RESEARCH REPORT 042 - Health and Safety Executive

1 HSE Health & Safety Executive Evaluating the effectiveness of the Health and Safety Executive 's Health and Safety Climate Survey Tool Prepared by The Keil Centre for the Health and Safety Executive 2002 RESEARCH REPORT 042 HSE Health & Safety Executive Evaluating the effectiveness of the Health and Safety Executive 's Health and Safety Climate Survey Tool The Keil Centre 5 South Lauder Road Edinburgh EH9 2LJ United Kingdom The Health and Safety Executive (HSE) developed the Climate Survey Tool (CST) to provide organisations with practical help to promote employee involvement in Health and Safety and to improve aspects of their existing Health and Safety culture and climate. This REPORT analyses evidence from a number of users of the CST to determine its effectiveness and actions resulting from its use.

2 This REPORT and the work it describes were funded by the Health and Safety Executive (HSE). Its contents, including any opinions and/or conclusions expressed, are those of the authors alone and do not necessarily reflect HSE policy. HSE BOOKS Crown copyright 2002 First published 2002 ISBN 0 7176 2159 6 All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise) without the prior written permission of the copyright owner. Applications for reproduction should be made in writing to: Licensing Division, Her Majesty's Stationery Office, St Clements House, 2-16 Colegate, Norwich NR3 1BQ or by e-mail to ii CONTENTS 1.

3 Executive SUMMARY 1 WHY ASSESS LEVELS OF Safety CULTURE? 1 AIM OF THIS PROJECT 1 HOW THE PROJECT WAS UNDERTAKEN 1 THE OUTCOME 2 SUGGESTIONS FOR IMPROVEMENT 2 ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS 3 2. INTRODUCTION 4 WHAT IS THE CLIMATE SURVEY TOOL ? 4 WHY THIS PROJECT? 5 3. METHODS 6 SUMMARY OF INITIAL TELEPHONE INTERVIEWS 6 ADMINISTERING THE SURVEY 6 PROCESS GUIDELINES AND CST SOFTWARE 7 RESULTS 7 ACTIONS 7 BENCHMARKING SERVICE 7 REPEATED SURVEYS AND USER ORGANISATION EXPECTATIONS 7 4. SUMMARY OF IN-DEPTH TELEPHONE INTERVIEWS HELD WITH 25 USERS 8 OVERALL IMPRESSION OF USING THE CST 8 ADMINISTERING THE CST 8 RESPONSE RATES 9 COMMUNICATING RESULTS 10 CHOOSING FOLLOW-UP ACTIONS 11 SPECIFIC ACTIONS ARISING AS A RESULT OF USING THE CST 11 KEY CHALLENGES IN DECIDING ACTIONS 12 iii COMMUNICATING ACTIONS

4 12 EFFECTS ON EMPLOYEE PARTICIPATION 13 EFFECTS ON EMPLOYEE PARTICIPATION SUGGESTIONS FOR IMPROVEMENT 13 EFFECTS ON Health AND Safety 14 IDENTIFYING RISK TAKING BEHAVIOURS 15 COMPLIANCE WITH Health AND Safety RULES, PROCEDURES, INSTRUCTIONS 15 RETAINING MOMENTUM AND INTEREST IN THE CST 15 CST SOFTWARE 16 5.

5 THREE UK CASE STUDIES 18 INTRODUCTION 18 BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF CASE STUDIES 18 WESTINGHOUSE UK FUELS, SPRINGFIELDS 19 PILKINGTON GLASS, ST HELENS 23 BP SNS BUSINESS UNIT 27 6. CONCLUSIONS 33 FUTURE DEVELOPMENT OF THE CST 33 7. ANNEXE 1 ANALYSIS OF CLOSED QUESTIONS 35 ORGANISATIONS WHO HAVE USED THE CST 35 ADMINISTERING THE SURVEY 36 CST SOFTWARE 38 CST PROCESS GUIDELINES 41 THE CST QUESTIONNAIRE 41 CST RESULTS 43 ACTIONS FOLLOWING THE CST 44 THE BENCHMARKING SERVICE 45 HAS THE CST BEEN REPEATED? 47 HAVE USER ORGANSIATIONS' EXPECTATIONS BEEN MET? 48 iv 1. Executive SUMMARY The Health and Safety Executive (HSE) developed the Climate Survey Tool (CST)*1 to provide organisations with practical help to promote employee involvement in Health & Safety and to improve aspects of their existing Health & Safety culture and climate.

6 This REPORT analyses evidence from a number of users of the CST to determine its effectiveness and actions resulting from its use. WHY ASSESS LEVELS OF Safety CULTURE? The prevailing Health and Safety culture within an organisation, the way it approaches and manages Health and Safety issues, is a major influence on the Health and Safety -related behaviour of people at work. HSE advocate that developing a positive Health & Safety culture is important if high standards of Health and Safety are to be achieved and maintained. The tangible outputs or indicators of an organisation's Health and Safety culture, as perceived by individuals or work groups at a point in time, is often referred to as the organisation's ' Health and Safety climate'.

7 HSE developed the CST to help organisations determine some important aspects of their Safety climate and to aid the promotion of employee involvement in Health and Safety issues. AIM OF THIS PROJECT The Keil Centre, a firm of Chartered Psychologists specialising in human factors affecting Health and Safety , was asked to undertake an evaluation of the CST to: investigate how organisations are making use of the CST validate the CST implementation process guidelines provided by HSE establish the extent to which organisations are implementing changes based on the results from their own CST survey identify and disseminate best practice in using the CST provide case study examples of how the CST can be used to improve Health and Safety and improve risk control establish user organisations' levels of satisfaction with the CST.

8 HOW THE PROJECT WAS UNDERTAKEN The Keil Centre gathered the views of CST users in three ways to gain increasingly in-depth information: 1. an analysis of closed question responses to a brief telephone interview conducted by HSE personnel. This had gained the views of 213 users 2. in-depth interviews with 25 users to gain a better understanding of how the CST had been used, and what organisations did as a result 1 HSE Health & Safety Climate Survey Tool HSE Books 1997 ISBN 0 7176 1462 X For further information see 1 3. three case studies to provide detailed information on how the CST could be used to improve Health and Safety and improve risk control. THE OUTCOME 97% of users who participated in the initial closed question interviews indicated that their expectations of using the CST had been met or exceeded.

9 Moreover, participants in this study indicated that HSE's CST can: provide a helpful overview of an organisation's existing level of Safety culture indicate positive and negative aspects of an organisation's existing Health and Safety arrangements help organisations identify opportunities for improving Health and Safety management systems be an effective way to raise the profile of Health and Safety within an organisation act as a basis for engaging and involving employees in Health and Safety issues add weight to, or can trigger, proposals for improving existing Health and Safety arrangements identify perception gaps (relating to Health and Safety in the workplace)

10 Between managers, supervisors and the workforce provide justification for taking action in new areas, such as behavioural Safety provide organisations with a baseline against which they can monitor the impact of interventions designed to improve Health and Safety . provide organisations with an opportunity to benchmark their results with others help organisations identify problems with existing rules and procedures and can highlight areas where there is non compliance improve employee participation and levels of Health and Safety within the organisation It was encouraging to note that every organisation approached in the second and third part of this project (the in-depth interviews and case studies) had taken at least one action to improve Health and Safety as a result of using the CST.