Persons, should not concentrate only on production activities at the cost of lack of safety, for the sake of furthering their careers. They should not ignore safety and allow things to go unsafely in their domain of work. Just ordering subordinates to ensure safety is not sufficient. Doing work unsafely will not enhance productivity in the long run. May be in a project, there were no accidents inspite of unsafe work culture. But, that is because of some luck i.e. all unsafe parameters did not converge, by fluke. But, this can not be a norm. And, safe practices do not delay the work. In fact, in the long run, safety will enhance the productivity. If it is found such arrogant managers are there, management should sack them without hesitation. Because, these are the persons who do not mind in jumping the ship in case of change of situation. Visibility of the managers in shopfloor and interaction with field staff frequently is required. This will help the managers to see the things as it is and also learn what are the issues faced by field personnel so that appropriate actions and allocation of resources can be done.
In general, safety departments anywhere do not have the authority to cut power supply or prevent persons from doing the work where hazards are present. As it is, safety department functions in advisory capacity only. Only those managements which do understand the importance of having safety in the workplace lend an ear to the safety department. And in these places, employees too will be happy and join hands for higher productivity.
How many organizations stop the work if a hazard is spotted and restart only after taking corrective and preventive actions is debatable. One may tell that safety is first. But, I am not sure in how many places really it receives top priority.
In general, production, quality and safety take slots from top to bottom in that order. Even those who got statutory powers to enforce safety also will have second thoughts before taking the violating organizations to court of law. This can be said firmly due to the accidents taking place in the production facilities and how many of these were found guilty and taken to task in inspections. Under staffing and having support facilities to regulators is also one of the reasons for this.
What is required is self discipline and strict implementation of statutory provisions and strengthening of the hands of regulators. Any violation should lead to total stoppage of the facility. Any person in the organization should be able to tell hazards in the place and take to the notice of concerned for rectification. Persons identifying shall not be ridiculed or punished.
Similarly, one should not think that punishing by fines or paying compensation will control the situation. Just ordering fines is not enough. It is said nobody can put a value to the life. It is not a commodity to assign a value. The compensations offered for an injury or death during accidents really do not have any meaning. It is to be seen by life value assessors in the perspective that what value they find for their own life in case of an injury or fatality. A person earning something may earn many times of it either in the same company or different company or by self employment. There are many cases where persons started career as peons, paper boys, etc have become millionaires and provided employment to many. Then what is the value for emotional attachment with family and friends.
