Safety management
Our Future State directs the decision-making and thinking for safety in the organisation.
See the poster on Our Future State (PDF 784KB) to see what our vision entails.
Learnings from our significant incidents have identified gaps in the consistent application of the Future State principles across the organisation. A substantial review was undertaken to assess what priorities are appropriate to re-establish a stable progression towards Zero Harm.
Deeper analysis of the fatalities that have occurred since the merger have provided the following key strategic learnings for the organisation:
- Low injury frequency rates do not mean low fatality rates – we cannot and should not draw any comfort from low injury rates in terms of our capacity to eliminate fatalities.
- Injury reduction programs alone will not prevent fatalities – a complementary focused effort is required on fatal risk. This is why we have implemented the Fatal Risk Control Protocols.
- Our fatalities often have similar underlying causes.
- High near miss reporting often correlates with declining injuries or fatalities – our ability to take heed of the ‘signals’ from near miss events is crucial to our efforts in eliminating fatalities.
- Leadership visibility in the field is crucial – our current state of safety maturity relies heavily on leadership energy to deliver improved performance.
- Effective contractor management is essential.
- Hazard identification and risk awareness are fundamental for success.
The Safety Improvement Road Map (see below) remains our guide to safety excellence.
The diagram illustrates that, as the maturity of our organisation increases, our safety improvement initiatives become all-encompassing. The most mature organisations understand that the behaviours of their people are the key to their success.
Safety Improvement Road Map
We are confident that our HSEC systems are comprehensive and the initiatives identified in the Safety Improvement Road Map have the right focus to deliver Zero Harm. Our efforts are directed towards the effective and consistent implementation of these across the organisation. To support this drive, some detailed analysis was undertaken during the reporting period of the safety cultures and climates that exist within our organisation. Specifically this work included:
- a review by DuPont of our overall organisational safety climate
- a comprehensive analysis of the South African safety situation and a subsequent action plan developed and implemented
- an Operational Excellence analysis of the Australian safety culture to assist with understanding and addressing underlying issues inimical to achieving Zero Harm.
Refer to the following sections to review our progress in safety management.
- Fatal Risk Control Protocols
- Leadership, behaviour and awareness
- Lead indicators
- Contractor management
Fatal Risk Control Protocols
A significant effort is being made to implement the requirements of the Fatal Risk Control Protocols across the organisation. There is clear evidence that their implementation, particularly in relation to light vehicle usage, has already delivered more effective protective barriers, preventing significant incidents and serious outcomes.
To support the successful implementation of the Fatal Risk Control Protocols, the following initiatives have been undertaken:
- development of an assessment and tracking tool
- establishment of a dedicated Fatal Risk Control intranet site
- allocation of dedicated resources to support selected protocols
- workshops conducted in key regional operating areas and involving site and business representatives.
These workshops addressed issues such as what had gone well, what needed clarification or resolution, and any barriers or threats to meeting the target of full implementation of the Protocols by 30 June 2005.
An additional Fatal Risk Control Protocol on Lifting was developed as a result of further analysis of our fatal risks. It was decided that the potential risks associated with lifting activities merited a protocol to cover this aspect specifically. Refer to our case study: Improvements to lifting and slinging practices by our Petroleum drilling team to understand how this is being implemented.
For details on the progress of the implementation of our Fatal Risk Control Protocols, refer to our case study: Implementation of Fatal Risk Control Protocols under way at all our operations.
Leadership, behaviour and awareness
The need to address at-risk behaviours and increase safety awareness is integral to achieving Zero Harm in safety, as outlined in Our Future State. Effective safety leadership is crucial to the success of our safety programs. We therefore hold line management accountable for the safety of our operations.
Behavioural-based safety is the process of involving our people in defining the ways they are most likely to be injured and asking them to observe co-workers and engage them in a discussion that reinforces safe behaviours and identifies ways the job can be done more safely.
The behavioural-based safety process has greatest impact when everyone on site conducts safety observations. Research has proven that the observer develops a far greater awareness of hazards and risks than those being observed. The other critical factor is that a positive discussion occurs on the job as part of every safety observation and that management uses the feedback from these discussions to eliminate barriers to safe behaviour.
We recommend that our sites employ the following principles in developing behavioural-based safety programs:
- Sustainable behaviour (and subsequent culture) change requires change in employee behaviour at all levels.
- Behaviours are markers of attitudes and beliefs and are amenable to change through observation, feedback and the removal of barriers to safe behaviour.
- The changes sought for safety culture improvement are often those that are required for general Company cultural change.
- Employee participation and ownership of the process is essential.
Our approach aims to increase safe behaviour and decrease at-risk behaviour by involving our leadership, employees and contractors. We seek to understand where and why at-risk behaviours occur, and blame has no place in a behavioural-based safety program.
A number of behavioural-based safety programs are being implemented across our operations. For a detailed example, refer to our case study: Behavioural-based safety leadership training program implemented at New Mexico Coal.
We have also progressed a number of initiatives over the reporting period to increase safety awareness across the organisation and improve the sharing of lessons learned.
When a trend of similar incidents, whether internal or external to the Company, is identified and common learning points are evident, a ’Repeat Significant Incident Alert’ is compiled. These alerts provide a succinct summary of the events and the common learnings, which are distributed widely within the organisation. They contain links for ease of reference and act as good catalysts to toolbox talks while raising general safety awareness. An example is shown below Unplanned Movement of Mobile Safety Alert (PDF 196KB).
Unplanned movement of mobile equipment safety alert
A number of posters have also been developed to assist with increasing awareness across the Company. See the Road to Zero Harm (PDF 624KB) and Safety Awareness (PDF 68KB) posters.
Lead indicators
The majority of sites have introduced lead indicators that support the measurement and tracking of their critical safety interventions.
A lead indicator is a metric used to drive and measure activities carried out to control and prevent injury, damage or loss. When measured and monitored effectively, they provide data to enable effective intervention to address or reverse a negative trend before it results in injury, damage or loss.
A guideline document and presentation were developed to increase knowledge, create discussion and promote the wider use of lead indicators as a driver to safety improvement across the Company.
Injury statistics or other lag indicators provide an overall estimate of the progress required to achieve our vision of Zero Harm but do not measure the effective implementation of safety programs, proactive action plans and preventative activities in place. If lag indicators are used as the only index of safety achievement (or failure), they can do more harm than good from the perspective of empowering people to take control of safety and to develop an effective organisational safety climate. It is therefore important that a mix of lead and lag indicators are used to measure overall safety effectiveness and performance.
The diagram below illustrates an indicative breakdown of lead and lag indicators being promoted at various levels of the organisation. The ratios indicated are only a guide to illustrate the concept and can be modified to suit circumstances.
Breakdown of lead and lag indicators being promoted across the Company
The use of a greater proportion of lead indicators at individual and department levels, as illustrated by the diagram, reinforces personal involvement and improves the perceptions individuals and work teams have about their control and management of injuries.
Contractor management
Managing contractors and their activities more effectively at our operations has been identified as a significant improvement opportunity for the Company. Our objective is to ensure that standards and procedures adopted by the contractors are consistent with the BHP Billiton standards. Some of the steps we have taken to move towards improved consistency in this area are:
- The contract work is to be assigned a BHP Billiton manager or supervisor as the single point of accountability.
- BHP Billiton line management is to allocate adequate time and resources to manage the day-to-day activities of the contract.
- Line management is to sign off on the work standards and how they are to be carried out and shall ensure via timely workplace inspections that the work is being carried out according to the agreed standards.
- Line management is to ensure that BHP Billiton’s expectations are clearly and effectively communicated to all contractors and their respective organisation’s leadership.
- Line management is to ensure that each contractor’s on-site manager is introduced to the responsible BHP Billiton supervisor who has single-point accountability and that effective systems of communication are in place.
This issue is further being addressed through the development of a Contracting Checklist that will be added to the requirements of our HSEC Management Standard 11 – Suppliers, Contractors and Partners.
To understand how some of our sites are addressing the challenge of contractor management, refer to our case study: Initiatives at Hillside and Worsley aim to improve contractor safety performance.
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