Management: commitment, importance

It is important that personnel at all levels—department heads, supervisors, academic faculty—exhibit a sincere and open interest in the waste management plan, and each one supports the other continuously. It is not sufficient to support the plan at its outset and to assume that it will then operate. Success depends on the participation and cooperation of the laboratory workers, who will be conditioned by their perception of management commitment. Any program that must be perceived and has only nominal support will come to be ignored by laboratory personnel. 

For employees, the policy statement is the declaration of an intent to achieve a goal. However, employees are skeptical of bureaucratic policies and look for more solid evidence of management commitment. Thus, the timing and sequence of health- and safety-related decisions demonstrate how the policy will be implemented and the importance of health and safety considerations. A health and safety pohcy with no follow-through is worthless and in fact may be damaging to employee morale by showing employees a lack of management commitment. This can backfire and can lead to poor employee safety attitudes and behaviors. Thus, an employer has to put the money where the mouth is to demonstrate commitment. If not, a policy is an empty promise. 

If a senior manager does not see the importance of safety it is unlikely that the safety officer will be given management status. The effectiveness of safety committees is also likely to be influenced by management commitment. If the senior executive sees safety as less important than other aspects of the organization e.g. production he/she... 

Management commitment Supervisors tend to concern themselves with what top management considers priority. If the emphasis is on productivity, then the human side tends to suffer. If the drivers are considered the company s most important asset, then productivity and utilization may suffer. 

Many factors have been highlighted as supporting the development of an effective patient safety culture. Some of the important ones are management (i.e., management commitment, ability, leadership, coordination, and flexibility), immediate supervisors (i.e., open-door policy, participation, and support correct behavior), reporting system (i.e., reporting near-miss, no-blame culture, analysis of error, open-door policy, confidentiality, and feedback). 

Therefore, Part I of this text focused primarily on the development of system safety, its military connections, the importance of including system safety requirements in contract acquisitions, the criticality of obtaining management commitment in support of the system safety effort, the process of risk analysis and assessment, probability theory and statistical analysis as they relate to system safety, and— perhaps of most value— how the fundamental principles of system safety are closely related to those of occupational safety and health management. 

Affirm management commitment to a worker-supportive environment that places as much importance on employee safety and health as on serving the patient or client. 

Sharpen the Saw The sharper the saw blade, the easier the cut. The more action and involvement by management, the easier the transformation to zero incidents. This is vital in the safety and quality culture. We must continually reinforce the importance of demonstrating management commitment by visual actions. 

Feedback of the results of the opinion survey, to all personnel, provides an opportunity to sow the seed of commitment to a behaviour-based approach to quality improvement. It also signals management commitment to the importance placed on quality and the need for quality improvement, and provides a forum in which to exchange suggestions and ideas. In essence, it can facilitate the process of employee involvement and empowerment (McAfee and Wirm, 1989). 

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