Historically, in the food industry product quality was considered to be the primary objective. As our understanding of management principles has grown safety is now more often seen as the most important area of focus. We have learnt that by concentrating on safety, which is one of the most difficult issues to manage, we can utilize the experience and skills developed to also significantly improve both product quality and productivity. Failure to address safety can result in high costs both on a personal and financial level.

In this article, we will examine how by putting safety at the top of the management agenda we can also gain important benefits elsewhere in the organization, thereby justifying safety’s preeminent position.

Here are some of the elements of a good safety program.

• Real commitment and leadership from the top of the organization.
• Establishment of a Site Safety Committee involving all levels of the organization.
• Regular departmental “tailgate” safety meetings.
• Maintenance of good statistical records of safety incidents.
• Regular Safety training.
• Completion of a Job Safety Analysis for all job functions.
• Behavioral Auditing programs.

Careful consideration of this list will prove that all of these elements are transferable to other aspects of the operation, in particular quality.

Real commitment and leadership from the top of the organization – If the senior management shows an enduring and active participation in safety, they set an example for all levels of the organization. The focus this provides ensures that safety (or other matters similarly handled) becomes part of the operating culture within the organization.

Establishment of a joint Site Safety Committee – Brings together all parts of the facility and provides a bridge between senior management and the shop floor. It enables managers to demonstrate their commitment to the safety program and, through their active participation, provides strong leadership towards resolving difficult issues. It also introduces the process of joint problem solving and teamwork.

Regular departmental “tailgate” safety meetings – This allows the line supervisors to demonstrate their own commitment to the well-being of their team and develop their rapport with their team’s members, built around an issue that involves all of them personally. It provides an opportunity for supervisors to develop as leaders and their subordinates to become involved individually, either through making presentations to the group, or by working on a team to solve a particular problem. This concept, or philosophy, is easily translated into other performance improvement programs covering areas such as quality and productivity.

Maintenance of good statistical records of safety incidents – A good safety program will generate a large amount of data on such things as incident reports, audits, suggestions and defects. This volume of data is difficult to manage and requires considerable resources to handle efficiently. Once such systems are in place they can easily form the basis for handling data from other areas such as quality assurance and production performance.

Regular Safety training – OSHA mandates a considerable amount of routine training of employees. Depending on the nature of the operation this often requires repeated emphasis. Setting up the system to record and deliver this training, including having personnel skilled in delivering such programs, is also of great value in providing the necessary training to effectively run a good quality system or other training needs within the organization.

Completion of a Job Safety Analysis for all job functions – Preparing a safety hazard analysis is a difficult and painstaking task. Each aspect of the job function has to be analyzed and recorded along with the appropriate actions to eliminate or minimize the risks associated with each task. A quality based HACCP analysis requires similar techniques and personal attributes as those required to do a safety hazard analysis, except that the emphasis is on reducing or eliminating risk to the product rather than to personnel.

Behavioral Auditing Programs – These programs are becoming increasingly popular and are focused on changes to people’s behavior as a means of improving safety. During these audits people are reminded about how their own actions, or inactions, will affect the safety of themselves and their fellow workers. These programs have been very good at eliminating risk within the workplace. Similarly, quality is most often adversely impacted by people’s actions or omissions. It is not difficult to demonstrate that a quality based behavioral auditing system can be of value.

This list is by no means exhaustive and it is not intended to oversimplify the level of commitment involved, but does demonstrate that the solutions to product quality and safety are analogous. In general, the application of sound management techniques to both issues should ensure a high standard of safety and quality within the organization. Therefore, a manager who successfully places safety at the top of his agenda, and the philosophy that is integral to a safety conscious organization, is also going to be able to see benefits in other areas of the operation.

Many organizations have difficulty with recording and analyzing data accurately. As with a quality system a good safety system will generate a vast quantity of data. Generating the systems to store, manage and analyze that data requires considerable management time and effort. Such systems, once developed, can easily be used as the basis for other data storage needs.

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