Behavior Based Safety
Behavior Based Safety (BBS) describes an approach in modern occupational safety that is based on behavior analysis . Unsafe behavior by employees should be changed through positive intervention . Behavior Based Safety is considered to be the best studied and most successful method for changing behavior in the field of occupational safety.
Occupational safety has long been viewed as a purely management task. In the company (partly due to legal requirements) occupational safety specialists are active in the implementation of and compliance with occupational safety regulations. Attempts are made to compensate for the effects of possible misconduct by employees through changes to equipment and protective devices. It is known from the statistics of the employers' liability insurance association and other international organizations that the proportion of personal behavior in occupational accidents accounts for more than 85% (TR Krause, Leading with Safety ). If you want to significantly reduce the number of accidents, this factor must be considered.
The accident pyramid is often used as a means of visualization, which can be traced back to Heinrich's law drawn up by the American safety engineer Herbert William Heinrich , which defines a ratio of 1-29-300. Fatal accidents at work are recorded at the top of a pyramid. In the next lower level, all serious accidents are described, i. H. all accidents that result in the employee being absent. Lighter work accidents that require first aid or medical attention appear below this. These occupational accidents are precisely analyzed by the safety specialist, the respective operations manager and the person involved in the accident. In the next step, occupational health and safety experts try to derive measures from this that should prevent similar accidents in the future. The BBS approach considers an expansion of the basis under the pyramid developed so far. Not only are all near misses considered and their causes determined, but also every risky or unsafe behavior by employees (that would have had no consequences in this situation, but could have led to an accident at work).
Basics
Behavior as a cause
Successful BBS systems deal with the behavior and motives of employees that lead to behavior. It applies here that a behavior pattern is a personal assessment of the benefit. The personal benefit results from the individual's personal experience. Usually the ABC model is used to explain this issue.
A ctivator or A ntecedent (activator or history)
people tend principally to behavior by a personal advantage is expected. This advantage is determined by factors such as praise and recognition, financial incentives, time savings, work relief and others. So if a person's behavior is praised, he will try to show this behavior again in order to receive further praise. Imagine the following situation: An employee is rushing to finish an important product. He does not use his personal protective equipment during manufacture because he thinks it is taking too long to get and put on. No accident at work occurs during his work. He reports the finished product to his supervisor and receives praise for it because the product was completed on time. As long as the supervisor does not criticize the lack of protective equipment, but rather praises the performance, he will display the same behavior again in the future.
B ehavior
The “visible” behavior.
C onsequence
All effects that result from active behavior are referred to as consequence. In relation to the above example, this means the following: If the supervisor pays close attention to compliance with the occupational safety guidelines, he will regularly inform his employees of deficiencies. This behavior on the part of the supervisor is absolutely correct from a legal point of view and must be lived as it is. However, if the superior only reacts to deficiencies, this behavior is rather counterproductive. This is because it is not a question of praise for correct behavior, but reproach for wrong behavior. This in turn has an important effect: the person who has been blamed will try to hide the behavior in the future. As long as the opposite, namely the recognition of correct behavior, is not lived, these effects occur again and again. This is known from everyday business life, when all regulations are adhered to as long as superiors are present, but the old behavior is continued unobserved (for example during the night shift). In order to change behavior permanently, it is necessary to reward correct behavior. Even simple praise is considered a reward in this sense.
Another very important factor in behavioral psychology is continuity. If risky or unsafe behavior is sometimes tolerated and sometimes sanctioned or addressed, this has an impact on credibility. There will be no change in behavior as long as incorrect behavior (even in exceptional cases) is tolerated. But one of the most difficult factors is linked to this. It means that any unsafe behavior must be addressed. This is not easy to do in day-to-day operations, but it is necessary in order to change behavior.
The third factor in behavior change concerns timing. If positive behavior is shown, praise should be given as soon as possible. Not just days later. If wrong behavior is shown, this must also be signaled immediately.
There are therefore three basic principles for the BBS systems:
- Praise for right behavior
- Continuity as a clear commitment to occupational safety
- Prompt praise increases effectiveness
Unconscious behavioral influences
In addition to the measures listed above that must be taken in order to influence the behavior of employees, there are also factors that cannot be easily influenced. These are considered passive factors. This includes the search for one's own challenge, the habit and the underestimation of the probability of an accident occurring and thus the “illusion of one's own invulnerability”. All of these factors influence daily behavior and the perception of security measures. If you want to improve occupational safety in the company sustainably and in the long term, you have to deal with it in detail.
methodology
For a BBS system to be successful, it is necessary to react quickly and consistently to incorrect and correct behavior. Superiors cannot do this alone. In order to create a broader basis, an attempt must be made to attract as many employees as possible to actively participate. This serves two effects: On the one hand, the base becomes significantly broader; the more employees are involved in such systems, the higher the probability that regular observations and feedback will take place. On the other hand, each individual observation serves to raise one's own awareness. Since an observing employee must first think about whether an action is safe or unsafe, or why it is carried out in the present manner. One result of this could well be that the observed person has carried out the action safely and the observer has to reconsider his own approach in this situation. In the subsequent conversation it must be clarified why the action was carried out this way. It is also conceivable that errors or obstacles in instructions can be recognized through observations and can thus be corrected.
In practice, attempts are made to include all company employees as far as possible. This results in the difficulty that employees do not want to “tell” each other. Everyone fears punishment if unsafe behavior is exposed. To do this, it is first necessary to promote an open error culture . The observation principle must not be used to carry out punishments, which is why a BBS system is mostly anonymous and, in the best of cases, run by employees who enjoy a high level of trust among the workforce. Fostering this culture of openly dealing with mistakes is a management task. It is therefore crucial that managers understand the principles of BBS and implement them in their operations. As already described, one of the essential pillars of a BBS system is direct communication between (if possible, equal) colleagues, where the procedure is discussed and ways are sought to make this action safer in the future.
Another effect is the statistical evaluation of the observations. To do this, it is necessary to obtain as detailed information as possible about the unsafe behavior of employees. However, this information may in no way be used for disciplinary measures, which is why the team controlling the process is of particular importance. If written observations are to be evaluated (i.e. communication between observer and observed), it must be ensured that no information about the observed can be identified from the recordings. It should not be possible to draw conclusions from the place and time of observation. The control team provides detailed statistics from the incoming observations that can be used to train employees. The statistics may also reveal a basic problem with a work area, so that “conventional” safety work can gain valuable information from it.
Known difficulties
Difficulties around a BBS system are manifold and can hardly be described in general. In the following, some known errors are shown and what influence they can have on the system.
Communication is the key to success. The employees must have appropriate information about expectations, possibilities, extent, schedule and consequences of the process and be kept informed of the status. Only then can the culture that is crucial for success develop. That alone already poses difficulties for many companies, as new security and training measures involve increased effort and thus additional costs. Since BBS systems cause changes in the long term, these often cannot be evaluated quarterly and thus worsen the often necessary presentation of the company on the stock market.
Dealing openly with mistakes is not a matter of course. Employees are often reluctant to openly admit mistakes, as negative consequences are feared. Clear rules must be drawn up here to prevent incorrect use. A real improvement in occupational safety is only possible if even small uncertainties can be communicated openly. Lack of action disrupts participation in the system. If the employees recognize that their observations do not result in any measures, the system will quickly lose its involvement. It is therefore important to give the control team the appropriate options to implement the measures promptly. If there can be no action on a point, it must be communicated openly.
Rewarding participation in the observation process must be quality-oriented. The easiest way to increase participation is through rewards. Often, it is simply rewarded through participation (for example, through the number of observations in a selected period). The difficulty arises that possibly inferior quality observations are made and recorded just to participate in the reward system. It is better to evaluate the quality of detailed observations and to award them accordingly. One example is the qualification via the damage matrix . The severity of the damage and the probability of occurrence are entered in the matrix. If the damage can occur often, but only minor effects are to be expected (e.g. tripping over the edge of the floor, with only minor effects), the value of the matrix will be correspondingly small.
| Probability of occurrence | Little damage (first aid, no downtime) |
Medium damage (medical care, downtime) |
High damage (fatal accidents, fire, explosion) |
|---|---|---|---|
| Rarely (<2x in 5 years) | 1 | 2 | 4th |
| From time to time (once a year) | 2 | 4th | 8th |
| Often (> twice a year) | 4th | 8th | 16 |
References
- ↑ Thomas E. Boyce, E. Scott Geller: Applied behavior analysis and occupational safety: The challenge of response maintenance. In: Journal of Organizational Behavior Management. Philadelphia, PA 21.2001, H. 1, pp. 31-60. ISSN 0160-8061
- ↑ Jagdeep S. Chhokar, Jerry A. Wallin: Improving safety through Applied Behavior Analysis. In: Journal of Safety Research. 15.194, pp. 141-151. ISSN 0022-4375
- ↑ The German ABO psychologists Bernhard Zimolong, Gabriele Elke and Rüdiger Trimpop state with regard to BBS: "By far the most successful and most frequently examined programs for behavior change are based on the ABC framework of operant conditioning" (p. 654) in Bernhard Zimolong, Gabriele Elke, Rüdiger Trimpop: Health Management (PDF; 148 kB). In: B. Zimolong & U. Konradt (eds.), Engineering Psychology. Encyclopedia of Psychology. Subject area D (practical areas). Series III (Business, Organizational and Work Psychology). Volume 2 . Hogrefe Göttingen. 2006, pp. 633–668.
- ^ Thomas R. Krause, KJ Seymour, KCM Sloat: Long-term evaluation of a behavior-based method for improving safety performance: A meta-analysis of 73 interrupted time-series replications. In: Safety Science. 32.1999, pp. 1-18. ISSN 0925-7535
- ^ Angelica C. Grindle, Alyce M. Dickinson, William Boettcher: Behavioral safety research in manufacturing settings: A review of the literature. In: Journal of Organizational Behavior Management. Philadelphia, PA 20.2000, no. 1, pp. 29-68. ISSN 0160-8061
- ^ R. Bruce McAfee, Ashley R. Winn: The use of incentives / feedback to enhance work place safety: A critique of the literature. In: Journal of Safety Research. 20.1989, pp. 7-19. ISSN 0022-4375
- ^ Beth Sulzer-Azaroff, John Austin: Does BBS work? Behavior-based safety & injury reduction: A survey of the evidence. In: Professional Safety. 2000, pp. 19-24. ISSN 0099-0027
literature
- Christoph Bördlein: Behavior-Based Safety (BBS). Erich Schmidt Verlag, Berlin 2015, ISBN 978-3-503-16545-2 .
- E. Scott Geller: Working Safe. How to Help People Actively Care for Health and Safety. Lewis Publishers, 1996, ISBN 1-56670-564-9 .
- E. Scott Geller: The Participation Factor. American Society of Safety Engineers, 2002, ISBN 1-885581-37-8 .
- Thomas R. Krause: The Behavior Based Safety Process. Wiley, 1996, ISBN 0-471-28758-X .
- Thomas R. Krause: Leading with Safety. Wiley Interscience, 2005, ISBN 0-471-49425-9 .
- Terry E. McSween: Value-based Safety Process. Wiley Interscience, 2003, ISBN 0-471-22049-3 .