Applying the 14 Points

The 14 points constitute a system. One is not free to choose some 

However, the biggest problem is oeated when the annual review pits one employee against another in a form of competition. This creates fear and reduces cooperation, which impair safety and productivity. Alfie Kohn, in his book No Contest (Kohn 1986), has written very eloquently on the dangers of introducing competition into business. Moreover, he cites a number of studies demonstrating that the most successM scientists and the most suc-cessM business leaders are not as competitive as their less successful colleagues. Competition among individuals does not always lead to better performance or better products. 

We sometimes use the 14 points as a diagnostic tool. After explaining the points to a group of employees, we ask than to fill out three sticky notes, listing the three points they feel the company most needs to work on at the present time, one on each note. No maUer how excellent your company may be. 

The responses of the group can be posted on the wall in the form of a bar chart or Pareto chart, as in Hgure 1.3. 

One of the important reasons to conduct this type of exercise is that it provides a very comprehensive picture. It provides a view of the entire system from a very high altitude (meaning that we see the whole system but with very little detail, as in the view of a landscape from an airplane.) You may not see much detail, but everything is included. We spend so much of our time working on details that we often miss the forest for the trees. This is especially true for the safety professional who must deal with so many issues of regulation and compliance that it is easy to lose sight of the organizational system that controls the safety of work. 

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