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"HOT ISSUE" QUESTIONS & ADVICE – Accountability

QUESTION: “I’m an EH&S manager at a Star site. Each year it becomes more difficult to find ways to improve. One area that we are focusing on is accountability. We are real good at holding our hourly workers accountable. However, I feel we could do better within the management ranks. Any words of wisdom?”

ADVICE:  You just named the biggest challenge for all Star sites. How do you continually improve on an already excellent system? You and the rest of the Star sites in the VPP have no choice … the day that you fail to strive to improve is the day that you begin your decline.

So let’s talk accountability. Demming said it “…what you measure and reward gets done…” The question that I have for you is when you look at the big picture from the shoes of a manager or supervisor, what is being measured and rewarded? While I am sure that S&H performance and support is part of it (otherwise you wouldn’t be a Star site) at the end of the end of the day from their view point what has to happen. If you are like most places managers and supervisors it will be productivity and quality. That’s not to say that they don’t support safety it’s a matter of balance.

My best guess is, you asked this question because while everyone will state that they are completely supportive of safety some mangers and supervisors are probably doing a great job being engaged and leading safety, while others are involved at times and not at other times, and then there is a group that avoids being involved except when they feel they have no choice. All organizations have these groups, what is important is the percentage that resides in each category.

So what do you do? One thing that mangers understand is managing and being held accountable for the numbers. The problem is what numbers are you using for safety?

To solve this dilemma for my clients I always recommend that they consider establishing a good suite of key performance indicators (both up stream activity measures and bottom line performance numbers, i.e., rates). To ensure that everyone is managing to the numbers, I like dashboards. Publish the data and you are more likely to encourage people to be more proactive. They can no longer hide. One thing that all mangers understand is that you never want to go into a meeting with the boss being the one with poor numbers. As long as the boss is willing to manage to the numbers and hold his/her direct reports accountable the accountability will flow down.

If you want to see an example of an interactive dash board click here: SafePath Dashboards

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Continue sending me your "head scratchers" that you just can't seem to resolve.  You'll read my advice in upcoming CoreInsights newsletters.