Connecting Safety to Purpose

In our Beliefs about Safety post, we observed that it’s better for both safety and performance to assume people are the solution, not a problem to be solved. We also said that it’s ok to provide boundaries and conditions and expect people to work inside them. In this post, we want to talk about how to unleash people to be and do their best.

Most people are drawn to the work they do and the industry they are in for the very best of reasons.

I was reminded of this when recently talking to one of our construction clients.  Taking him through a Why Discovery conversation, it struck me that most people, whether talked about or not, work in their industry for deeply personal reasons.

After several questions, this person told me that they joined the industry to improve other peoples’ lives, by bringing to the world the infrastructure that contributes to society’s development, be this bridges, tunnels, buildings or infrastructure. The presence of these physical things makes the world an better place, he believed, and a more pleasant experience for the everyone.

Indeed, we have a past construction client whose tagline is, Bringing Engineering to Life, which eloquently sums this concept up. Whether in energy, mining or manufacturing, or whatever sector you can imagine, this higher purpose, cause or belief of contributing to others — this Why — is real for people, even if not fully visible or expressed.

Yet, in many industries, people still get hurt, and sometimes killed in the course of their work. When this happens, it puts pressure on people who believe in the purpose of the business but recognise the pain caused by these events. Some give up on the noble cause of business and become resigned or cynical, and others take up the torch of safety and try to make it the purpose of their life’s work.

Living with this dilemma is really tough. But as humans, we’re good at dealing with tough stuff and can create ways to ‘live’ with it — not to like it but to live with it.  We may create a story that it is the inevitable cost of doing the work we do, but as long as we are enhancing many peoples’ lives, maybe it’s ok. Or, we make up another story that safety is the most important thing at any cost, even at the expense of the business success.

But if we are truthful to ourselves, none of these stories we tell ourselves really takes away from the internal struggle with ourselves; it simply just doesn’t feel right. In addition, it appears we have hit a plateau in the performance improvements in safety and productivity.

It may dawn on us that the only real option is to find a way to move forward that is outside the current paradigm, the very thinking that holds the current circumstances in place.

The best way to do this is to start to unpack some of the stories or assumptions that are deeply entrenched in our collective belief systems. The three most common assumptions are: