Management Leadership and Employee Involvement

What do you mean by management commitment and employee involvement?

Management leadership and employee involvement are complementary. Management leadership provides the motivating force and the resources for organizing and controlling activities within the organization. In an effective program, management regards worker safety and health as a fundamental value. Employer involvement provides the means through which workers express their own commitment to safety and health, for themselves and their fellow workers.

Management Leadership

Effective protection from occupational hazards takes leadership and commitment from top management. Management leadership provides the motivating force and the resources for organizing and controlling activities within an organization. In an effective program, management regards worker safety and health as a fundamental value of the organization. Ideally, this means that concern for every aspect of the safety and health of all workers throughout the facility is demonstrated.

Does your safety and health system incorporate:

Reasons for establishing a safety and health program (or the worksite policy),
Where you want to end up (or the goal), and
The path to your goal (objectives).

These are some of the actions recommended by OSHA to ensure that management leadership is in place.

Other recommended actions for management leadership include visible management involvement, assigning and communicating responsibility, authority and resources to responsible parties and holding those parties accountable. In addition, management should ensure that workers are encouraged to report hazards, symptoms, injuries and illnesses, and that there are no programs or policies which discourage this reporting.

Visible Leadership

Successful top managers use a variety of techniques that visibly involve them in the safety and health protection of their workers. Managers should look for methods that fit their style and workplace. Some methods include:

Getting out where you can be seen, informally or through formal inspections.
Being accessible.
being an example, by knowing and following the rules employees are expected to follow.
Being involved by participating on the workplace Safety and Health Committee.

Employee Involvement

Employee involvement provides the means through which workers develop and express their own commitment to safety and health, for both themselves and their fellow workers.

We at OSHA are aware that the growing recognition of the value of employee involvement and the increasing number and variety of employee participation arrangements can raise legal concerns. It makes good sense to consult your labor relations advisor to ensure that your employee involvement program conforms to current legal requirements.

Why should employees be involved?

Because it’s the right and smart thing to do. Here’s why:

Rank and file workers are the persons most in contact with potential safety and health hazards. They have a vested interest in effective protection programs.
Group decisions have the advantage of the group’s wider range of experience.
Employees are more likely to support and use programs in which they have input.

Employees who are encouraged to offer their ideas and whose contributions are taken seriously are more satisfied and productive on the job.

What can employees do to be involved?

Examples of employee participation include:

Participating on joint labor-management committees and other advisory or specific purpose committees.
Conducting site inspections.
Analyzing routine hazards in each step of a job or process, and preparing safe work practices or controls to eliminate or reduce exposure.
Developing and revising the site safety and health rules.
Training both current and newly hired employees.
Providing programs and presentations at safety and health meetings.
Conducting accident/incident investigations.
Reporting hazards.
Fixing hazards within your control.
Supporting your fellow workers by providing feedback on risks and assisting them in eliminating hazards.
Participating in accident/incident investigations.
Performing a pre-use or change analysis for new equipment or processes in order to identify hazards up front before use.

Responsibility, Authority and Accountability

When you have authority or responsibility, your performance is not necessarily measured. But when you are held accountable, your performance is measured in relation to standards or goals that result in certain positive or negative consequences.

An owner or top manager of a business delegates certain responsibilities to other worksite managers or supervisors. The owner must avoid undercutting the authority of the managers, since that will interfere with their ability to carry out those responsibilities. At the same time, the owner wants to demonstrate their own commitment to reducing safety and health hazards and protecting employees. How can this be done?

Elements of an effective accountability system

Any accountability system should have the following elements to be effective:

Established standards in the form of company policies, procedures or rules that clearly convey standards of performance in safety and health to employees
Resources needed to meet the standards, such as a safe and healthful workplace, effective training, and adequate oversight of work operations.
A measurement system which specifies acceptable performance.
Consequences, both positive and negative.
Application at all levels

When managers and employees are held accountable for their safety and health responsibilities, they are more likely to press for solutions to safety and health problems than to present barriers. By implementing an accountability system, positive involvement in the safety and health program is created.

Review of Program Operations

The last action recommended under management leadership and employee involvement is an annual review of program operations to evaluate success in meeting the goal and objectives. A comprehensive program audit is needed to evaluate the safety and health management means, methods, and processes, to ensure they are protecting against worksite hazards. The audit determines whether the policies and procedures are implemented as planned and whether they have met the objectives set for the program. This allows for the identification of opportunities for improvement and can drive next year's planning process.