Safety incentive schemes

Identify possible safety incentive schemes on a construction site. 

These are a form of planned motivation, the main objectives being that of providing motivation by identifying the targets which can be rewarded if achieved, and by making the rewards meaningful and desirable to the people involved. Any planned motivation scheme should always be viewed with care, however, in that it may alter behaviour, in order to win the rewards, but not necessarily attitudes. Safety incentive schemes are most effective from a health and safety viewpoint where ... 

Recognition and feedback do not refer to safety incentive schemes. We have written elsewhere about the inadvisability of these approaches. Our experience is that safety incentive schemes usually have negative rather than positive effects on organizational culture. 

At point A, despite full management commitment to safety performance, with low employee commitment to safety, the number of accidents remains high employees only follow procedures laid out because they feel they have to. At the other extreme, point B, when employee commitment is high, the number of accidents reduces dramatically employees feel responsible for their own safety as well as that of their colleagues. Employee commitment to safety is an attitude of mind rather than a taught discipline, and can be enhanced by training and (less effectively) incentive schemes. 

Problems can also arise when the results of safety audits are used in a competitive manner, for example, to compare two plants. Such use is obviously closely linked to the operation of incentive schemes. However, as was pointed out earlier, there is no evidence that giving an award to the "best plant" produces any lasting improvement in safety. The problem here is that the competitive aspect may be a diversion from the aim of safety audits, which... 

Under this heading come modifications to physical work design and layout, new machinery and work methods, changes in allocation of jobs to people, introduction of new incentive schemes so that different behaviour is rewarded and punished (e.g. payment schemes, promotion systems, direct safety incentives or simply what behaviour elicits praise from the boss), changes to safety rules, company policy or legal standards. 

Safety budgeting is allocating financial and other resources necessary to achieve the safety objectives. A budget allocation may be required for the reporting incentive scheme. Funds should be allocated. Mechanical or structural repairs or modifications may be needed to eliminate hazards reported through the near miss incident system and these expenses must be budgeted for as well. 

Have the advantages of not reporting accidents been reduced Incentive schemes in industry, such as safety prizes for zero accidents , may cause under-reporting. It is important to evaluate such schemes in relation to the need for reliable accident reporting. 

Personally involve themselves in risk assessing proposed budget reductions for safety impacts and provide incentive schemes which don t encourage production at the expense of operational safety risks. 

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