Clear commitment to safety from senior management is consistently cited as a cornerstone of safe organizations by industry regulators, accident investigators and safety experts. To date most research on senior managers explores their influence on key financial and business outcomes, while little empirical work investigates their influence on safety. This appears to be a major gap in the safety and management literatures in light of the major human, environmental and economic implications associated with leading safe operations.
This paper presents findings from the first stages of a project which aims to develop an evidencebased safety leadership tool for senior managers. Results from a systematic literature review and interviews with subject matter experts (senior managers, health and safety professionals) indicate that key safety leadership functions of senior managers include: (1) Emphasizing safety as an organizational priority, (2) Establishing clear communication for safety, (3) Participating in safety activities, (4) Setting and maintaining safety standards, (5) Maintaining risk awareness and, (6) Motivating and supporting the workforce.
Get full access to this article
View all access options for this article.
References
1.
AndriesonJ.H.T.H. (1978). Safe Behaviour and Safety Motivation. Journal of Occupational Accidents, 1, 363-376.
2.
BanduraA. (1977). Social Learning Theory. New York: General Learning Press.
3.
BarnardC.I. (1938). The functions of the executive. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.
4.
ButlerM.C.JonesA.P. (1979). Perceived leader behaviour, individual characteristics, and injury occurrence in hazardous work environments. Journal of Applied Psychology, 64, 299–304.
5.
CharmazK. (2003). Chapter 8-Grounded Theory: Objectivist and Constructivist Methods in Strategies of Qualitative Inquiry (2nd ed). DenzinN.K.LincolnY.S. (2003). Sage Publications, Inc., Thousand Oaks, CA.
6.
*CavazzaN.SerpeA. (2009). Effects of safety climate on safety norm violations: exploring the mediating role of attitudinal ambivalence toward personal protective equipment. Journal of Safety Research, 40(4), 277-283.
7.
*ChewD.C.E. (1988). Effective occupational safety activities: Findings in three Asian developing countries. International Labor Review, 127(1), 111-125.
8.
*ClevelandR.J.CohenH.H.SmithM.J.CohenA. (1979). Safety program practices in record holding plants. Cincinnati, OH: National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health.
9.
CohenA.1977. Factors in successful occupational safety programs.Journal of Safety Research, 9, 168-178.
10.
*CohenA.SmithM.CohenH. (1975). Safety program practices in high versus low accident rate companies- an interim report (Publication no. 75-185). Cincinnati: National institute for Occupational Safety and Health: U.S. Department of Health Education and Welfare.
11.
CSB: 2005. U.S. Chemical Safety and Hazard Investigation Board. Urgent Recommendation to BP Global Executive Board of Directors. WednesdayAugust 17, 2005.
12.
CrawleyF.K. (1999). The change in safety management for offshore oil and gas production systems. Process safety and environmental protection, 77(3), 143-148.
13.
DealB.G.D. (2004). Beyond the widget- Columbia accident lessons affirmed. Air and space power journal, 18(2).
14.
DunbarR.L. (1975). Managers’ influence on subordinate thinking about safety. Academy of Management Journal, 18, 364–369.
15.
*GershonR.R.M.KarkashianC.D.GroschJ.W.MurphyL.R.Escamilla-CejudoA.FlanaganP.A.BernackiE.KastingCMartinL. (2000). Hospital safety climate and its relationship with safe work practices and workplace exposure incidents. American Journal of Infection Control, 28(3), 211-221.
16.
*HarperA.C.CorederyJ.L.KlerkN.H. de.SevastosP.GeelhoedE.GunsonC.RobinsonL.SutherlandM.OsbornD.ColquhounJ. (1996). Curtin industrial safety trial: Managerial behavior and program effectiveness. Safety Science, 24(3), 173-179.
17.
*HinzeJ.RaboudP. (1988). Safety on large building construction projects. Journal of Construction Engineering and management, 114(2), 286-293.
18.
HofmannD.A.JacobsR.R.LandyF. (1995). High reliability process industries: Individual, micro, and macro organisational influences on safety performance. Journal of Safety Research, 26, 131–149.
19.
*JaselskisE.J.AndersonS.D.RussellJ.S. (1996). Strategies for achieving excellence in construction safety performance. Journal of Construction Engineering and Management, 122(1), 61-70.
20.
KingN. (1994). ‘The qualitative research interview,’ in CassellC.SymonG. (1994). Qualitative Methods in Organizational Research: A Practical Guide. London: Sage Publications.
21.
KletzT.A. (1985). An engineer’s view of human error. Warwickshire, England:The Institution of Chemical Engineers.
22.
KvaleS. (1983). The qualitative research interview: A phenomenological and hermeneutical mode of understanding. Journal of Phenomenological Psychology, 14(2), 171-196.
23.
*LevittR.E.ParkerH.W. (1976). Reducing construction accidents- Top management’s role. Journal of the construction division (ASCE), 102 (3), 465-478.
24.
MaurinoD.E.ReasonJ.JohnstonN.LeeR.B. (1995). Beyond Aviation Human Factors: Safety in High Technology Systems. Ashgate Publishing Limited, United Kingdom.
25.
MoustakasC. (1994). Phenomenological research methods. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage.
26.
*MullenJ. (2005). Testing a model of employee willingness to raise safety issues. Canadian journal of behavioural science, 37(4), 273-282.
27.
*NielsenK.J.CarstensenO.RasmussenK. (2006). The prevention of occupational injuries in two industrial plants using an incindent reporting scheme. Journal of Safety Research, 5, 479-486.
28.
OHSAS 18001. Occupational health safety management
system– Requirements. Section 4.4.1.
29.
PerinC. (1992). British Rail: the case of the unrocked boat. In Workshop on Managing the Technological Risk in Industrial Society, 14-16May, Bad Homburg, Germany.
30.
ReasonJ. (1998). Achieving a safe culture: Theory and practice. Work and stress, 12(3), 293-306.
31.
*SimondsR.H.Shafari-SahraiY. (1977). Factors apparently affecting injury frequency in eleven matched pairs of companies. Journal of Safety Research, 9(3), 120–127.
32.
SimardM.MarchandA. (1997). Workgroups’ propensity to comply with safety rules: The influence of micro- macro organizational factors. Ergonomics, 40(2), 127-188.
33.
*SmithM.J.CohenA.CohenH.H.ClevelandR.S. (1978). Characteristics of successful safety programs. Journal of Safety Research, 10(1), 5–15.
34.
*ThompsonR.C.HiltonT.F.WittA.L. (1998). Where the safety rubber meets the shop floor: A confirmatory model of management influence on workplace safety. Journal of Safety Research, 29(1), 15-24.
35.
WaldmanD.A.JavidanM.VarellaP. (2004). Charismatic leadership at the strategic level: A new application of upper echelons theory. The Leadership Quarterly, 15, 365-381.
36.
WaldmanD.A.RamirezG.G.HouseR.J.PuranamP. (2001). Does Leadership Matter? CEO Leadership Attributes and Profitability under Conditions of Perceived Environmental Uncertainty. The Academy of Management Journal, 44(1), 134-143.
37.
ZaccaroS. J.KlimoskiR. J. (2001). The nature of organizational leadership: An introduction. In ZaccaroS. J.KlimoskiR. J. (Eds.)The nature of organizational leadership (pp. 3–41). San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.
38.
ZoharD. (2002). The effects of leadership dimensions, safety climate, and assigned priorities on minor injuries in work groups. Journal of Organisational Behaviour, 23, 75-92.
