Safety4me]

Yes, it seems to be working well but with any safety incentive program there is room for improvement.



What people do want is recognition. Unfortunately companies have safety committees who perform inspections pointing out ‘what’s wrong" as opposed to what is right


I agree with you on this. Within our Safety Committee are "Sub Committees" and one of the Subs responsibilities is work place inspections. They do find things that are wrong, but they also report what is right. For example when they do an inspection at a maintenance depot and find that every thing is very neat, organized, clean, basically good house keeping then this is recorded. Of course the things that are wrong are recorded as well.
I'm not saying that we are perfect by no means as there is still a lot to learn. We are working hard at it though :)

[Mari-Len]

Hi,

I'm the editor of Canadian Occupational Safety (COS) magazine and I'm currently working on a feature around safety incentives. I'm looking to speak with workplace safety practitioners about some of their experiences on what works and what doesn't when it comes to safety incentives.

Also, in these tough economic times safety managers are struggling with budgets and how to keep some of the safety programs (including safety incentives) while doing some cost-cutting. So, any ideas on how to be creative with incentives would be great!

I'd like to hear from you, if you're willing to share your experiences.

Cheers,
Mari-Len De Guzman
Editor, COS
mdeguzman@clbmedia.ca

[seanchalmers]

Hello

I have a different point of view with regards to safety incentive programs
As we know incentive programs cause different issues to arrise, from workers hiding injuries to recieve a gift to workers scared to talk about injuries in fear that other co-workers provide pressure.

My first thought is that the gift of safety is that they go home with their health and all their fingers and toes.

Safety is a culture rather then simply numbers, so to have workers looking out for their peers and visitors to the site is a area that needs to be recognized rather then individual awards.
If you can sell to the employee's that they can be proud of their site for being a safe place to work and that the company truly cares for workers safety, the program would be that much better for it.

[RFlynt]

Hi,

I have the same point of view Sean. I wonder sometimes when you "reward" those that act safely, if you're not reinforcing the idea that safe behavior is something above and beyond what is normally expected. It would never cross my mind to rob a bank, but if you offered me an "incentive" not to....I might think about it!

I also agree with some others that have raised the idea that these rewards will only supress the reporting of accidents, not the accidents themselves. In the U.S. where most healthcare insurance is private, I'm afraid you would just be pushing the coverage from the state-run workers compensation program to the individuals health insurance, so they could get their prize.

[seanchalmers]

If people aren't reporting in order to get a prize or dinner you could be rewarding people in your mind for being safe, when in fact the incidents that aren't being reported then the hazards are still out there leaving it for unexpecting workers that could possibly be a worse outcome.

It can take a fair amount of time to instill the safety culture amongst the workers and rates might go up for a little bit. It is worth it in the end if the program is honest and really works, with incidents being reported as near misses or even just hazards that were identified.

[EGordon]

Hi All,

It is better to focus on a Proactive Safety Culture vs a Safety Incentive Program.

Most Incentive Programs result in people not disclosing all incidents in the workplace and in some cases actually hiding them!

Better to chose Safety Talks for each month for each department that is specific to the workplace. (CSAO has great samples of this on their site).

Better programs are Safe Driver of the Year, celebrating successes as a whole (accident free stats), lots of training that is at the request of the staff and to keep them refreshed on the subject matter (e.g. three point contact, slips/trips/falls, etc).

[seanchalmers]

Hello

As I have previously posted I agree 100% that the culture needs to be developed on your individual work sites, it is important for all areas from managment to workers that everybody is on the same page and working towards the same goal, which is to prevent any and all incidents from happening

I really do believe that all incidents can be prevented through safety tours, hazard assessments and audit reviews. If the culture is developed to the point that hazards are identified and fixed before hand then workers and managment can be proud of where they go to work everyday.

[Safety4me]

Hi All,

It is better to focus on a Proactive Safety Culture vs a Safety Incentive Program.

Better programs are Safe Driver of the Year, celebrating successes as a whole (accident free stats), lots of training that is at the request of the staff and to keep them refreshed on the subject matter (e.g. three point contact, slips/trips/falls, etc).

I agree that we have to focus on a proactive safety culture. Isn't that what we all are trying to do? I also believe in safety incentive programs. Lets go to the "safe driver of the year award" for example. The driver works very hard to drive defensively and safely for a year, and receives recognition for this. How is this different for the labourer that works safely for a whole year? Shouldn't he/she deserve recognition?
Maybe I live a sheltered life here, but our people are very proud to be honoured by receiving an award recognizing them for working safely.
We have "safety talks" and safety training is a part of any course that we provide. I don't know of anyone in our department that has hid the fact that they was injured on the job.

[Brian Nodwell]

A number of our customers have asked that we add a "safety points" module to our safety management system, which we hope have in place by summer 2009.

That being said, we're not particularly interested in keeping an inventory of dvd players, golf clubs and jackets (and we'd rather avoid the shipping costs that are associated with these items).


Instead we are currently proposing to regularly award employees that are 100% compliant in the safety management system with gift cards from major retail outlets (Tim Hortons, Mark's Work Wearhouse, etc.). I have a couple of questions for bulletin readers:
How do you feel about rewarding workers for their compliance within the safety management system (such as acknowledging all policies, reviewing all procedures, completing all training etc.)? This obviously rewards leading indicators (compliance) vs. trailing indicators (no reported incidents). This system would also remove the incentive to hide accidents.
What cash-equivalent value do you feel workers would consider a reward for remaining compliant ($5 a month, $10 a month)? Obviously the higher the rewards, the more it would cost the company.
Any insight or comments about a safety points module would be greatly appreciated. It is always great to get feedback from customers before we develop a new module.

[SafetyNS]

Brian

All employees should be compliant with policies, procedures and training and if not, this would be addressed in performance reviews or addressed with their supervisor or manager.

"Acknowledging all policies, reviewing all procedures, completing all training etc" is part of their job duties and should not be rewarded.

If you are developing a commercial module to track employee compliance to assist in managing the safety system, rewards are not needed.

[Brian Nodwell]

SafetyNS,

We build our software according to established safety management standards. The following quote is taken directly from one of the 3 safety management system standards we subscribe to:

"The purpose of safety awards is to recognize and promote safe work practices and reinforce positive attitudes toward safety. Workers benefit from the pride they feel in receiving awards. Your company benefits from the loyalty, productivity, and safe work performance this pride can foster."

What safety rewards does your company offer? What do you suggest we recognize?

[SafetyNS]

I personally do not use safety rewards or incentives.

For example, all our 75 workers should receive a $5 gift card every month for being compliant in completing procedures; policies, training or toolbox meetings etc.

The $4500 annual cost seems high to reward compliance of worker and supervisor responsibilities.

Would the workers be happy to receive a gift card? Absolutely!

I don’t see having a reward for participating in the programs of a safety management system.

Just my view on rewards and incentives

[Celestemmcknight]

GapWould you have the most recently reported figures?It would be nice to see how many are actually being reported and what types of other injuries are occurring.From my own experience, not all accidents / nera misses / injuries are reported. Should be, but unfortunately are not.

[1.john.1]

It can take a fair amount of time to instill the safety culture amongst the workers and rates might go up for a little bit. It is worth it in the end if the program is honest and really works

[Brian Nodwell]

Hi all,

Just a follow up post on my earlier comments on incentive programs. We have had a hard time convincing any of our clients to pay even an extra $5 a month for Tim Horton's cards for satisfying an employee's required safety program elements. I guess it's a reflection of the tough ecomonic times.

Anyhow, in it's place we've offered users access to an animated a Joke of the Week if the employee has satisfied a minimum number of safety program elements (training, certificates, policies, work procedures, bulletins, etc.). Our comedian Malcolm is computer-generated, but his dead-pan British accent is absolutely perfect at delivering them. The approval rating on the jokes is very high (users have the opportunity to throw money at Malcolm if they like the joke, or a tomato if they don't).

It has been up and running for two months now and it is working very well. Between 30% and 50% of users view the joke every week, depending of course, on the quality of the joke. Although the jokes only take about a minute of a person's time, not everyone finds the time to listen to the jokes. That being said, it does help incent half of the workers to stay compliant with their training, bulletins, policies, etc. It also gets employees asking each other if they've heard the joke, which reminds people to log into the system and check their compliance (in case they overlooked their reminder emails).

Rewarding employees with a good joke once a week is certainly better than no incentive. And it's included in the monthly Safety Management System fee, so there's no additional cost.

As always, I'd appreciate any comments or suggestions.