STEP Demonstrates That Your Safety Measures Work

By Don Moen, HR and Safety Director

Relatively few studies have been conducted on the correlation between the use of measures companies can take to keep workers safe on jobsites – leading indicators and the number of incidents/accidents and injuries that occur – lagging indicators. Thus, to quantify the positive impact of proactive injury and hazard elimination programs on the jobsite ABC has gathered data from STEP participants in construction. Then analyzed the aggregated data from STEP to determine how measures taken to prevent incidents actually improve lagging indicator performance. From this data we found STEP to be a great safety benchmarking and improvement tool which you as a member can use to measure your safety programs and policies. STEP is a Key Component detailed questionnaire to help you meet your goal of implementing and or enhancing safety programs that reduce jobsite incident rates. From STEP, now apply ABC’s world-class processes to improve safety performance regardless of company size or type of work and you have the ultimate in safety programs. Our model for a world-class safety program utilizes STEP and contains the following elements:

Leadership Commitment – Top Management Engagement and Commitment Matters
Employer involvement at the Top level of company management produces a 63% reduction in total accidents.

Cultural Transformation – New Hire Safety Orientation
New-hire orientations are standard practice throughout the construction industry and are designed to onboard new employees into the culture, policies and procedures of their new employer. This process is normally conducted before an employee sets foot on a jobsite or enters into a training program and can vary in length. The onboarding process can take many forms, but the most important aspect is introducing a new employee to the culture and norms of the company—to indoctrinate them and help them understand the how’s and why’s of what a company does and expects of the new employee. Here senior leadership delivers the introduction of the companies’ safety culture and core values. This process experiences nearly 50% lower incident rates than companies that limit their orientations to basic safety and health compliance topics.

Best Practices and Core Leading Indicators
A leading indicator is a system or process used to identify hazards and eliminate or minimize the condition to prevent injury. ABC STEP focuses on eight best practices/core leading indicators that have the most dramatic impact on safety performance

1. Toolbox Safety Talks – Can you brief employees on safety too much? No matter what you may have heard, there is no negative effect to conducting daily toolbox safety talks – brief, single topic training session of 15 to 30 minutes held on the jobsite for all employees. The less frequently this type of training is conducted the fewer safety topics covered, the higher the training indicators. Companies that conduct daily toolbox talks reduce total accidents by 85% compared to companies that hold them monthly.
2. Substance Abuse Programs – One-third of all incidents on construction jobsites are drug or alcohol-related. Companies with substance abuse programs/policies with provision for drug and alcohol testing where permitted are 60% safety than those without a program. Plus, substance abuse testing can be an effective method of incident prevention if used properly.
3. Safety Program Performance Review – A biannual review of safety program performance by executive leadership that evaluates whether the program is producing expected results and identifies opportunities for improvement leads to a 59% reduction in total accidents and a 60% reduction in days away from work.
4. Taking Action on Trailing Indicators – Training personnel to know the meaning and relevance of key safety rates and numbers such as EMR (Experience Modification Rate), TRIR (Total Recordable Incident Rate), and Dart (Days Away, Restricted or Transferred), leads to a 57% reduction in TRIR and a 62% reduction in DART rates.
5. Employer Supervisory Safety Meetings – Conduction weekly safety meetings with supervisors and distributing minutes for review leads to a 56% reduction in TRIR and a 59% reduction in DART rates.
6. Use of Personal Protective Equipment – Having a written PPE Policy that is consistently and universally enforced, conducting an annual needs assessment and continually investing in new equipment leads to a 55% reduction in total accidents.
7. Pre-planning for Jobsite Safety – Integrating safety pre-planning into the estimating, bid and pre-mobilization phases of a project leads to a 53%, reduction in TRIR and a 54% reduction in DART rates.
8. Safety Program Goal Setting – Implementing a formal process to annually assess safety program needs and establish safety goals lead to a 48% reduction in TRIR and a 50% reduction in DART rates.

The STEP Safety Management System provides a clear picture of what world-class looks like. Analysis of each of the Key Components’ scores against lagging indicator performance will continue to provide statistical evidence of how individual elements of a safety program contribute to performance. Combined with the resources developed by ABC and the construction industry companies will be able to identify and develop singular elements of their safety program to improve their safety performance further. Learn more about STEP here.