Content – Ten Elements of an Effective Safety Kickoff Volume Five by Safety Speaker John Drebinger

#5   Safety Kickoff Content – Tuesday, October 25th

A successful safety kickoff has many elements. The one most people think about is the content of the meeting and they forget the importance of the other elements. Once again, ask yourself does your content contribute to the outcome for which you are looking?

Content at a safety kickoff is often times a presentation by a guest speaker such as myself. It also includes comments by local and corporate leadership. I enjoy it when local or national union leadership is also speaking.

Keep Everyone Focused On Your Outcome

With all these contributors remember your outcome. Take some time to share your outcome with each presenter. Teach them to evaluate their comments in light of staying focused on the outcome. Remind them that in order to demonstrate the importance of safety the entire kickoff is dedicated to your outcomes.

I was speaking at a safety meeting at which a politician from the state legislature was invited to talk. He spoke for over forty-five minutes about all he had done to improve the economic situation for that portion of the state. He had been given ten minutes and ended up going thirty-five minutes over. It wouldn’t have been an entire disaster if he had at least focused on safety but of the forty-five minutes only two were spent telling us how much he valued safety. The measure of value he placed on safety was displayed to the audience in that he spent less than five percent of his time on the subject.

You need to remind everyone involved that while it is tempting to tackle other subjects while you have everyone together it does send a message that safety isn’t as important when it gets pushed back by other topics.

An exception to this can be to eliminate things that would get in the way of your safety kickoff message. For example, at one site, three days before the kickoff, its corporate office announced they were being split off into a different company. An executive vice president from the corporate office made a statement and then answered questions for about one half hour before my presentation. This was entirely appropriate because without that everyone would not have been focused on the content of the safety kickoff.

I must share they were fortunate I was hired as their kickoff speaker because I was able to merge the VP’s comments into my safety talk and even included a module explaining that during times of change it is even more critical for everyone to stay focused on safety because of the mental distractions.

One of my favorite speaking situations is when I follow a key corporate or union leader with my presentation. A skill I learned years ago was the ability to take notes on their talk then weave their comments and mine together so each reinforces the other. After one presentation when I followed a CEO, I had the opportunity to visit with them on our ride to the airport. The CEO mentioned to me that my speech fit in so perfectly with theirs they would have bet that I had a copy of their speech ahead of time, yet they knew I didn’t because it was only in their possession. I would be just as glad to customize my presentation to fit in with the content of your corporate or union leadership.

A Good Story Isn’t Enough

I have had the privilege of coaching several safety speakers on how to make the most impact with their speech. In fact, one client hired me to come in one day early to meet with the employees who were telling safety stories to help them have the best impact possible.

The safety-speaking field is an interesting one. Practically any outside speaker you bring in will get comments from the audience that they are the best safety speaker they have ever seen. The reason for those comments is that too often they have been exposed to boring safety material. A mistake safety kickoff organizers sometimes make is to confuse positive feedback with effectiveness. Too often a great and moving emotional story has the audience in their grasp but because they haven’t studied the science of communication they don’t get the outcome for which you are looking. It takes someone with a knowledge of speech coaching and effectiveness to engineer a story so that it gets a result. Be careful who you put in front of your employees. As I mentioned, I have coached some very effective speakers and if I am ever unable to be booked for your event because of a prior engagement my marketing director, Diane Weiss, will be able to recommend one of them to you.

PowerPoint Presentation Tips

“Luke, beware the dark side of the Force.”

Yoda

“Beware the dark side of Power Point.”

Drebinger

A big part of many kickoffs today is some form of a PowerPoint presentation. I have actually had applause when an audience finds out I am not using PowerPoint. The challenge is it has been abused just as many great tools get abused.

The key to a great Power Point presentation is to avoid being seduced by the technology and forgetting your message.  Recently, I interviewed some great trainers. I asked them how many hours they spent preparing for their presentation and then, I asked them of those hours how many went into preparing their Power Point presentation. For many of them, they spent more time on the Power Point than on their content.

Here are some simple tips

• Keep slides to a minimum.
• Avoid every cute trick. Once again, ask the question, “Does this contribute to the outcome of my presentation?”  If the answer is no, you may have a problem.
• Just because you think it is so cool that characters can noisily arrive on the page, not everyone else does. It seems disproportionately wonderful to you because you just spent hours discovering how to use the technology and want to share it with everyone.
• As a show, make sure they can hear the music.
• Check visibility by sitting in different places in the room.

Great uses of Power Point

• Using Power Point as a multi-media slide show is one of its best uses.
• You can mix music and photos into a presentation to run before your meeting, during your meeting, or during breaks.
• Combined with digital photography you can put photos from that day right into the pre-prepared presentation.

Are You Looking For The Best Content?

You may not have twenty-one years to develop a speech for your safety kickoff but I have! If you want to be guaranteed to have content that will get you the outcome you want then you should give Diane Weiss a call at 209-745-9419. She can help you select the best fit one of my presentations will have with your outcomes. These presentations have been developed and sharpened over the past twenty-one years.

Would You Like to Share This Article With Others?

This newsletter is the 5^th in a series of ten on how to have an effective safety kickoff. If you would like to share any of these articles go to http://www.drebinger.com/?page_id=690

where they have been posted on my daily blog. When reprinting or emailing please include credit to: John Drebinger Presentations 209-745-9419 and www.drebinger.com

Outcome Based Presentations For Your Safety Kickoff

“Would You Watch Out For My Safety?”
We tell everyone that they should be their “brothers keeper” and yet we don’t teach them how to do it. This presentation which accompanies my new book by the same title is designed to create a culture in your workplace where watching out for each other is the norm rather than the exception.

“Would You Watch Out For My Safety?” will:
• Give people the five reasons they should watch out for the safety of others.
• Explain the three reasons people fail to watch out for the safety of others and then give them a perspective that will allow them to overcome the obstacles that keep people from helping others.
• Give them specific techniques they can use immediately to share safety with someone else in a way both people will feel great.
• Finally the most important lesson of the presentation is showing people how to respond when someone watches out for their safety. This lesson ensures that people will continue to watch out for each other and will seek out ways to watch out for the safety of their fellow worker.

This presentation is so powerful that John has written a book by the same title that is provided for each attendee so they can review what they have learned and share it with their family and friends. It has been so well-received that we have already made our second printing of 5,000 copies only four months after our releasing the book.

“Ensure Your Safety”
If you want people to take personal responsibility for their own safety on and off the job this presentation is for you.

Your employees will learn:
• Why they need to take personal responsibility for their own safety.
• How to stay focused in order to ensure safe performance.
• How distractions impact their personal safety.
• How to regain their focus on safety when distractions get in the way.
• Why they want to avoid shortcuts for themselves and others.

Everyone will develop a positive association between safety and their job and understand how working safely directly benefits them and their families, today and in the future. Using magic, group participation, specific safety principles and universal truths, John will show the seasoned worker why they play a vital role in helping the “new guy” work safely by avoiding shortcuts and doing everything the safest way we know how.

John shows them why using the appropriate personal protective equipment ensures their safety even when machinery fails or human errors occur. This presentation covers safety from the time they leave home to driving safely back to their family at the end of the day.
His unique presentation breaks through the mindset of, “We have heard it all before.” His magic captures their attention, and the message they hear will make them take action resulting in fewer injuries.

“Safety as a Value”
In this completely different program, John shows your employees how to improve their own safety by sending the right message via their actions and words at work and home.

Your Employees Will Learn:
• What their real values are.
• How to convey those values to their family and friends.
• Safety is a value for everyone.

The key to his insightful approach is the premise that safety must be a personal value, and that values don’t change when conditions change, even in tough times. John will help your people raise their expectations, vision, passion, and energy to work safely and make a safer and more productive workplace.

With new stories and magic, this presentation will help your employees continue their enthusiasm and focus toward another year of safety success!

What do you want from a safety presentation?
• People to walk out saying, “That was the best safety meeting they have ever attended.”
• Everyone to talk about the safety meeting long after it is over.
• You want all of the above and most of all you want to get results. It doesn’t matter if everyone loved the speaker, their message, and yet they don’t change how they work.

John Drebinger is the only top safety speaker specifically trained to deliver an effective message. In addition to his Bachelors degree in Speech he has been a member of the National Speaker’s Association for over 16 years and has attended seminars from some of the most effective communicators in the nation.

From the descriptions listed above you have already noticed something that separates John Drebinger from other professional safety speakers. As an author and speaker he has many different presentations he can do for your employees. To help you deliver your safety message John customizes each of his presentations to convey your theme and concepts. Unlike many other safety speakers who have only one speech or story to tell, John has developed presentations that build on each other to help you improve your safety performance.

Logistics
John can do multiple presentations during the day so that all your shifts can hear his outstanding message. Diane Weiss his marketing director can help you with your scheduling as she has worked with hundreds of companies over the past twenty-one years and knows what will serve you best.

John’s presentations can be done in virtually any location. If you can safely gather an audience he can get his message to them.

These presentations are designed for employee meetings with 45 minutes to 1-hour time available.