Changing the Safety Culture

Southeast Firms Committing to New Programs to Change Workers’ Mindsets, Results

By Debra Wood

Determined that everyone on the jobsite leave safe and healthy, several firms are changing the construction industry’s culture.

To ensure a safe working environment that includes more than arming crews with the technical know-how to deliver a quality product without incident, several Southeast construction firms have embarked on a culture transformation.   

“Safety is a journey, something that you work at every day,” says Dan Danner, health-care safety director for Bovis Lend Lease in Denver.

Hendrik van Brenk, senior vice president of environmental health and safety for Skanska USA Building in Atlanta adds, “You have to address not only what to do, but you have to address relationships so you can inspire people to do the right thing.”

Following is a review of some of the safety programs and initiatives that some Southeast firms have adopted to achieve a safer work environment at area jobsites.

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Bovis Lend Lease

Bovis set out to change the culture at its jobsites five years ago, establishing its Incident and Injury Free Program. It involves modifying behavior by assigning work to avoid accidents, publicly recognizing people who work safely and privately talking with someone who has not safely performed his or her job.

“Incident and Injury Free is caring about people and demonstrating that care on a daily basis, and it’s about speaking up when you see something out of place,” Danner says. “It’s about choosing to follow safety rules versus having to be told.”

Each day begins with a pretest plan. Workers meet with their supervisors to discuss potential hazards and how they will address them. Everyone from surveyors to crane operators take part.

“Workers enjoy participating in their lives on the job that day and the tasks they do,” Danner says. “Having input means they are important, and they have ownership in something, particularly their safety.”

Bovis trains subcontractors’ lead personnel, who conduct the meeting and document the plan, which Bovis officials review. Each trade’s plan differs because the risks vary.

“When we start a project and meet with subcontractors, we let them know we care about them and will do our best to make sure they go home to their families,” says Steve O. Williams, project superintendent for Bovis at St. Joseph’s Hospital, a $135 million, 108-bed, 382,662-sq-ft hospital under construction in Lutz, Fla. He also heads up the health-care safety lead team.

Williams says at first people seem a little skeptical about the paperwork, especially “old-school guys.” However, it has become an accepted part of the routine.

Anyone bidding on a Bovis job knows from the start about the company’s safety program and what it entails. Company officials meet with subcontractors’ owners or vice presidents and obtain buy-in.

“If they see you are running a safe job, they know you are running a good job, and a good job to them is making a profit on the project,” Williams says. 

As in the aviation and health-care industries, workers document and report near-misses, accidents that could have happened. Bovis evaluates the reasons for the incident and passes those reports and prevention recommendations to other jobsites, so everyone can learn from the experience, Williams says.

Bovis also holds weekly safety meetings to discuss upcoming activities and ways to eliminate hazards, such as placing barriers or using platform stairs rather then ladders. The safety lead team walks the project weekly, watching for safety lapses and addressing them.

Danner calls the Incident and Injury Free Program’s results tremendous, citing a 0.4% lost-time injury rate in the health-care division. Costs for the safety program vary by jobsite.

“People say the program costs owners a lot of money and costs subs money, but it doesn’t,” Williams says. “What is the cost of a human life? The unfortunate part for our Incident and Injury Free Program, you won’t know what it’s worth if it works because we don’t know how many lives and injuries it really saved.”

Skanska

Skanska USA Building began its Injury-Free Environment Program about four years ago. It aims to create a culture in which everyone is responsible for safety and is empowered to act.

Intervening when someone notices something amiss represents a key element of the Skanska program, van Brenk says. Workers feel comfortable speaking up.

“It empowers people to act for the sake of safety,” van Brenk says. “IFE doesn’t take the place of traditional training. It adds a component of empowerment and awareness.”

All employees attend a four-hour educational session about the program. The company indoctrinates subcontractors and encourages them to take the practices learned on a Skanska job to the next project.

“It translates for us [into] lower general liability claims and lower workers’ compensation claims for subcontractors,” van Brenk says. “Our annualized savings exceeded $1 million.”

Van Brenk says the training costs money but far less than the amount saved. He would not release a dollar figure.

In addition, some Skanska projects begin with Flexible Solutions, an onsite, 10-minute, low-impact exercise program, offering multiple benefits. It decreases soft-tissue injuries, such as sprains and strains. It positively contributes to prevention, and it allows the entire workforce to assemble and recognize that Skanska values safety, says van Brenk

“It promotes the culture as well as having a sound physical-therapy component,” he adds. 

United Forming

Cognizant of the dangers posed by forming concrete in high-rise and other buildings, Tom Isola, United Forming safety manager for the company’s Central Florida district, established a safety program about two years ago and accidents rates decreased 50%. He explained how the program works.

A bilingual safety coordinator works at every job, focusing entirely on accident prevention. The company adds a second safety coordinator if more than 60 people are working onsite. The coordinator trains employees, inspects equipment daily, enforces policies and completes a safety audit each week.

“They pick up on what the superintendent doesn’t have the expertise or time to do,” Isola says.

Fluent in English and Spanish, safety coordinators can easily converse with project leaders and train workers in their native language. Isola estimates that 90% of the company’s forming employees speak Spanish.

Throughout the week, the safety coordinators meet with each crew and hold 10-minute meetings to address safety on that aspect of the job. Framers and wrecking crews might both hear about nails and splinters, but the messages will be tailored to the work they perform.

New hires wear green tape on their hardhats for the first 30 days and meet weekly with the safety coordinator in a supportive environment that fosters learning and asking questions when unsure about something.

Safety Guys

South Florida contractors concerned about safety can outsource it through Safety Guys of Fort Lauderdale, which supplies a safety foreman, onsite training of workers and in-house designed materials, such as perimeter railings, elevator protection, gates and debris-containment nets.

Working as a laborer, Chris Cockerell, president and founder of Safety Guys, recognized an opportunity to improve safety on job sites.

“There was a great need for a company to specialize in safety, because it was being done badly,” Cockerell explains. “It took me a couple of years to figure out a system to offer to clients and make life easier for everybody.”

Safety Guys CEO Christian Panagakos says the company began doing business as Things All Decked Out in 1998. It continues to act as the management company for Safety Guys, which was formed in 2001.

About 30 large general contractors have hired Safety Guys for more than 200 projects, Panagakos says. Safety Guys operates in South Florida. Cockerell plans expansions to Orlando, Melbourne, Tampa and out of state.

Safety Guys presents a quote in advance, so the general contractor knows upfront how much safety and debris containment will cost. The company’s crews not only know safety rules but also how to ensure safety does not interfere with getting the job done.

“It increases production on the jobsite and reduces the amount of accidents because the [general contractors] can focus on their work, while safety is taken care of by a professional company,” says Cockerell.

Useful Sources:

Safety Guys
http://www.safetyguys.net

Skanska
http://www.skanska.com/

Bovis Lend Lease
http://www.bovislendlease.com/