Are You Proactive or Reactive? By Safety Speaker John Drebinger
Are You Proactive or Reactive? By Safety Speaker John Drebinger
Going from reactive to proactive. At a recent meeting, someone questioned a new policy that was being implemented. They wondered if something had occurred to trigger this. The question comes from someone who is used to companies that react and make changes when something has gone wrong. This company is committed to making sure nobody gets hurt. Instead of waiting for an incident they look at their processes and constantly look for ways to do them better and safely. Because of that the answer to the above question was the parent company was being proactive.
The Value of Follow Up
In this case, the new policy was to follow up on certain activities. Follow up sends a great message. It reminds those contractors what is expected from them includes some performance expectations. I believe this is important because sometimes people may assume you are just spouting a safety policy to keep OSHA or some other agency happy but you really don’t mean it. People also will use the above belief as an excuse saying, “I thought they really didn’t expect that.“
Either way, it reminds us how important feedback and paying attention are to the communication process. Just because you have communicated something very clearly to someone it doesn’t mean they understood it the way you meant it. As a safety speaker, I have found that results are often the best measure.
