Description of Workplace Hazards and Safety Breach
Safety culture is a collection of values and attitude in regards to the safety of a workstation or environment shared by members/employees at all levels in the organization (Hopkin, 2018). In this case, a safety culture in an organization is based on the extent to which people and employees are aware of the risk and unknown hazards that are induced by organizational activities both within and outside the organization (Aven, 2016). A safety culture is characterized by commitment, awareness, information, justness, and adaptability. Therefore, to safeguard the life of employees and surrounding people, it is important for the organization to identify risks before engaging in any internal or external activities. Identification of risks will involve site inspection, reviewing organizational work practices and exploring any legal exposure in regards to the organization (Pidgeon, Turner, Blockley & Toft, 2018). The article is about a construction company which was fined a total of $ 1.1 million over the death of a truck driver. Michael Booth, 48, had been electrocuted when his truck touched a low-slung power line. The company had been found guilty of not maintaining safety standards in the workstation. The magistrate judge concluded that the construction had a poor corporate culture.
The workplace in the organization was carelessly handled. As an illustration, the employees who were working had not indicated any warning on ongoing work to alert the pedestrians and drivers. Their carelessness can be proven by the fact that there were working without any warning signs or attach a flag to themselves to indicate that there is ongoing construction. The construction company had a poor working corporate culture. In this case, the company employed a safety officer who was underqualified for the position. This shows that the organization had no set of rules and regulation to be followed when it comes to hiring and selection of employees (Akintoye & MacLeod, 1997). When a construction company hires a person with inadequate knowledge or skills, there will be a lack of competence and accountability because they don’t understand the nature or requirement of their work. The carelessness of the employees can be described as a lack of employee engagement in their work. There is a lack of effective leadership and management style (Tah & Carr, 2000). As an illustration, when it comes to leadership, the management of the company doesn’t have clear guidelines on how organizational activities should be done.
Possible Solutions to Prevent Workplace Safety Breaches
Furthermore, they don’t have a clear and defined risk management in case of any accidents (Clothier & Walker, 2015). In the article, the son of the general manager was able to recruit an employee without the knowledge of the father and selection procedures. This is an example of an organization where employees mix their work and family without considering the impact (Maguire, 2017). Lastly, there is a lack of teamwork since the son of the general manager was able to recruit an employee without another department within the organization knowing. This led to the recruitment of underqualified employee.
Hazards are stressors that cause stress and strain within a work environment. In the article, the major types of hazards include safety hazards which are the common type of hazards in organizations across the globe. In the article, the organization was carrying out an activity without adequate resources. As an illustration, while the employees from the construction company were working, they never indicated any warning sign or erected safety warning equipment to indicate that there was an ongoing construction taking place (Khan et al., 2016). Secondly, employees were able to leave a live wire which was insulated in a place that is used by the public. This resulted in the death of a 48-year truck driver. This is negligence which could be avoided. This types of hazard are known as an electrical hazard. The second type of hazard is known as an ergonomic hazard which often arises due to poor set up of the working station. According to the article, the employees set up their workstation careless which resulted in the death of a civilian who was never aware of the status of the workstation.
The main cause of the safety breach was lack of effective corporate culture. The safety breach could have been avoided in different ways. First, the general manager should have known the importance of separating work from family. With this, the general should have prevented the son from interfering with organizational practices when it comes to hiring and recruitment of employees.
Additionally, the organization should have an effective leadership and management style. In this scenario, effective leadership and management style should ensure that employees have adequate resources when it comes to any organizational activities carried within an outside the organization (Flin, Mearns, K., O’Connor & Bryden, 2000). Furthermore, effective leadership and management have a set of rules, regulation, and policies that should be used as a benchmark when carrying out any organizational activity. These policies are effective especially when it comes to a construction company (Hofmann, Burke & Zohar, 2017).
Importance of Safety Culture in the Workplace
Safety breach could have been avoided by employing a person who had the appropriate skills and knowledge regarding the position which was required by the organization. A safety officer is a significant position in regards to the safety of employees within the organization and outside. The safety officer would be responsible for the lives and safety of everybody within the operating environment. In their working environment, the employees ought to have placed warning signs to alert motorists and pedestrians about the ongoing construction. Additionally, they ought to have a given alternative route to be followed. With the diversion routes, pedestrian and motorists will be safe from harm.
The death of the truck driver started when the son of the general manager recruited a candidate who didn’t qualify for the position of a safety officer. After the officer had been employed, he was given a responsibility that he couldn’t handle. This means that he wasn’t aware of any protocol, safety, and risk management techniques to be used in case of outdoor activity. While at work, the safety officer poorly arranged the workstation. As an illustration, they were not in a position to put warning signs. As a result, the motorist drove past the workstation and came across a live electrical wire. He was the electrocuted to death.
A safe working station involves employees being aware of dangers, precautionary measures, and regulations to be followed. Within a safe environment, there will be the reduction in injuries because an injured worker or civilian will cost the organization large sums of money through compensation. According to the article, the construction had to compensate a total of $ 1.1 million to the deceased family. A safe environment improves the quality of work being offered by employees (Lisenkov & Bestemyanov, 2015). This is because they will not be worried about the occurrence of an accident or any eventualities while doing the work. Through working in a clean environment, workers level of satisfaction will increase hence improving their performances (Lysenko & Bestemyanov, 2015). This is because of increasing employee engagement. A safe environment ensures that the organization is adhering to the safety standards as indicated by the law. This will minimize issues to deal with litigation. This may affect the corporate image of the organization. According to the article, a safe environment can help in increasing the number of a customers through customer loyalty. With the information that was released about the construction, it is clear that they will be experiencing a reduction in the number of customers because they can’t take care of their environment which affects the people and community (Tran, 2018).
In conclusion, safety and risk management is essential when it comes to organizational practice and corporate culture. Certain mistakes within an organization could be avoided if there are guidelines and policies to be followed. Additionally, workplace rules or station policies are important in an organization. According to the article, employees carelessly handled workplace pilicies. Their carelessness can be proven by the fact that they were working without any warning signs or attaching a flag to themselves to indicate that there is ongoing construction. The construction company had a poor working corporate culture which could be evident from the way a new employee was being recruited.
The safety officer who was introduced into the business never had the desired skills. This made it possible to have an idea of what he was expected to do as a safety officer. In the article, the son of the general manager was able to recruit an employee without the knowledge of the father and selection procedures. This is an example of an organization where employees mix their work and family without considering the impact. The death of the truck driver could be prevented if the management of the company had employed skilled personnel and dedicated adequate resources towards completion of the project. When it comes to appropriate resources, employees were to have warning signs or flag that could be used in signaling any incoming civilian about the presence of construction work. Most importantly, employees should always be aware of their working environment.
References
Akintoye, A. S., & MacLeod, M. J. (1997). Risk analysis and management in construction. International journal of project management, 15(1), 31-38.
Aven, T. (2016). Risk assessment and risk management: Review of recent advances on their foundation. European Journal of Operational Research, 253(1), 1-13.
Clothier, R. A., & Walker, R. A. (2015). Safety risk management of unmanned aircraft systems. In Handbook of unmanned aerial vehicles (pp. 2229-2275). Springer, Dordrecht.
Flin, R., Mearns, K., O’Connor, P., & Bryden, R. (2000). Measuring safety climate: identifying the common features. Safety science, 34(1-3), 177-19
Hofmann, D. A., Burke, M. J., & Zohar, D. (2017). 100 years of occupational safety research: From basic protections and work analysis to a multilevel view of workplace safety and risk. Journal of Applied Psychology, 102(3), 375.
Hopkin, P. (2018). Fundamentals of risk management: understanding, evaluating and implementing effective risk management. Kogan Page Publishers.
Khan, F., Hashemi, S. J., Paltrinieri, N., Amyotte, P., Cozzani, V., & Reniers, G. (2016). Dynamic risk management: a contemporary approach to process safety management. Current opinion in chemical engineering, 14, 9-17.
Lisenkov, V. M., & Bestemyanov, P. F. (2015). Safety and Risk Management. JITA-JOURNAL OF INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY AND APLICATIONS, 9(1).
Maguire, R. (2017). Safety cases and safety reports: meaning, motivation and management. CRC Press.
Pidgeon, N. F., Turner, B. A., Blockley, D. I., & Toft, B. (2018). Corporate safety culture: improving the management contribution to system reliability. In Reliability 91 (pp. 682-690). Chapman and Hall/CRC.
Tah, J. H., & Carr, V. (2000). A proposal for construction project risk assessment using fuzzy logic. Construction Management & Economics, 18(4), 491-500.
Tran, T. H. (2018). Critical factors and enablers of food quality and safety compliance risk management in the Vietnamese seafood supply chain. ArXiv preprint arXiv: 1805.12109.
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