Safety on the line
In the battle to make Defence safer, winning the hearts and minds of members is the key to victory, Private John Wellfare reports.

PTE John Wellfare reports

Safety is a natural part of some Defence procedures, but in many cases it is regarded as a hindrance to getting the job done.

Photo by CPL Michelle Lucraft.

The higher level of threat during operational deployments doesn’t cancel out the need to take safety into account.

Photo by CPL Darren Hilder

WHEN the F-111 Deseal/Reseal Board of Inquiry reported to then-CAF Air Marshal Errol McCormack at the end of 2000, one of its findings exposed a serious problem for the entire Defence organisation – Occupational Health and Safety (OHS) failures were systemic or cultural in nature.

That is, the major OHS mistakes of the past could be repeated in an organisation of members with a safety-second attitude towards getting the job done.

That revelation, among other findings of the F-111 report, set in motion a series of initiatives to change the way Defence members look at OHS in the workplace.

One project, the Behavioural Baseline Research (BBR) survey, conducted from March to June last year across more than 10 per cent of the Defence organisation, aimed at establishing a benchmark, or behavioural baseline, from which to gauge the effectiveness of OHS initiatives.

The results from that first survey have been compiled and, according to Director General Occupational Health Safety and Compensation Branch Steve Grzeskowiak, offer an insight into Defence members’ opinions on health and safety.

“Putting in place fantastic OHS systems will not work if there is a culture of cutting corners and taking risks to get the job done,” he says.

“We went to all services and groups, questioned 12,000 people [and] got a huge response rate, a 79 per cent response rate, which for any survey is pretty good.

“This report provides a baseline of behaviours and attitudes as a snapshot in time.
“The plan is to repeat the survey in 2007 and in following years to provide Defence with trend information and to establish if we are making any headway into the areas we had identified as needing more work.”

Mr Grzeskowiak says the survey has already provided insights into how important people in Defence perceive OHS to be and what can be done to change faulty practices. Interestingly, more training is not the first item on the agenda.

“For the first time, really, we’ve actually got data that allows us to say that it’s not just our hunch that we need to, for example, train more people more thoroughly in risk assessments,” he says. “People are telling us that they get sufficient training, that they know how to do risk assessments, but when they go out to do the job, they get pressured to get the job done quickly and they have to cut corners.

“So that’s not a training issue, that becomes more of a cultural issue, an issue of prioritisation, if you like.”

The survey revealed that Defence members held the organisation’s senior leadership in high regard and that unit COs had the highest degree of influence over their units’ OHS behaviours, but many didn’t actively seek to improve health and safety.

“That’s not to say they’re doing anything bad,” Mr Grzeskowiak says. “They’re aware of health and safety, but the commitment to improve safety is not there. Obviously there are some who are very committed to safety.”

In support of the surveys, Mr Grzeskowiak’s team hosted focus groups to develop a more detailed understanding of OHS issues and attitudes in the organisation.

He says the key is integrating safety into Defence’s standard processes, rather than making it an extra consideration. But any changes to the culture of an organisation will take time and he doesn’t expect to see drastic changes straight away. He is, however, positive that the initiatives currently underway and those planned for the future will eventually change attitudes. The facts, he says, are on his side.

“There’s a lot of evidence out there that says doing things in a safe way doesn’t necessarily mean they take any longer to do or cost any more to do. In fact, if you do them safer and you don’t injure people, then you’re a lot better off.

“No one’s running away from the fact that this is the military and there are conflicts, and people have to do dangerous things.

“You recognise that the level of risk increases as you get closer to the front line, [but] that doesn’t mean you neglect safety.

“If safety is ingrained in the way that you do things, rather than an add-on that you do because somebody said so, then that will flow through to everything we do, including on the front line.”

For more information on the BBR survey, visit the intranet site here or to access the report,
email ohsc.dohspo@defence.gov.au.

Survey response rates
Where the results go

 

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