A interesting counter-view of the benefits of Behavioural Based Safety systems is raised here. It’s an aged article and produced by a controversial labor organization, The Maritime Union of Australia… (c’mon guys, your views have been considered ‘strident’ on occasions in the past…) Nonetheless, we think it’s a valid comment and would welcome your own […]
Safety Management
‘Tailor’ Your Behavioral Based Safety Program
Summary: A successful Behavior-Based Safety program must be tailored to the organization’s language, culture, structure, and regulatory environment without weakening its core elements. For safety leaders, tailoring BBS means adapting how observations, feedback, roles, and communications are delivered so employees see the program as relevant and credible. The result is stronger workforce buy-in, better OSHA […]
Why not use Certainty Software with IMCA guidance documents?
It’s great to see that the International Marine Contractors Association (IMCA) has undertaken its ambitious project of reviewing every guidance document in its extensive library, ensuring all are fully up-to-date. Work on the project, which started in January 2016, will be completed in the first quarter of this year. The IMCA guidance documents provide an […]
Involving your employees…(but it’s better if we call them ‘people’!)
The fifth blog in our series on implementing a Behavioural Based Safety System discusses involving your people in a BBS Program… The good news is that it’s common sense and so obvious that a lot ofmanagers don’t bother to do it. But you should, because your people can make you look great or pretty dumb, […]
How the Behavioral Based Safety System is a Group Effort
The fourth blog in our series on how to implement a Behavioural Based Safety System is about the need to listen to your employees and use the process to improve communication in the organization. Many managers are often stuck on ‘transmit’ and expect their people to continuously listen to them as they spout on the […]
Certainty Software reduces ISM inspection and audit costs across a fleet
The costs and consequences of a major incident onboard a ship at sea are extremely high. Certainty Software is an ideal inspection management tool to reduce inspection and audit costs in the maritime sector. It helps manage the huge amount of management data across an entire fleet and multiple office sites instantly and online – […]
Asking for help isn’t easy… but it’s worth trying
In our blog on setting up a Behavioral Based Safety System, we suggested (in point 3) contacting others to try and learn from experience. Whenever I’ve done this I’ve initially found the other firms’ management to be stand-offish and apparently feeling at some sort of commercial ‘risk’ as a result of my approach. I found […]
A Pilot Intervention for your Behavioral Based Safety System
Piloting your Behavioral Based Safety (BBS) intervention before full-scale rollout is one of the most important steps you can take to protect your investment and maximize program effectiveness. A pilot test is a structured, small-scale trial that confirms whether your BBS program is ready for organization-wide implementation — and identifies gaps, misalignments, and logistical challenges […]
There’s no safety without ‘leadership’.
Safety leadership is the foundation of every effective workplace health and safety program. Without active, visible commitment from management, safety directors, and frontline leaders, even the most carefully designed safety systems will remain aspirational rather than operational. Research consistently shows that organizations where senior leadership treats safety as a core business value — not a […]
Setting Realistic Safety Goals
In our last blog, one of the first points we mentioned was the need to establish clear and realistic goals. Establishing goals for the safety program provides a vital blueprint for managing the organization’s resources to achieve the desired outcomes. The most commonly found goals in any safety and health program include lost-time injury rate, […]
How to Start a Simple Behavioral Based Safety System
We’ve talked in previous tweets about Behavioral Based Safety (BBS) programs. We’ve also highlighted key issues such as the needless deaths and injuries that arise from food handling and preparation. If you’re a food manufacturer or even just a local delicatessen or cafe, why not think more about what you can learn from other sectors […]
420,000 needless food-related deaths a year… What do we do?
The World Health Organization estimates that 420,000 people die each year from food-borne diseases — and for QA Managers, Quality Engineers, and food safety professionals, these numbers represent a systemic failure of quality management that is largely preventable through rigorous auditing, HACCP compliance, and digital inspection programs. The WHO reports that approximately 600 million people […]
The Checklist Manifesto – by Atul Gawande
If you’ve read ‘The Checklist Manifesto’ by Atul Gawande you’ll know the amazing effect that the World Health Organisation had by introducing a simple checklist into hospital surgery routines. The surgery infection rates and mortality dropped hugely in those hospitals that were selected for a pilot program…and now that simple list has been adopted worldwide. […]
Outlining the Basic Goals for Safety and Health Programs
A safe workplace is a sound business – and a great place to look at reducing operating costs is to scrutinize your ‘safety’ in the workplace. OSHA has recently updated the Guidelines and Goals for Safety and Health Programs it first released 30 years ago, to reflect changes in the economy, workplaces, and evolving safety […]
Designing a BBS Program for Improved Safety Performance and ROI
Behavioral Based Safety (BBS) is a structured approach to reducing workplace injuries by identifying, observing, and reinforcing safe behaviors — and when designed correctly, it delivers measurable ROI. Since the emergence of BBS in the early 1970s, thousands of organizations worldwide have implemented BBS programs to reduce injuries, illnesses, human suffering, and associated costs. However, […]
