Presentation by Mark Stephens and Jason Edwards Theory into Practice: Safety Culture Presentation by Mark Stephens and Jason Edwards &

UnitingCare Queensland Blue Care, UnitingCare Community, UnitingCare Health UCQ is one of Australia's largest not for profit provider of community health and residential aged care. Over 20000 staff and volunteers 2200 vehicles Over 5000 fleet drivers Average 1000 drivers paid kilometer allowance (Grey Fleet) Travelling 32 Million Kilometres per year 10,000 client visits per week Australian Regional and Remote Care Services (ARRCS)

The Motivation Behind The Program Drivers with multiple crash history High incidents of reversing crashes At fault crashes with third parties that was well above industry averages Increasing rate of traffic infringements and a relationship between drivers with infringements and crashes Vehicles delivered to auction in poor condition resulting in reduced residual values Increasing insurance costs

Our Objectives To achieve a desired high level of best practice in fleet safety and instil a culture of road and vehicle safety by; providing drivers with the knowledge to be safe and courteous drivers implementing systems that identify risks and gaps in the operation of vehicles, drivers and cost centres developing interventions to address and reduce identified risks To achieve a high level of sustainability both for staff and fleet operations through; safe and responsible drivers low emission fleet cost effective fleet operations Ensuring “duty of care compliance” through; Policies, procedures and training in vehicle and driver safety Strategies to identify emerging Duty of Care responsibilities In line with our organisational Values to spread the road safety message to staff, volunteers and the community

The Journey in Facts – Blue Care

Management Support No significant change to practice or policy will succeed without unequivocal executive and centre management support. Before we commenced this program we made sure we had support from: Management with the commitment to achieve the objectives All levels of the organisation for the objectives and The authority to develop and implement change That costs of the program would not be a barrier to achieving our objectives

Methodology Education methods used to raise awareness Development of unique resources that Blue Care staff would relate to including safe driving handbooks, posters, dash stickers etc Awareness campaign including internal magazine articles, email messages, newsletters group orientation sessions and media releases. Training programs using contracted trainers targeting groups or individuals Use of Data to Identify focus areas Fleet management system Insurance register Infringement register Complaints register How managers and staff encouraged to participate Education in why the need to participate in driver safety awareness training Fleet funding of trainers, travel and venue hire

Partnerships The journey of developing and implementing a road safety program has involved a number of stakeholders both internal and external which was essential in achieving the objectives and the ongoing success of the program. RACQ CARRS-Q Queensland University of Technology Smartfleet Pickles Auctions

Distracted Drivers are Dangerous DO NOT USE YOUR MOBILE PHONE WHILE DRIVING Place any mobile devices out of reach to avoid temptation

Thank You

Overview of Safety Culture Theory Early origins – Chernobyl Growth in popularity Still little agreement over what it is 3 broad views of safety culture (Edwards, Davey & Armstrong, 2013)

Functional Interpretive Pragmatic Domain Theme What is culture? Measurement Responsibility Goal

Functional Interpretive Pragmatic Domain HR and Psychology Theme Any organisation should seek to have a strong/good safety culture What is culture? Good management practices Worker perceptions and attitudes Measurement Safety climate surveys Safety attitude surveys Responsibility Management Goal Safety as the top priority

Functional Interpretive Pragmatic Domain HR and Psychology Sociology and Anthropology Theme Any organisation should seek to have a strong/good safety culture All organisations have a culture which can influence safety What is culture? Good management practices Worker perceptions and attitudes Shared beliefs, attitudes and values (not necessarily about safety) Measurement Safety climate surveys Safety attitude surveys Spend time observing and talking to workers Responsibility Management No one can control culture Goal Safety as the top priority Understand culture to understand how to manage

Functional Interpretive Pragmatic Domain HR and Psychology Sociology and Anthropology Management Theme Any organisation should seek to have a strong/good safety culture All organisations have a culture which can influence safety We have a problem. Someone is doing something wrong What is culture? Good management practices Worker perceptions and attitudes Shared beliefs, attitudes and values (not necessarily about safety) Patterns of behaviour Measurement Safety climate surveys Safety attitude surveys Spend time observing and talking to workers Rates of near misses, incidents and injuries Responsibility No one can control culture “Who cares, what can we do” Goal Safety as the top priority Understand culture to understand how to manage People acting safe

Overview of Safety Culture Theory Different but all have merits Shared beliefs and values, and management practices are meaningless unless we can reduce safety problems Management practices, and attempts to fix behaviour won’t work if it goes against the beliefs and values of our workers Low incident rates don’t necessarily indicate good management. There may be a disaster waiting to happen Management practices and other contextual factors are interpreted by workers based on the beliefs and values they hold, leading to patterns of behaviour (Edwards et al. 2013; Guldenmund, 2010)

Typical Application In definitions the interpretive perspective is most common In practice and research, the functional and pragmatic approaches are most common

Typical Application Assumption:: A company recognises a problem, and is able and willing to change These companies usually either take a simple management approach or a functionalist approach Consistent with management of other issues Best practices are considered best practices for a reason Known to work Easy to find Easy to implement

UCQ UCQ identified a problem (too many crashes and near misses) Took an early management approach analysed the problem with the available data to work out how to fix it Determined a need to go further Need to developing a good culture (functional approach) Implemented a range of best practices, tailored to their organisation Major improvement in incident rates, but also positive feedback from drivers.

UCQ Done a great job applying the management and HR/Psychology approach. However, no evidence of applying a more interpretive/sociological understanding of culture It is not unusual for this approach to not be applied Could see further improvements by adding this to existing strategies By understanding the existing culture of a workforce, methods of safety intervention delivery, and well as unique approaches to solving problems can be developed resulting in further benefits to safety.

Thank you! Edwards, J., Davey, J., & Armstrong, K. (2013) Returning to the roots of culture: A review and re-conceptualisation of safety culture. Safety Science, 55, 70-80. Guldenmund, F. (2010). (Mis)understanding Safety Culture and Its Relationship to Safety Management. Risk Analysis, 30(10),1466-1480.