Is organisational culture affecting safety?

No post image

Brenda Aremo, managing director of aviation training and consultancy firm TWIGA AERO, considers how companies across the aviation industry are managing safety while facing the reality of their own organisational cultures. She suggests that we are immersed in our environments and roles, and over time can become complacent with regard to safety matters

The faces of organisational culture crop up as ordinary but their impact is far-reaching and exhibits strong links to systemic deficiencies. A few examples come to mind:

  • We don’t always walk the talk: We make promises to our clients, our employees, and our stakeholders that we can’t keep. We agree to improve and do better but then don’t measure our progress or set targets. We make plans but then don’t follow through on them. We have roundtable discussions but then don’t conclude and follow up with concrete actions plans. The corporate agenda is frequently commercially skewed and safety’s importance only comes to the fore when it comes to ticking the boxes and achieving ‘cosmetic compliance’.

Key learning point: Manage safety like you would any other business unit; set targets and measure them; hold everyone responsible and the managers accountable.

  • We can be unwilling to collaborate: A simple initiative can be difficult to execute due to the silos that exist within our organisations. If it is beyond my scope or job description, then it is not my problem. If it is not part of my key performance indicators or targets, then it is not a priority. It is an even harder task to bring stakeholders together without the blame game taking effect. This is clearly visible in our client relationship, where the interaction is often one of ‘us and them’ as opposed to the collaboration we require.

Key learning point: Safety is everyone’s responsibility and it is a journey that has no end. I can’t claim to be safe if you are not.

  • Resource allocation can be biased: The initiatives of marketing and business development compete with safety, even though neither guarantees a return in value for money. We host existing and potential clients to expensive lunches, retreats etc to appease or attract them with no guarantee that they will be retained or acquired. If safety initiatives prevent an accident then the company’s profit margin is not affected.

Key learning point: Sell safety in the way that marketing sells itself. Speak the CEO language if you wish to gain traction. Just because it is an industry agenda doesn’t mean that it is automatically at the forefront of the corporate agenda. Dare to make the link between the industry and corporate agendas.

  • There is often comfort in being reactive rather than proactive: The role and approach is cut out or spelled out because it is repetitive, monotonous and predictable. There is a lack of tactical or even strategic input to break the cycle in order to move the system from a reactive state to proactive and finally predictive. Sometimes it is the competence for execution that is lacking, other times it is unwillingness to get out of the comfort zone, to make decisions and forge ahead with confidence and authority. All these factors drive further stalling and stagnation of the progress.

Key learning point: Leverage from training programmes and mentoring to ensure competence that is targeted, ongoing and progressive. Empower, guide and support staff to ensure that they stay ahead of the game.

  • People don’t always care enough for their own individual safety let alone their organisation’s: Yet the selling point for attempting to change the safety culture of an organisation is that the safety of the individual comes first. There is a clear misalignment of individual values and the organisational values.

Key learning point: The essence of an organisation is its people. Aligning individual and organisational values starting from the point of recruitment is key. It will determine the level of positive influence future organisational initiatives will have on that individual and as a whole the ability of the business to be nimble, adaptable and versatile.

  • There can be misconceptions about the role of managers: The operational manager’s role is in the office in front of a computer or on the phone, not in the operational environment. They are formally dressed and protected from the elements and rightfully so because they have done their time and worked their way to the coveted position. Getting their hands dirty is not perceived as being a part of their job. In fact, if they have to, it is perceived as a sign of ineffective leadership.

Key learning point: Remote supervision is still ineffective. Supervision, aside from the task and process control, allows for greater visibility on the challenges personnel face, as well as the organisation as a whole.  It creates an opportunity to not only positively interact with staff, but also to mentor and influence them. Lastly, the continuous involvement with the operational environment enables the breakdown of filters as one rises up the ranks. Briefly stated, Manage By Walking Around (MBWA).

The organisational culture reflects our ability to progressively go beyond the individual or the problematic equipment, towards programme execution and finally to how the management system is organised, developed and controlled.

It enables us to increase our learning, our analytical depth and the scope of our initiatives that have a positive, long-term and enduring impact.

Share
.