Learning H&S indicators from economists
February 11th, 2010
Economic science could teach health and safety practitioners how to measure leading and lagging indicators of health and safety behaviour and performance.
Behaviour-based safety consultant and Safemap Africa MD Francois Smith told an engineering safety conference in Midrand that leading indicators, as defined by economists, are “measurable factors that change before performance displays a particular pattern or trend.”
Indicators commonly used to predict changes, are not always accurate. “Changes in leading indicators may predict the course the economy would take in future, although not with great accuracy”, said Smith, citing economists writing on Answers.com
“Examples of leading indicators are trending, such as increase,
decrease, or stasis (no change), regarding performance in business aspects like production, building permits, unemployment insurance claims, money supply, inventory changes, or stock prices.
“Lagging indicators, as defined by economists on About.com, are measures that change only after the economy had changed. Lost time injury frequency rates (LTIFRs) used in health and safety performance measurement, are also lagging indicators. These are of little use in looking ahead. Lagging indicators are helpful in confirming a trend.
“As defined by InvestorWords.com, lagging indicators change after the overall economy had changed. Examples include unemployment rates, labour costs, business spending, prime rate, outstanding bank loans and inventory book value.”
Leading indicators of health and safety performance include reliable records of hazards and risks, which become visible in audits, hazards, and minor incidents.
Reporting of minor incidents, named ‘near misses’, should be broken down into risks relevant to each site or job, like substances, fumes, exposures, horseplay, breach of instructions, sleeping on duty, water control, ergonomics, electricity, access security, slips and trips, intoxication, housekeeping, lockout, personal protective equipment condition and PPE use.
Smith’s experience in health and safety management teaches that all elements of current behaviour predict health and safety performance outcomes. Behaviour could be measured, and must include the measurement of positive and risk-averse behaviour.
Among the metrics that could predict behaviour, are quality levels of orientation training received by workers, regular and comparable audits of safe worker behaviour, results and quality of workers observations, level of involvement of workers in the safety process, level of job satisfaction when working in a crew or team, skills level of workers, risk perception and awareness, risk aversion or tolerance levels, level of participation in pre-task planning, and worker engagement.
The results of these metrics should focus the attention of managers, trainers, supervisors and workers, as much as the frequency curves of types of minor incidents do.
Management should apply leadership, goal setting, information, organisation, discipline, and other measures, to grow a workplace climate and culture based on realising shared values.
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