OHS Professional Magazine June 2022

PROFESSIONAL A U S T R A L I A N I N S T I T U T E O F H E A LT H & S A F E T Y P U B L I C AT I O N

JUNE 2022

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The journey to influence, success and status for OHS 2022 HSE job market trends: a seller’s market

How effective are health and safety training programs?

How to bridge the process safety-OHS gap

JUNE 2022

18 The journey to influence, success and status for OHS: The health and safety profession is on a journey to greater influence, status, and success, and significant strides have been made in recent times to further advance this journey

contents Features

OHS Professional Published by the Australian Institute of Health & Safety (AIHS) Ltd. ACN 151 339 329 The AIHS publishes OHS Professional magazine, which is published quarterly and distributed to members of the AIHS. The AIHS is Australia’s professional body for health & safety professionals. With more than 70 years’ experience and a membership base of 4000, the AIHS aims to develop, maintain, and promote a body of knowledge that defines professional practice in OHS.

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2022 HSE job market trends: a seller’s market: COVID-

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How to bridge the process safetyOHS gap: There are both gaps and

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Leading safety from the front at Schneider Electric: Why Pat Vitalone

related challenges have turbocharged demand for work health and safety professionals in recent times, according to a recent analysis of HSE jobs

Freecall: 1800 808 380 Phone: (03) 8336 1995 Postal address PO Box 2078 Gladstone Park VIC 3043 Street address Unit 2/217-219 Mickleham Rd Tullamarine VIC 3043 Membership enquiries email: membership@aihs.org.au Editorial Craig Donaldson email: ohsmagazine@aihs.org.au Design/Production Anthony Vandenberg email: ant@featherbricktruck.com.au Proofreader Heather Wilde Printing/Distribution SpotPress

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How effective are health and safety training programs? Employers make significant investments in WHS-related training.

However, research suggests employees do not always apply newly acquired learnings to working on-the-job.

overlaps between process safety and OHS, and there are a number of important lessons professionals in both fields can learn from each other

won the Health & Safety Rep of the Year in the Australian Workplace Health & Safety Awards

Advertising enquiries Advertising Manager, Robbie O’Rourke Ph: (03) 9974 3315 Fax: (03) 9012 4215 E: robbie2@mediavisionaust.com.au For the OHS Professional magazine media kit, visit www.aihs.org.au.

Disclaimer: The opinions expressed within are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect AIHS opinion or policy.

No part of this magazine may be reproduced in whole or in part without the permission of the publisher. Advertising material and inserts should not be seen as AIHS endorsement of products or services

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Regulars

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@AIHS_OHS

Four safety traps (and solutions) for principal contractors with JV and alliance projects: There are a range of safety challenges that can arise for principal contractors working in a JV/alliance contex

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From the editor

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Chair’s Note

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News

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Partnerships

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Book review

Australian Institute of Health and Safety

JUNE 2022 | OHS PROFESSIONAL

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EDITORIAL NOTE

Lifting standards through the OHS certification program The OHS certification program plays an important part in the OHS profession’s ongoing journey to relevance, status, and success, writes Craig Donaldson

Craig Donaldson, editor, OHS Professional

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IHS CEO Dave Clarke wrote about the OHS profession’s ongoing journey to relevance, status, and success in the last edition of the magazine. His CEO message generated some good comments online, with many OHS professionals weighing in on the debate. It is true that the AIHS is on a journey, and it has certainly come a long way under Dave Clarke’s leadership.

Having edited OHS Professional magazine for more than 12 years, I’ve witnessed the journey the institute has been on from its latter SIA days and previous two CEOs, through to the respectable industry association it is today. Is it perfect? No. But as a professional body, it is like night and day comparing the AIHS of today to the SIA of yesterday. The AIHS is on a journey (just like the profession) to relevance, status, and success, and Dave Clarke and the hardworking team at the institute are focusing on what needs to be done to lift standards in the industry through initiatives such as the OHS certification program.

Feedback from many in the industry about the program is positive, while others remain less convinced. It is a big step in the right direction, and there are encouraging signs that an early majority are undertaking certification. The cover story for this issue (beginning page 18) builds on Dave’s message from the last issue and delves further into the profession’s journey to influence, success, and status. Richard Coleman, head of HSE – Australia Hub at Laing O’Rourke, for example, explains the certification program establishes an important professional floor of skills and capabilities for the profession. Richard is undertaking the certification program (even though he doesn’t really need to, with a long career and some of the biggest health and safety roles in Australia under his belt together with a Masters’ degree in OHS). There are some senior OHS professionals in Australia who might view the certification program with some scepticism. But this is where it’s important to take a step back and look beyond one’s own person and job and consider the broader profession, and the kind of legacy you would like to be part of and contribute to.

As Richard notes in the article: “It is a commitment more broadly to the profession.

It’s a standard, and just like other professional graduates such as a doctor, a lawyer, or an accountant, there is an expectation that you will have the correct qualification and have gone through the certification process that sits across the top of it. Most people would argue that these professions are well respected, and you would expect quality advice from such professionals. I would love for health and safety professionals to be perceived in the same way.”

Also in this edition, our latest OHS Body of Knowledge feature (page 26) examines

both the gaps and overlaps between process safety and OHS, and the important lessons professionals in both fields can learn from each other. In this article, Trish Kerin, a professional process safety engineer and director of the IChemE (Institution of Chemical Engineers) Safety Centre, explains both OHS and process safety need to recognise each other and work to the common aim of preventing injury. This requires awareness of and respect for the other discipline. “When we see something, we think may not be quite right to do with the other discipline, we should be calling each other for advice,” says Kerin.

“Consider the broader profession, and the kind of legacy you would like to be part of and contribute to” Lastly, our research-based feature (page 12) details the findings of Thanh Tung Pham’s PhD research, which examines the effectiveness of OHS-related learning and development initiatives and how well (or not) this is applied on the job – particularly in the construction industry. Importantly, his research also identified training characteristics likely to enhance learning transfer behaviour, and he details some effective interventions that organisations can utilise to improve the transfer of newly acquired learning to the workplace. n

The OHS Professional editorial board 2022

CHANELLE MCENALLAY National safety, property & environment manager, Ramsay Health Care

DAVID BORYS Independent OHS educator & researcher

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KAREN WOLFE General manager of high reliability, ANSTO

KYM BANCROFT Head of Health, Safety and Environment (AsPac), Serco Asia Pacific

LIAM O'CONNOR HSET group manager, SRG Global

LOUISE HOWARD Executive director of safety, Transport for NSW

MICHAEL TOOMA Managing partner, Clyde & Co Australia

PATRICK HUDSON Professor, Delft University of Technology

STEVE BELL Partner, Herbert Smith Freehills

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CHAIR'S NOTE

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What will your leadership legacy be?

A leader’s legacy provides support and encouragement for others and enables them to solve important health and safety problems, writes Naomi Kemp

L Naomi Kemp, Chair of the Australian Institute of Health & Safety

eadership legacy is one of those phrases that we have a general understanding of, and we use it loosely when we talk about politicians and high-profile leaders. Yet, putting it into practice ourselves can be more challenging than we can imagine. In our work as health and safety practitioners and professionals, we see the need for leaders to consider the legacy they are building and the culture it creates in the organisation they lead. I know that I often try to appeal to or influence management to be better safety leaders, citing the likes of the Honourable Kenneth Hayne AC QC or the popular author Simon Sinek – “the leader sets the tone.”

While we recognise leaders do not have to be managers, I feel as a profession, we sometimes forget to think about ourselves as leaders no matter what level we are at in an organisation or in comparison to the Global OHS Capability Framework. Before I move on, take this as a reminder that you are a leader, and in the work you do, you will leave a legacy through the support and encouragement you give to others to grow and feel enabled to solve the health and safety problems they face at work.

I have chosen to write about leadership legacy because they are two of the institute’s values.

“Legacy is about being grateful and honouring the contributions that have built what is here today” Leadership is required to drive positive change within industries, organisations, and our community, so we must be credible and trusted. And legacy is about being grateful and honouring the contributions that have built what is here today. It is these values which I am reflecting on as we transition into a new era of management and say goodbye to our steadfast CEO and leader, David Clarke.

They say being a “manager” is not the prerequisite for leadership, but if you have “manager” in your title, your responsibility is much greater than simply managing a process. The remit is to deliver results through people by coaching, challenging, and creating stretch for them and the

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organisation to grow. When David joined the institute in September 2014, he did so knowing that it would take an astute manager to fix the challenging financial position of the SIA, and require a strong leader – a leader who could bring together the various branches into a collaborative national association, and one who could build a sustainable national office with a healthy work environment.

He does not like to be called a ‘fix-it CEO,’ but there is no denying that his command and control in the early years fixed the SIA. But he has done more than fix the organisation. During these last almost eight years, David has been instrumental in the institute implementing and delivering on its capability agenda, which he wrote about in the March Issue of OHS Professional. He has facilitated the growth of the institute’s revenue significantly and, in more recent times, sustained revenue levels during the COVID pandemic – something not all CEOs could say they were able to achieve.

There are critics everywhere these days, and when you step forward and take on a leadership role, you most certainly gain your fair share of them. Not everyone will like you, agree with you, or even follow you. While David has his critics, many of us recognise the leadership legacy he will leave behind. As this will be the last OHS Professional issue published under David’s leadership, I thought I would take this opportunity to thank him for his dedicated service, for his contributions that have helped build what we have today, and wish him all the very best for the future.

In the coming months, we will be recruiting our next CEO and supporting our staff during the transition. It is a pivotal time for the future of the institute with leadership changes, including the new Chair and Deputy Chair of the College of Fellows and the new Chair of the Certification Governance Committee. Professor Dino Pisaniello, Sarah Cuscadden, and Christine Edwards all bring fresh enthusiasm and diverse strategic mindsets to the broader leadership group of the institute.

I look forward to working with them to continue developing world-class health and safety practice and a diverse, influential community of practitioners, professionals, and leaders positively shaping workplaces and communities. n

JUNE 2022 | OHS PROFESSIONAL

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AIHS NEWS

More workers report their health is going downhill

QLD: first individual convicted for industrial manslaughter

According to a Safe Work Australia analysis, the self-reported health of workers has declined noticeably since 2016 while unsuccessful return to work attempts continue to increase, and employee perceptions of employer support have reduced over the past few years. The National Return to Work Survey found a significantly greater proportion of respondents rated their health as fair or poor in 2021 (31.5 per cent) and 2018 (30.1 per cent), compared to 2016 (21.9 per cent) and 2014 (23.7 per cent). Furthermore, despite steady headline measures in return to work rates, 2021 continued to see a significant increase in the proportion of unsuccessful return to work attempts (those who had to take additional time off since returning to work, due to workrelated injury or illness), at 25.2 per cent (compared to 19.6 per cent in 2018, which was also significantly higher than the 15.9 per cent seen in 2016). There were also significant declines in 2021 across all six statements which measure employer support (61.0 per cent to 74.4 per cent) compared to 2018 (65.2 per cent to 79.5 per cent).

A Gympie businessman has become the first person prosecuted and convicted under Queensland’s industrial manslaughter laws. At a hearing in the Gympie District Court, Jeffrey Owen was sentenced to five years in jail over a workplace incident in which his friend was crushed to death by a falling generator being moved from the back of a truck.

The offence occurred at Owen’s Electric Motor Rewinds in Gympie.

The business, operated by Owen, involved repairing and maintaining electrical items, including generators. A Workplace Health and Safety Queensland investigation revealed that on 3 July 2019, a generator was delivered on a flatbed truck and a friend of Owen helped him unload the generator. The defendant used a forklift to remove the generator from the back of the truck, but it fell from the tines and landed on his friend.

The court heard that Owen’s conduct caused the death of his friend in that he negligently operated the forklift. His conduct was negligent because he was not licenced to operate a forklift and the business he ran had no documented health and safety procedures.

ACTU report: 32 per cent more deaths at work since 2018

Regulator issues warnings about amusement ride safety

One worker is killed every two days on the job in Australia, which is a 32 per cent increase in workplace fatalities and an 8 per cent increase in workplace injuries from 2018, according to a recent ACTU report.

A further 5000 people will die each year from diseases caused by their work. More than 100,000 will be seriously injured and receive workers’ compensation, said the report Morrison missing in action in work health and safety. The calculations, mostly based on Safework Australia’s key WHS statistics Australia 2021 and an ACTU calculation using preliminary fatality figures for 2020 and 2021, also suggested mental health conditions have increased in frequency, rising to 9 per cent of all injuries. It was also found that 28 per cent of workers injured at work did not take time off work when they needed to, according to statistics from an ACTU Work Shouldn’t Hurt – 2021 report, which also found that more than half of workers did not take time off because they feared negative consequences for their job.

WorkSafe Victoria recently cautioned amusement ride operators across Victoria to make safety a priority as the industry re-opened following two quiet years due to COVID. WorkSafe has completed 279 inspections at events this year – including the Grand Prix, Moomba, St Kilda Festival, and the Australian Open – and issued one improvement notice for inadequate guarding on the passenger doors of one ride.

Last November, WorkSafe also issued an improvement notice to a ride operator after patrons became stuck due to a mechanical fault.

WorkSafe Victoria executive director of health and safety Narelle Beer said the maintenance of rides should already be completed as operators set up for Easter. “Every person who uses amusement rides, or works with them, has the right to do so without risking their lives or an injury,” Beer said. “In light of two recent incidents on amusement rides interstate, including one where a child was injured, we’re reminding Victorian duty holders of their obligations.”

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AIHS NEWS

Safe Work Australia reviews high-risk work licensing for cranes Safe Work Australia is reviewing high-risk work licensing for cranes and has invited public consultation on a discussion paper examining contemporary industry work practices and equipment. The paper also focuses on perceived issues with the model WHS laws related to crane licensing that may significantly impact workers, businesses, and the community, including issues related to crane licence classes and crane definitions. The latest national data available shows that, as of April 2022, there were more than 220,000 active crane licences across Australia. However, less than 7000 tower crane licences were issued nationally in 2015, and the paper said this suggests there may be a disproportionately high number of tower cranerelated incidents. In NSW, between 2012 and 2019, the industries with the highest proportion of crane incidents were construction, manufacturing, and transport/storage, and being “hit by load” was the most common cause of crane incidents (42 per cent).

SHARING OUR VISION – DIAMOND MEMBERS Programmed Safe365 Limited Safety Champion Software Pty Ltd SAI360

GETTING CONNECTED – SILVER MEMBERS Aurecon Australasia Pty Ltd Australian Unity Brisbane Catholic Education Clough Projects Australia Pty. Ltd Compita Consulting Pty Ltd Craig Mostyn Group Downer EDI Ltd Engentus PTY LTD FIFO Focus Guardian Angel Safety Pty Ltd Herbert Smith Freehills HOK Talent Solutions

Regulators issue safety reminders as construction booms WHS regulators across Victoria and NSW launched safety compliance crackdowns and warned employers to put safety first as activity in the construction sector continues to increase. SafeWork NSW cracked down on dangerous work practices with a targeted operation in Bankstown and Rockdale. The week-long safety blitz saw 35 construction sites visited, 86 improvement notices issued, and 16 prohibition notices handed out. NSW Minister for Fair Trading Eleni Petinos said the first priority of the NSW Government is safety, with falls from heights still the number one killer on NSW construction sites. “We take a zero-tolerance approach to lives being placed at risk. This means a construction sector with no site taking unacceptable risks when it comes to working with heights. As a result of the SafeWork NSW inspections, two construction sites were fined $3,600 for failing to meet safety compliance around heights. We want to ensure construction sites have the appropriate safety systems and the right safety equipment in place to prevent incidents causing serious injury or death,” Minister Petinos said.

INVESTING IN HEALTH & SAFETY – GOLD MEMBERS

Corporate Members APPENATE PTY LTD Art of Work Pty Ltd Avetta Enablon Australia Pty Ltd HealthSafe NZ Limited

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Alium Works Australian Army Clade Solutions Coles Group EY Federation University FZTEST Org Insync Workplace Solutions

Investigations Differently Kitney OHS PFP Robotics Pty Ltd T/A Presien Relevant Drug Testing Solutions Sydney Metro Teamcare Insurance Brokers Pty Ltd Transport for NSW Uniting

BEING PART OF THE NETWORK – BRONZE MEMBERS Myosh Pilz Australia Port of Newcastle Operations Pty Ltd Southpac International Group Sustainable Future Solutions The Safe Step Trainwest Safety Institute Transurban Tru-Bilt Industries Ltd UnitingSA

5 Sticks Consulting ACTRUA Airbus Australia Pacific AusGroup Limited Australian Workplace Strategies Pty Ltd BWC Safety Pty Ltd Flick Anticimex Pty Ltd Green Light Environmental Services Pty Ltd Health & Safety Advisory Service P/L Integrated Trolley Management Pty Ltd Isaac Regional Council

ITS Transport Liberty Industrial Maroondah City Council Multiworks Australia National Training Masters Office for the Commissioner of Public Sector Employment One Maestro RMIT Vietnam SafeWork SA Services Australia Valeo Construction

Strategic Partner Organisations Ai Group ASHPA Australian College of Road Safety (ACRS) Australian Institute of Management (AIM) Australian Institute of Mining and Metallurgy (AusIMM) Australian Transport Safety Bureau (ATSB) Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisations (CSIRO) Environment Institute of Australia and New Zealand (EIANZ)

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Farmsafe Australia Inc Health and Safety Association of New Zealand (HASANZ) Human Factors and Ergonomics Society of Australia (HFESA) International Network of Safety & Health Practitioner Organisations (INSHPO) National Road Safety Partnership Program (NRSPP) New Zealand Institute of Safety Management (NZISM)

Primary Industries Health and Safety Partnership (PIHSP) Professions Australia SafeWork NSW SafeWork SA SANE Australia Standards Australia WorkSafe Victoria Workplace Health and Safety Queensland

Would you like to become a Corporate Member of the AIHS? Please contact AIHS on 03 8336 1995 to discuss the many options available.

JUNE 2022 | OHS PROFESSIONAL

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PARTNERSHIPS

How is technology reducing risk through supply chain management?

Transformative technologies on the supply chain horizon promise to reduce risk while making supply chain functions less linear and more interconnected

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oday, more than ever, organisations recognise the strategic role of the supply chain and the need for supply chain transparency as an operational goal when it comes to safety and risk management, according to Adam Boyle, VP of APAC, and Workforce for Avetta, a global cloudbased supply chain risk management and commercial marketplace platform for managing qualified suppliers, contractors, and vendors.

“The pandemic has disrupted supply chains on a global level,” said Boyle.

“According to the 2021 BCI Supply

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Chain Resilience Report, 59 per cent of disruption in the supply chain comes from smaller contractors, subcontractors, or lack of visibility into the supply chain itself.”

While most organisations have the means to focus only on top-spend supplier risks (causing them to miss significant risks in other areas of the supply chain), Boyle said those risks could be costly; nearly $66,000 per accident, $1.4 million per day in environmental violations, and $5.9 million per cyber incident.

Boyle said supply chain risk management technology and expert auditing and verification services could

help uncover hidden risks, reduce safety incidents, and improve safety performance. “Research by Avetta shows supply chain risk management technology reduced Total Recordable Injury Frequency Rate (TRIFR) for Australian businesses by 17 per cent and the Lost Time Injury Frequency Rate (LTIFR) by 19 per cent,” said Boyle.

“In addition to immediate impacts to safety, Australian suppliers have seen a reduction of an average of 12 per cent year over year in TRIFR for as much as five years.” Total Recordable Injury Frequency Rate (TRIFR) is the number of total

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recordable injuries per 1 million hours, while Lost Time Injury Frequency Rate (LTIFR) is the number of fatalities and lost time injuries per 1 million hours.

Common challenges and issues

Avetta has identified seven areas of risk in the supply chain: health and safety; workforce qualifications; sustainability and ESG; diversity and inclusion: liability; financial viability; and cybersecurity.

Digitisation can go a long way in reducing those risks, according to Boyle, who said companies using the Avetta platform reaped a number of benefits: • Clients and suppliers reduced safety incidents by as much as 55 per cent compared to industry averages • Suppliers improved their safety statistics by 7-8 per cent each year spent in the network • One client increased their contractor count by 32 per cent by sourcing safe contractors through the Avetta network

Key trends over the coming 1-3 years

According to Boyle, sustainability is becoming much more important to stakeholders and consumers across industries. “Stakeholders are finding much value in what is called Environmental, Social, and Governance (ESG) investment while consumers believe brands bear as much responsibility for positive change as governments,” he said.

“59 per cent of disruption in the supply chain comes from smaller contractors, subcontractors, or lack of visibility into the supply chain itself” One global study by FTI Consulting found that almost a third (30 per cent) of Australian companies think they are “falling short” on ESG reporting and performance (compared to 20 per cent in the UK and 22 in the US), while Boyle said another global study by Unilever showed one-third of customers purchased from brands with perceived social or environmental impact.

With this in mind, he said there are some top risks to watch out for in the coming years: • COVID-19: “it may take years for supply chain to recuperate from losses,” said Boyle.

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• Natural disasters: climate change is proving to have a major impact to supply chains, from hurricanes to wildfires, and Boyle said employees and manufacturing could be put at risk of injury or damage.

• Reputational damage: this will be more important than it has been in the past, and Boyle said customers would increasingly expect transparency as to how and where their products are made. “Modern slavery and child labour will continue to be issues, and more and more companies will be held accountable,” he said.

• Regulatory: trade laws and exchange rates change often, and Boyle said these would likely continue to do so as countries continue to discuss their trade agreements with one another.

• Digital: the digital age is advancing with help from the pandemic, and as more businesses go virtual and processes become computerised, Boyle said there is “always a risk of cybersecurity breaches, hackings, and other digital risks.”

Steps organisations can take

One study, Tortoise, Not the Hare: Digital Transformation of Supply Chain Business Processes, reiterates Avetta’s internal research and provides insight into how lagging organisations can rapidly progress in their digitisation efforts, said Boyle. The study’s authors determined that companies should take the following steps to ensure their readiness to adopt and effectively use one or more of these technologies: 1. Identify a supply chain technology visionary to lead the process. To lead the digital transition process and overcome these challenges, it is important to identify a visionary who understands the technologies, can intermediate between supply chain and IT, and possesses excellent change management skills.

2. Develop a digital technology roadmap for supply chain processes.

Companies can develop this roadmap internally if they have the expertise.

“But this is an area where outside resources can be extremely beneficial,” Boyle added.

3. Update foundational information systems. Two information systems, ERP and e-procurement are key sources of supply chain data that are essential to effective decisions, according to Boyle, who said many companies struggle with outdated or disconnected ERP or e-procurement systems.

Adam Boyle, VP of APAC, and Workforce for Avetta, says that as the supply chain sector gains strength in digitisation, it will lead to more profitable organisations

Implications for OHS professionals

In risk management, Boyle recommended adopting consistent contractor hiring policies and procedures throughout the process. “Keep the policies simple, but you should communicate clearly that strict adherence is required,” he stated.

“Define the roles and responsibilities of all participants as the new technology is adopted. Ensure that participants understand the business objectives for each additional program and establish a top-down culture around the process of procurement and protection against environmental, health, and safety risks.

“In all, each of the transformative technologies on the supply chain horizon promise to make supply chain functions less linear and more interconnected. As the supply chain sector gains strength in digitisation, it also leads to more profitable organisations,” said Boyle. n Adam Boyle is VP of APAC and Workforce, Avetta, a global cloud-based supply chain risk management and commercial marketplace platform for managing qualified suppliers, contractors, and vendors. Avetta is an AIHS Diamond Member.

JUNE 2022 | OHS PROFESSIONAL

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EMPLOYMENT

2022 HSE job market trends: a seller’s market COVID-related challenges have turbo-charged demand for work health and safety professionals in recent times, according to a recent analysis of HSE jobs

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mployment opportunities have increased as organisations put forward a people-first approach while also dealing with shifting environmental factors such as changing legislation, said Aaron Neilson, CEO of The Next Group. “Recent demand for HSE support comes from a broad range of employers, with noticeable increases in professional services, manufacturing and supply chain, and mining. Job ads are markedly up on previous years, but a scarcity of people looking for new positions has created a significant shortfall in applicants. Those looking for work have their pick of roles. Competition in some areas helped to drive up salaries,” he noted.

HSE job opportunities rose 17.7 per cent in the 12-months to April. The Safe Step National HSE Job Opportunities Index currently sits at 182.44, which is just a fraction below the record established in November 2021.

Contracting: In April 2022, contract roles made up 22.5 per cent of all HSE job opportunities, according to Neilson, who said this was a response to companies requiring immediate and additional support to augment existing resources, assist in the management of Covid, or ensure BAU initiatives continued.

“Pockets of work for unbundled consulting services are expected to persist as employers continue to deal with the lingering impacts of the pandemic and return-to-work requirements,” he said.

Wellbeing and ESG: Over the past year businesses have continued to increase investment in the areas of wellbeing and ESG (environment, social, and governance). “While these are not new trends, there was a noted elevation of focus in these areas where responsibility

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Aaron Neilson, CEO of The Next Group, says employers are seeking WHS people with professional expertise who can balance technical and commercial/relational capabilities

sat within the broader HSE function.

Across our client base there was a clear imperative for business to bring in SMEs in both areas to drive a more informed, evidence and risk-based approach,” said Neilson.

Evolving job market opportunities Significant talent shortages will continue across most Australian industries and HSE job categories, and Neilson noted record numbers of jobs were advertised on SEEK in April 2022 (up almost 59 per cent from two years ago). “Yet job application rates have dropped by almost half.

Opportunities abound, but applicants are low,” he said.

“While borders are reopening, overseas visa applications are taking three times longer than before the pandemic. Relief is still some way off for sectors such as technology, healthcare, and consulting/

professional services. Employers across the board are seeking WHS people with professional expertise who can balance technical and commercial/relational capabilities.”

Neilson said 2022 is a great time for WHSE professionals to look for a new role or a step up in their careers.

“The job market will remain strong as businesses continue to deal with the ongoing pressures of the pandemic whilst also returning to BAU. We expect a rise in both contract as well as permanent appointments in the year ahead,” he said.

Employers need to think differently in this environment, as attracting and retaining staff will become a significant challenge. Neilson explained businesses will need to bolster capability through whatever means possible given current talent shortages. “In certain segments, hiring managers are having to compromise either on remuneration or on expected capabilities in order to fill vacancies,” he said.

“In HSE, there is certainly a semblance of a false economy being created which requires employers to think differently around their total offering. Hybrid and flexible ways of working, development opportunities, and culture are often trumping salary in importance.”

Speed to market is also a key challenge for employers at the moment, and Neilson said delays in engaging with talent or slow hiring processes could result in talent being snapped up elsewhere. “An anticipated ‘sellers’ market’ will favour job seekers through 2022.”

Job market trend drivers

The pandemic has increased demand on HSE functions and, as a result, a need to increase capacity through additional resourcing said Neilson. In addition, the maturing of businesses and their view of what ‘good looks like’ continues to evolve. “With the spotlight firmly on HSE functions over the last 12 months,

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their ability to contribute more broadly to organisational strategy has been highlighted and resulted in an expansion of portfolios and breadth of roles, again requiring additional resourcing to support,” he stated.

“As highlighted earlier, with increased awareness in areas of wellbeing and ESG driven through all layers of society, we have seen this flow through to business, driving growth and demand for informed SMEs in these areas. We expect this to continue throughout 2022 and beyond.”

Overlaying all of this is an evolution in thinking and practice across the HSE profession, with businesses looking to take a risk-based approach that is simple, practical, and impactful, and individuals looking to organisations with an appetite to try new things to enable this approach, all of which Neilson said leads to change, and creates opportunity and movement across the market.

Job advice for WHS and HSE professionals

Neilson explained that there is no doubt that the current market creates a great opportunity for HSE/WHS professionals who are looking for a new role. Before changing jobs, however, he stated it is important to clearly understand why you are looking to move and what you hope to achieve in doing so. “Merely moving for the money is not a good strategy. Our clients continue to seek professionals that can

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The Safe Step HSE Job Opportunity Index

perform the role required. However, also bring a thirst for learning and development and an ability/desire to contribute beyond the role itself,” he said.

“It is important to ensure that you continue to learn, to build knowledge and experience in areas you do not have depth (i.e., wellbeing/ESG) as a business is always looking for informed practice and thinking. This does not necessarily mean you have to go back to study (although, for some, this will be important); however it is critical for you to stay connected to the broader profession, to network and engage with peers and others, to understand the different thinking and approaches out there and challenge your own thinking alongside this.”

Neilson also stated it is important to remember that 70-80 per cent of people identify their next role through their networks, so accessing these networks is key and crucial to your learning and potentially your next employment opportunity. “There are many groups online and as we head into 2022 in person where you can connect, we encourage you to explore these whether you are looking to make a move or simply stay current and connected in your thinking,” he said. n The next edition of The Safe Step HSE Job Opportunities Report was scheduled for release at the end of May 2022, followed by the end of August and November. For more information, please visit www.thesafestep.com.au.

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RESEARCH

How effective are health and safety training programs?

Employers make significant investments in WHSrelated training. However, research suggests employees do not always apply newly acquired learnings to working on-the-job

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ne of the biggest issues in HR, learning, and development is the effectiveness of employee training. All stakeholders, from organisations who pay, trainers who deliver, and employees who learn, expect training to be effective because it can be a considerable waste of money, time and effort if learned knowledge, skills, and abilities are not applied on-the-job.

Thanh Tung Pham recently completed RMIT’s Doctorate by Research program and his PhD thesis, The transfer of training among Australian construction workers participating in occupational health and safety training, examined the effectiveness of OHS training in construction.

His research identified environmental factors at work and motivational influences associated with employees’ intentions to transfer health and safety training to on-the-job practice. The research also identified training characteristics likely to enhance transfer behaviour, and importantly, his research can inform the development of measures to increase training transfer in relation to WHS in the construction industry.

“Researchers found that only 10 per cent of training expenditures result in skills and knowledge transfer to the job” Pham explained that a sensible approach to measuring the effectiveness of training is to detect changes in trainees resulting from training. “The basic indicator of training effectiveness is trainee reactions.

An effective course should make trainees be happy with it and feel it to be valuable,” he said.

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“However, people don’t just take part in training courses to develop those pleasurable reactions. The acquisition of skills and knowledge seems to be a more accurate indicator. A common perception is that training is effective when trainees successfully gain skills and knowledge.”

According to Pham, in the 1950s, training researchers and practitioners recognised an interesting phenomenon.

They often observed that trainees did not use learned skills and knowledge at the workplace. “They raised a critical question: if trainees successfully learned skills and knowledge during training but do not apply those skills and knowledge in practice, can we still consider training as effective?”

Pham explained that while it is good to know the theory of how things work, it is better to act to make things happen.

As such, researchers proposed a more comprehensive indicator: transfer of training (or training transfer). “Training transfer occurs when trainees effectively use what they have learned to the job. Since the 1980s, it has become an important research problem because researchers found that only 10 per cent of training expenditures result in skills and knowledge transfer to the job.”

Three key research findings

Previous research has investigated training transfer in various industries and contexts. However, there is a lack of research on training transfer in construction – especially OHS training.

“Our research investigated training transfer in two different settings: managers learning safety leadership training, and non-managers learning task-based safety training,” said Pham, who explained that his most important research finding is identifying critical factors that influence the transfer of OHS training among construction workers.

“Non-managers consider the approval (or disapproval) of using learned OHS training content from their co-workers in their local workgroups as the main reason for performing (or not performing) transfer action. It becomes problematic when learned skills and knowledge and established work practices are in conflict or lack consistency. In that case, nonmanagers may follow normative ways of doing things if they realise that their co-workers, especially senior workers, disallow or discourage new ways of working,” he said.

While managers face less social pressure related to whether or not they use newly learned OHS skills and knowledge, Pham said OHS training for managers includes a substantial proportion of theoretical and conceptual knowledge. He explained that the complex nature of skills and knowledge they are trained to perform, coupled with the diversity of work situations, poses a significant challenge to the effective transfer of training among them. “If managers are uncertain about the outcome of transfer action, they tend to revert to old patterns and habits instead of trying new ways of doing things,” he said.

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It is important to look at OHS training, as training transfer will not occur if learning is unsuccessful, according to Pham. He went on to explain that one interesting finding is that construction workers are not interested in a one-way instructional approach in which trainers simply disseminate knowledge to them and expect them to receive and absorb knowledge.

“Construction workers would like to play a more active role in their learning by exploring and personally making sense of the knowledge. Also, construction workers can learn easier when they receive engaging visual training materials instead of text-based materials,” he said.

Improving learning transfer on-the-job

Pham said the difference between OHS training content and normative work practices is a barrier to transfer action among non-managers. “Workgroup training may solve that problem. When possible, all members of a workgroup should participate in the same course and then still work together after training,” said Pham. “By learning the same training content, members are more likely to

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develop similar levels of awareness of what good practice looks like following training.”

In addition, Pham said workgroup training can provide opportunities for members to discuss and debate the application of OHS training content in work situations that are relevant to their jobs and workplace. All members, especially experienced ones, can share their viewpoints, take advantage of their expertise, and propose solutions. Then, members can have an agreement on the most suitable course of action, which is also validated by trainers, said Pham: “by doing so, members can develop a new standard work practice based on collective knowledge of workgroup and formal knowledge from training.”

Managers may also be uncertain about whether or how to use learned OHS skills and knowledge in novel, complex, or difficult situations that are not covered in training. When encountering those situations, Pham said managers might benefit from the expertise of other people in the workplace (especially OHS professionals) by seeking advice and guidance.

Besides the support from the local work environment, providing a professional support network or community of practice can also be helpful. A community of practice can include managers who occupy similar job roles and experience similar job demands, situations, and concerns.

“The community of practice will provide a peer-to-peer learning network that allows members to exchange ideas and solve problems together. By doing so, members can identify suitable ways of using OHS training content in various situations, as well as develop a shared understanding and value related to OHS practices,” said Pham.

Advice for OHS professionals

While OHS training is essential, Pham said its effectiveness needs to be considered. “It is unrealistic to assume that improved safety performance will automatically appear after training.

Learning is not the endpoint,” explained Pham, who said trainees need to further build a solid bridge between knowledge and action. OHS professionals can definitely support that process.

One central idea arising from Pham’s research is that OHS training needs to be designed for training transfer. “Generic training content is not sufficient. It is hard for trainees to perceive its usefulness and relevance. It is hard for trainees to use it,” he said. “We should tailor training content to fit trainees’ needs. When possible, OHS professionals and supervisors should

PhD researcher Thanh Tung Pham says it is unrealistic to assume improved safety performance will automatically appear after training

collaborate with trainers and provide inputs related to what trainees need to know when working in their specific tasks and environments.”

It is also important not to underestimate the power of influence. In some contexts (such as the transfer of training among non-managerial construction workers), Pham said social influence is so powerful that it can hinder workers’ willingness to do something different to accepted working methods. “If we want to see workers applying safety practices learned from training, we need to provide them with a supportive and encouraging social work environment, especially at the workgroup level. If we want to see changes in individual behaviours, do not forget to deal with group behaviours,” said Pham.

“The most ambitious idea is that we should develop a respertoire of good practices that guides or at least provides some clues to effectively apply learned OHS skills and knowledge in known situations,” he explained. Practical knowledge from work experiences and ways of solving ‘real world’ safety problems are more useful than theoretical knowledge from training. “If we can gather practical knowledge from not just a single worksite or an organisation but many organisations or even the whole industry, it will be a valuable ingredient to make industry-standard work practices. Then, we may store them in a computer-based repository so that every worker can quickly and easily retrieve them, when necessary,” he said. n

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Four safety traps (and solutions) for principal contractors with joint ventures and alliance projects There are a range of safety challenges that can arise for principal contractors working in a joint venture/ alliance context, write Melissa Carnell and Katherine Morris

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oint venture (JV) and alliance contractual arrangements are a common model for delivering major construction projects in Australia.

There is a range of practical and operational safety challenges that can arise for principal contractors (i.e. civil constructors) working in a joint venture (JV)/alliance context (references to JVs in this article are to unincorporated joint ventures) where there is more than one delivery contractor that may not necessarily arise under more traditional client/contractor models (e.g. design and construct (D&C) agreements), and one head contractor delivers the project.

In this article, we examine this issue in further detail, in particular: • the legal and practical context of JV/ alliance contractual models.

• specific legal responsibilities of a principal contractor (which are separate from the general safety duties of a PCBU).

• safety operational issues or ‘traps’ that may arise for principal contractors in a JV/ alliance context, and recommendations and tips for managing these.

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Legal and practice context of alliance and JV arrangements

The core feature of both JV and alliance models is the collaborative approach taken to project delivery with multiple delivery partners, as opposed to a more traditional model, where most of the legal and practical responsibility for the delivery of the project is placed upon a head contractor.

Under a JV model, the JV partners (rather than the head contractor alone) will be responsible for delivering the project under the head contract with the client. Each party to a JV has joint and several legal liabilities to the client.

Similarly, under an alliance model, all participants in the alliance will be responsible for delivering the project under the project alliance agreement.

There will usually be a range of alliance principles that each party must agree to, such as a commitment to working together in a spirit of cooperation and openness and developing a culture of collaboration.

Depending on the delivery model, there may not be any agreement or breakdown in the delivery contract as to specific

project responsibilities between the parties in a JV/alliance. For example, this will be the case in a fully integrated JV. However, in practice, there may be different aspects of the work that each party takes practical responsibility for.

Specific legal responsibilities of a principal contractor

A principal contractor has a number of specific legal responsibilities regarding construction risks under Australian work health and safety (WHS) laws (or, in the case of Victoria, occupational health and safety laws), as set out in the table below.

These are separate duties from the general safety duties held by a person conducting a business or undertaking (PCBU), and only the principal contractor is subject to these duties. Principal contractor duties are also specific and only apply to the construction industry.

A principal contractor cannot legally delegate, transfer, or contract out of these duties. From a practical perspective, this means that the principal contractor should aim to fulfil the principal contractor duties itself, or to the extent that other parties will

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be relied upon to fulfil its safety duties, the principal contactor needs to be given rights under the delivery contract to verify/audit safety performance and issue directions in relation to safety matters, so it can ensure the above requirements can be met.

The overall intent of these duties is to ensure there is a single point of responsibility for the coordination of the multiple contractors and activities performed on a construction project.

“In a JV/alliance model, the principal contractor will continue to have legal responsibility for the overarching safety management system” In light of the specific statutory responsibilities imposed on a principal contractor, the principal contractor will therefore be subject to the most legal risk on a construction project, even in a

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JV/alliance arrangement. It is also the principal contractor that will usually be subject to the most regulatory focus in the event of a serious safety incident.

Contractors need to consider each of the above requirements and how they will ensure that they are practically implemented in respect of each construction project for which they are appointed as principal contractor. The delivery contract, which sets out the scope of the principal contractor appointment, should be the starting point for this checking process regarding each of the above requirements.

Operational tips and traps

We set out below a number of common operational traps for principal contractors working in a JV/alliance model context, along with our ‘tips’ for principal contractors to respond to these.

Trap #1: principal contractor appointment: While legal responsibility for delivery of the works will be shared under a JV/alliance model, there will generally be one party (typically the

construction contractor) whom the client appoints as the principal contractor for all of the construction works under the project.

From a legal perspective, a principal contractor is required under the work health and safety legislation to be given management and control of the workplace to the extent necessary to discharge their duties as principal contractor. The delivery contract needs to reflect this in the principal contractor appointment clause to ensure the valid appointment of the principal contractor.

The delivery contract will usually give management and control of the project site to the JV/alliance. The delivery contract will also usually impose an obligation on all JV/alliance parties to carry out all of the works. However, challenges may arise for the principal contractor where it does not have practical management or control of particular works or a particular part of the site for which other parties (including third parties, such as authorities, utility owners, and local councils) have taken responsibility.

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Table: specific legal obligations of a principal contractor 1

Signage identifying themselves as principal contractor.

2

Preparation and maintenance of a WHS management plan for the construction project, which addresses the specific content required under the work health and safety laws. The required content includes specifying the names, positions and health and safety responsibilities of personnel with specific safety responsibilities.

3

Provision of safety inductions regarding the content of the WHS management plan.

4

Obtaining and reviewing safe work method statements for any high-risk construction work activities carried out on the project.

5

Putting in place arrangements for ensuring compliance with various safety matters, being: • the general working environment; • first aid; • emergency plans; • PPE; • managing risks from airborne contaminants; • hazardous atmospheres; • storage of flammable or combustible substances; • falling objects; and • falls.

6

Managing a number of specific safety risks on the construction project, being: • the storage, movement, and disposal of construction materials and waste.

• the storage at the workplace of plant that is not in use.

• traffic management; and • essential services.

What can principal contractors do?

Principal contractors should ensure that the scope of work and physical work for which they are appointed as principal contractor align with the management and control of the works and site that they will have both under the delivery contract and in practice.

Ideally, there should be written documentation regarding which parts of the work and site each JV/alliance party will be primarily responsible for and written detail regarding how the parties will coordinate with each other in the performance of their various activities to ensure that the principal contractor has adequate access to all works and work areas to satisfy its principal contractor duties.

Where the principal contractor does not have practical management or control, there are a number of ways that this can be addressed, e.g., through interface agreements or access deeds.

Trap #2: safety management systems and culture: Principal contractors will usually have their own existing safety management systems that are utilised to deliver projects under delivery models involving an individual corporate entity as the contractor for the construction works.

In a JV/alliance model, the principal contractor will continue to have legal

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responsibility for the overarching safety management system, as one of the core legal obligations of a principal contractor is to prepare and maintain a WHS plan for the construction project that meets the requirements of the WHS laws.

However, challenges can arise in system application and implementation if project participants are each responsible for different parts of the work and are used to operating under their own systems for the part of the works that they will be delivering.

What can principal contractors do?

The project safety systems and WHS management plan are the core way the principal contractor will ensure that the specific matters and safety risks for which it is responsible (as set out in rows 5 and 6 of the table above) are addressed. The principal contractor should: Consider safety systems during project engagement, and in particular, how the principal contractor’s safety systems will need to be adapted to address the specific needs of the project and interface with the safety system of other project parties, whilst ensuring the risks and matters set out in rows 5 and 6 of the table are adequately addressed.

Ensure that the project safety systems clearly define and address the practical roles of each of the project parties, so that there is clarity with regard to the party that

is responsible for managing the risks and matters set out in rows 5 and 6 of the table.

• To the extent that systems, processes, and requirements of other parties will be integrated into project safety systems, ensure that the way in which this is done is understood and agreed upon between all project parties, and there is a mechanism for checking that the systems, processes, and requirements of other project parties will adequately address the safety risks and matters set out in rows 5 and 6 of the table.

• Ensure that the project WHS management plan addresses the safety risks and matters set out in rows 5 and 6 of the table. To the extent that other parties will be responsible for implementing these safety matters, the principal contractor should ensure adequate arrangements are in place for auditing and monitoring compliance.

• Monitor and verify the implementation of project safety systems by all project parties and contractors. Auditing and monitoring processes should have a particular focus on any work areas or parts of the safety system that other project parties or contractors are responsible for implementing.

Trap #3: supervision and resourcing: Principal contractors have an overarching responsibility to ensure that appropriate safety arrangements and resources are in place for a construction project as part of their specific obligation to provide and maintain a WHS management plan (as set out in the earlier table).

Resourcing and supervision arrangements can be practically challenging on large complex JV/alliance projects where there are multiple parties involved, each of whom is carrying out different parts of the work or has different types of expertise. There may also be multiple work fronts and work sites which are physically separated from one another, and smaller sites may be manned by smaller teams with less supervisory or safety personnel.

What can principal contractors do?

Principal contractors will need to ensure that there are adequate and appropriate supervisory resources in place, with the right expertise, and that such arrangements are understood and agreed upon between other project parties.

Supervisory resources can be provided by the principal contractor itself, or by another party (i.e., another project party), particularly in work where specialist expertise is required, and that expertise is held by another party on the project and not the principal contractor.

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Where another project party is providing supervisory resources for a particular task or work area, the principal contractor should still undertake monitoring to ensure that those supervisory resources have been implemented and continue to be provided.

The principal contractor should also ensure there are mechanisms and resources for monitoring any parts of the project for which the principal contractor does not provide a constant safety resource. For example, when smaller worksites are physically separated from the main project site with a much smaller team of personnel or where aspects of the work and worksites have been wholly allocated to a third-party contractor.

Trap #4: responding to serious safety incidents: The immediate and core focus for all parties in responding to a serious safety incident will be ensuring appropriate steps have been taken in response to the incident to eliminate and mitigate safety risks, providing for the welfare of workers and their families, and the broader affected communities, and assisting regulators in their inspection and investigation activities.

Given the collaborative nature of JV and alliance contractual models and close working arrangements between parties that arise in this context, it may feel natural and expedient for parties in a JV or alliance to undertake a joint investigation where a safety incident occurs. However, such a desire may not be appropriate in the context of a serious safety incident where there is potential legal exposure for one or more parties. As a result, there may be anticipated legal proceedings or a need for legal advice, meaning that legal professional privilege may be applied in respect of the causal investigation report.

There can be challenges in applying and maintaining privilege in a joint investigation and where multiple legal

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entities are involved in an incident, each of whom will need to apply and maintain their privilege separately. While there are mechanisms such as limited purpose waiver and common interest privilege arrangements that can be utilised to enable a joint investigation, there are challenges and limitations associated with the use of these types of arrangements, such that they may not be appropriate in all situations.

In addition, as separate legal entities, there is also a need for each party to separately understand and manage its legal liability in relation to an incident.

The legal interests of individual parties to a JV/alliance may not necessarily be aligned, and any differences in legal liability between parties may not necessarily be understood until such time that the investigation has been completed.

Project parties may also disagree on the approach that is to be taken to applying privilege to the investigation – one party may wish to apply privilege, and another may not. A party may become concerned about its legal liability in relation to an incident and cease its involvement in a joint investigation or no longer be willing to share information. This will likely impact another party’s ability to properly complete an investigation or understand its legal liability concerning the incident in the way that it would if it had been running its own separate investigation.

What can principal contractors do? In respect of legal privilege considerations, it is recommended that principal contractors consider the following: • A joint factual investigation (i.e., which does not consider cause) may be helpful for efficiency purposes and ensure a common understanding of the facts. This may be carried out using a common interest privilege protocol or not applying legal privilege at all – i.e., not being carried out in anticipation of

•

•

•

•

•

legal proceedings or for the purpose of obtaining legal advice.

The principal contractor should consider carrying out its own causal investigation into the incident under its legal privilege. This avoids delays and challenges arising from the need to coordinate with other parties.

The contractor’s causal investigation can be carried out in parallel with any other causal investigations carried out by other parties on the project.

If possible, it is helpful for there to be an arrangement for each party on the project to share privileged information with each other to protect each party’s privilege and enable all parties to understand incident causes and findings as accurately and comprehensively as possible. Options include a common interest privilege protocol or a limited purpose waiver arrangement for sharing privileged information. A mechanism should be agreed upon at an early stage and documented.

There can be protocols established between the parties regarding communication and sharing of information. While project documentation exists until the incident is usually available and accessible by all parties, assistance may be required from other parties to determine the relevance and accuracy of the information, particularly where a party has received a regulatory notice to produce documents. A contact person should be appointed from each party in order to handle document requests and ensure the efficient exchange of information.

Each party will need to ensure that it is separately and confidentially storing its own privileged information, so it is not accessible to other project parties. n

Melissa Carnell is a special counsel, and Katherine Morris is a partner with Norton Rose Fulbright Australia.

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The journey to influence, success, and status for OHS The health and safety profession is on a journey to greater influence, status, and success, and significant strides have been made in recent times to make greater advances on this journey

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HS has been on a journey over the past decade and more. It still has a way to go as a profession compared to other functional disciplines, but it has made notable gains in recent times. Yet employers, regulators, and other stakeholders are constantly raising expectations, and OHS professionals are also seeking greater standing and status within and outside of their organisations.

Since joining the profession nearly two decades ago, Sarah Cuscadden, deputy chair of the AIHS College of Fellows, has seen the role and impact of safety professionals grow significantly. “Twenty years ago, safety roles were traditionally one dimensional, purely operational in their focus and about managing immediate hazards and controlling the risks. Organisations have seen the impact safety professionals can make – not only to safety but the business’ overall operations and have leveraged the strong skill set that safety professionals possess,” she said.

Fast forward 20 years to today, and Cuscadden said safety professionals are much more diverse. “A safety professional can now specialise in operational safety, health and wellbeing, safety technologies, safety strategies and so on. Because of the depth of a safety professional’s role, boards and executives are now turning to heads of safety for proactive strategic advice, with safety professionals now finding themselves with a seat at the board room table instead of having to fight to be heard,” she said.

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Richard Coleman, head of HSE – Australia Hub at Laing O’Rourke, has also seen respect for the OHS profession increase. “But like everything, there’s a bell curve, right? There are some very well-respected health and safety professionals, and there are some that aren’t. Some of that is a function of the organisations in which they work and their level of maturity, and some of that is a function of the individual’s capability, capacity, and ability to influence,” he says.

Overall, Coleman thinks the bell curve of the profession has moved to the right, and the profession is broadly becoming more well respected – predominantly thanks to a focus on the development of softer skills. “There is a realisation that health and safety is more than just the application of a narrow technical set of skills and capability,” he says.

“There are some very well-respected health and safety professionals, and there are some that aren’t” Kym Bancroft, head of safety, environment & wellbeing, AsPac for Serco Asia Pacific, agrees and says she has seen an uptick in OHS professionals becoming more respected and influential within their organisations. This may correlate with how safety science is evolving and changing the profession, according to Bancroft, who observed that OHS professionals are becoming more aware of evidence-informed practices and starting to challenge traditional safety

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paradigms that might not be serving their organisations anymore.

The COVID-19 pandemic has also raised the profile of the OHS profession, she said. “The pandemic required a multidisciplinary response to a highly dynamic and constantly evolving situation, where partnering was essential,” she said.

“However, a significant proportion of the OHS profession still focuses on ‘safety work,’ believing that this is directly impacting operational safety.

In some cases, this safety work creates an oversupply of administrative work, such as lengthy auditing processes, risk assessments that merely get ‘ticked and flicked,’ and investigation processes that only end in a conclusion of human error rather than taking a systemic view.”

She gave the example of HR as a discipline that has evolved into a business enabler and value-creating part of an organisation rather than a cost centre. “The OHS profession could mirror this same transformation. We can drive toward transforming the OHS professional into being a value creator rather than focussing on low-level transactional safety work,” she said.

Dave Clarke, CEO of the Australian Institute of Health & Safety (AIHS), said the number one complaint expressed to him by the health and safety profession over the years, including by practising professionals, is that they are not influential enough in their company, their status is not high enough, and the status of health and safety people needs to be raised.

“Much of the time, that is couched as an expectation that the institute should raise their status. And yet, the single greatest influence on the status, position and influence a person has in their own company, is their performance, and how effective and critical they are to the business,” said Clarke, who explained the need to understand the business so that they can convey health and safety messages in the language of the business.

This is an ongoing journey for OHS professionals, according to Clarke.

He explained that this journey is almost singularly related to how the AIHS establishes stronger capability frameworks for the profession. “One of the journeys we’ve been on in recent years is to better understand that the achievement of effective health and safety performance in companies is as much about non-OHS skills and competencies as it is about OHS skills and competencies. I think that’s been a major education, and

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the evolution of thinking in that space has been significant,” he said.

“So while we recognise the core skills needed to be a practitioner or professional in the OHS Body of Knowledge, we also now recognise the importance of the soft skills required to be effective in leading health and safety through the global capability framework. This is about improving your business acumen and ability to understand what’s on the mind of the chief executive and board, and being able to speak to them in a way that demonstrates your understanding of their problems – and your ability to help them solve their problems. That’s what effective health and safety people do.

They help boards and chief executives solve their problems and produce more efficient, effective organisations (that by the by happens to be healthier and safer),” he said.

Where OHS has succeeded and failed Cuscadden says that safety professionals (along with many others) really succeeded during COVID: “they were at the epicentre of understanding the rules, developing, and implementing policies on the run, all while keeping people safe and healthy and organisations running.

COVID demonstrated the breadth of safety professionals’ skills and the ability to partner strongly with other crossfunctional internal teams,” she said.

Safety professionals have organically grown the health and human side of safety over the past five or so years, and Cuscadden said they have been instrumental in including health and wellbeing in organisational strategies and plans and have worked with training organisations to develop impactful and meaningful health and wellbeing programs.

However, the work of safety

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“The single greatest influence on the status, position, and influence a person has in their own company, is their performance, and how effective and critical they are to the business” professionals is not yet done, and there are still plenty of gaps and opportunities to learn from past experiences. “In some industries, safety has been late to the start line on leveraging technology to improve operational safety and wellbeing,” said Cuscadden.

“I think the contributor to this is a skill gap for safety professionals. They are not trained in technology development and implementation. Over the past seven or so years, we have seen a plethora of safety apps developed to transition paper-based processes into digital ones, and we have seen the use of virtual reality for high-

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risk training and simulations. I see the professional’s next frontier is to level technology to reduce the operational safety risk. To be successful in doing this, safety professionals need to be equipped with some level of technological knowledge and build really strong relationships with internal technology officers and external technology providers.”

Coleman observed that health and safety professionals who see themselves operating as a standalone set of knowledge and process owners in a business are “doomed to fail.” In order to

drive change within an organisation, it requires engagement on the part of other leaders and functions, he said. “You can’t be in a castle throwing information over ramparts, expecting people to pick it up and use it and run with it. You need to partner with other parts of the business effectively – operations, human capital, finance – no part of the business ought not to be having a conversation with the health and safety function about how an organisation changes. This connectivity, professionally and personally, with a whole range of different people in the business, is key,” he said.

While there has been an improvement in the work quality of health and safety, Clarke said there is no standardisation of that improvement, and this is where the AIHS plays an important role. “What is a professional association if it’s not taking a systemic approach? The things that a professional association can do on behalf of its profession is to systematise good things and systemically remove bad things. When I think of the profession, I also think of the institute. And when the institute succeeds, the profession succeeds, and when the profession succeeds (or fails), the institute succeeds (or fails). I see them as fundamentally tied together,” he said.

“That’s why we have a certification program; it’s the systematisation of quality standards in the work of the practitioner and professional while introducing a culture of learning and development, which is about continuous improvement through people’s working lifetimes. I think we’re still lacking engagement in those systemic processes.

So, we’ve been building the systemic processes, and the next step now is getting engagement in those processes.”

How to address failures and shortcomings

To continue to evolve and improve the profession’s value proposition, Bancroft said OHS leaders and professionals must continue to take brave steps in challenging their own safety beliefs and their organisation’s perceptions of how best to improve safety. To be effective in doing this, she said it is imperative that OHS professionals become regular consumers of safety science literature that informs best practice and provides ideation for effective strategic initiatives.

“This external research can then be considered in their organisation, applied, and teased apart in a practical sense.

For example, Provan and Rae (in their paper Safety Clutter: The accumulation

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and persistence of ‘safety’ work that does not contribute to operational safety) introduced the concept of safety clutter which has enabled OHS professionals to view safety processes and systems through this lens, making it easy to identify over bureaucratisation,” said Bancroft, who explained this model could be used to explain to internal stakeholders the concept of safety clutter and steps to take to improve.

“And as has been the case for decades, true consultation and consultation with the frontline will ensure we fully understand the reality of frontline safety.

In turn, we can feed these insights into safety strategies and initiatives. If we fail to do this, we risk becoming irrelevant and misaligned to the ‘work as done’.”

Don Zakroczymski, head of HSE for Growthbuilt, said people need to decide whether they want to be a practitioner, subject matter expert, leader, or a combination of all – and follow that stream in their development. “This is where a certification program becomes so important (and it’s okay to change your mind along the journey),” he said.

Zakroczymski said it is also important to identify and engage with a good mentor or mentoring organisation

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“In some industries, safety has been late to the start line on leveraging technology to improve operational safety and wellbeing” and “network and then network some more” as well. “There is a wealth of knowledge out there and heaps of ways to learn from other people’s learned experiences. I am grateful that the health and safety profession acknowledges peoples’ qualifications, skills, and more importantly – life experiences. Join a professional body, get access to their resources and knowledge base. Don’t go out trying to ‘reinvent the wheel.’ It is not surprising that most WHS leaders are members of a professional body such as the AIHS,” he said.

Coleman said one of the most important elements for career success in OHS is the ability to actively listen.

“And by that, I mean to hear the message, reflect it back and check that you’ve kind of heard it right. This goes against the stereotypical perception of a health and safety person who tells people what to do all the time. I’ve never found that to be an effective way of driving people

or driving organisational change. This predominantly comes from the skill of listening,” he said.

High performance vs poor performance and standards of work

A key driver of the status and success of practising OHS professionals (like any worker) is their performance on the job.

According to Clarke, before looking at what separates the two, it is important to define exactly what good performance is. “What is good performance for an individual? What is good performance for a company? And where’s the evidence? Let’s just ponder that for a moment,” he said.

“So, good company performance in OHS is company performance where, ultimately, the company has a really good health and safety culture.

And that health and safety culture is usually driven by the health and safety leaders in the company. The culture is constantly about questioning how to gain

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greater effectiveness and efficiency as a company, including improvements in how to become safer and healthier. This is about a company that understands the relationship between the performance of the company and its profitability, and good health and safety.”

Clarke explained that, in practice, the best health and safety performance comes from people who don’t do safety for the sake of it but do health and safety work in an enabling way. “That becomes part of the company’s DNA, or a common way of describing culture is ‘the way we do things around here.’ That’s conscious and unconscious behaviour. So good health and safety performance builds a strong health and safety culture,” said Clarke, who noted this could be expressed differently in different companies.

This also leads to a challenge, where different boards in different industries have different personalities with different approaches and priorities. As such, health and safety professionals who might be moving to a new company need to meet them where they find them. Clarke added: “A health and safety professional who moves into a company with an already strong culture has a different task to the person who comes into a company with a very poor culture. And the way they behave in the company will be different.

This goes to the question of what makes for a highly capable health and safety person.

It’s someone who can meet the company as they find it, and then take the company to its next level,” he said.

“As a profession, we have to step up and take responsibility to be more accountable for our work. It’s true that greater accountability might be uncomfortable for some people. But it’s also true that if we really want to rise in status, and want a profession that makes a difference, then that’s a path we must take. This then means better performance measurement and evaluation.”

Similarly, Cuscadden said it is essential to look at a range of performance indicators in conjunction with safety performance to determine the standard of work, such as employee engagement and turnover. When these indicators are performing well (in addition to safety performance indicators, budget, work completion status etc.) Cuscadden said this provides a good sense of work standard performance.

“When looking specifically at the safety performance indicators, I focus on indicators from the field – what people on the frontline are saying about safety and how these items are being responded

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to. I also focus on senior leadership engagement, interaction, and response to safety, and then look at the traditional measure such as incidents, injuries, and open safety actions to form an overall index of the safety performance and determine if changes to the standard of work are immediately required,” she said.

Zakroczymski said there are a number of key factors which separate high performance from poor performance, including leadership support and ownership, focusing on critical issues, a good plan and education, and knowing what is going on in your business by learning from the people who do the job.

Another key differentiator for most WHS professionals is that after many years of experience, Zakroczymski said they attain a ‘gut feel’ for a situation. This could occur when investigating an incident, visiting an injured person, resolving a conflict situation, or speaking to a worker or colleague about safety. However, translating this ‘gut feel’ into words and putting pen to paper requires some skill and, more often than not, reflection.

“My mentor used to ask me these three questions before submitting any of my work: (1) is it the best that I can do? (2) would I be prepared for the whole world to see it? And (3) will it stand up in court?

These three questions have remained my guiding principles throughout my career.

Learn to question and challenge your thoughts and re-read anything that you produce. It will save you a lot of angst later on,” he said.

Zakroczymski also advised to actively listen to what others have to say and avoid attitudes like ‘my way or the highway,’ as well as role modelling behaviour and working smart. “Wherever possible, influence, influence, and influence,” he said. “Get your executives or leadership teams to work with you and for you. Them saying one word at a meeting can save you 100 plus emails or dozens of meetings.”

A genuine intent and commitment toward continual growth and improvement of core capabilities, knowledge, and evidence-informed thinking, is also important, according to Bancroft. There are safety professionals around the globe who are constantly tapping into published research, podcasts, new publications, and conferences to grow their professional capabilities. She said: “I see many organic small groups popping up in different forums (such as LinkedIn and Clubhouse) where professionals are seeking like-minded people to discuss safety improvement and learn from each other,” she said.

“These high performers aren’t intent on sticking to the status quo. Instead, they tap into experts, researchers, and professionals who have dedicated their careers to improving safety.

They understand that cognitive biases exist, seek to control them and remain curious. It is inspiring to tap into this global network of highly motivated OHS professionals and share learnings and insights. It’s easier than ever to access information and learn.”

“There is a realisation that health and safety is more than just the application of a narrow technical set of skills and capability” How will OHS evolve over the coming years?

The OHS profession is on an ongoing journey of growth and development.

However, Coleman said there is a need to lift the base quality of the profession at the procedural compliance level.

“It’s not just about ‘I know what the law says, I know the PPE rules, I can interpret guidance material and then create policy posters,” he said. “There is a whole range of soft skills and leadership skills that apply, regardless of your role in the organisation. I think that’s increasingly going to be demanded of people. People will be expected to effectively self-manage and self-lead and influence others.”

Bancroft also said the OHS profession would ideally evolve and become more concerned about operational excellence, with safety as an enabler rather than a separate entity. There are Australian organisations already achieving this that view safety as one of many drivers of operational excellence, she said.

“More progressive organisations already understand and seek out OHS professionals and leaders that have strong non-technical capabilities such as empathy, self-reflection, curiosity, and the ability to have constructive conversations. OHS professionals will also be able to continue to leverage the positive groundswell of CSR and ESG to bring safety professionals into the business conversations and decision making,” she said.

“The OHS professional will also need to adapt to the ever-expanding

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COVER STORY

role boundaries and identify generalist versus specialist roles. They will need to leverage specific expertise to solve safety challenges and build new capabilities.”

Zakroczymski recalls that when he began his journey as an OHS officer, he was told that to be a good one, “all I needed was two eyes, two ears, and one mouth, and use those bits in those proportions. To some extent that remains true to this day,” he said.

“As I matured, I was told that the purpose of a WHS professional was to work themselves out of a job. As every worker would know their health and safety obligations and perform their activities safely, there would no longer be a need for us professionals. Thirty years later, I am still trying to achieve this goal.”

Looking to the future, Zakroczymski said he sees health and safety professionals becoming stronger change agents within their respective industries.

Simply speaking, this is about knowledge gain, attitude change, and behaviour change, according to Zakroczymski, who said Sidney Dekker summarises this in ‘The 4 Principles of Safety Differently’: 1. Safety is not defined by the absence of accidents but by the presence of capacity.

2. Workers aren’t the problem. Workers are the problem solvers.

3. We don’t constrain workers in order to create safety. We ask workers what they need to do to work safely, reliably, and productively.

4. Safety doesn’t prevent bad things from happening. Safety ensures good things happen while workers do work in complex and adaptive work environments.

OHS professionals will be engaged in championing these changes, Zakroczymski explained. “Every business looks to become more efficient, and we have long believed that there is a correlation between quality and safety, whether that be in plant, process, or systems. I believe there is a seat at the table for WHS professionals to work with their management teams to develop ways for their business to become more efficient and profitable whilst maintaining safety as a top priority,” he said.

Cuscadden also sees the OHS profession rising in status over the coming ten years, and this will have a number of impacts both internally and externally.

“Let’s be honest. I don’t know of anyone who said as a kid, ‘when I grow up, I want to be a safety professional.’ And that’s okay – there is nothing wrong with that. A lot of people I know didn’t start

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their career in safety; they fell into it. I predict that because of the depth of the profession now, there will be a lot more people entering the industry from the grassroots level,” she said.

The number of board seats held by safety professionals will also increase.

Because of this, Cuscadden said the way businesses think about safety would mean they will inherently become safer and healthier. “Successes for the safety industry will come from innovative technologies that not only significantly reduce operational risk; they will enhance production and profitability. Safety professionals have a really bright and prosperous future where they can create some real change and improve people’s wellbeing simultaneously,” she said.

“What is good performance for an individual? What is good performance for a company? And where’s the evidence? Let’s just ponder that for a moment” The AIHS certification program

The Australian OHS Profession Certification Program (see box) was introduced five years ago and was developed from the original membership grading system of the Safety Institute of Australia. The program was built on The OHS Professional Capability Framework: A Global Framework for Practice (available at www.inshpo.org), which provided an international benchmark, and today nearly 2000 people have been certified.

“The AIHS certification program, along with the numerous AIHS endorsed programs on offer, are invaluable for the OHS profession to tap into and continually improve skills, knowledge, and capability,” said Bancroft. “As the awareness of OHS as a profession and career path shifts to school leavers and university graduates, these initiatives are extremely helpful.”

As a Fellow of the AIHS, Zakroczymski has been involved in the institute’s mentoring program, which he said has been a great initiative in enabling people like himself to share experiences (including mistakes) and the lessons learned along the way

with other professionals or up-andcoming professionals. “I see the AIHS certification program as just as important as mentoring and an integral part of developing a WHS professional and their recognition amongst their peers and industry colleagues,” he said.

“This is why the AIHS’ capability agenda is so important in maintaining the highest standards and standing of our profession. As individuals and as a profession, we must realise and accept that we are either ‘green and growing or brown and rotting’.”

To supplement any certification program, he said each WHS professional should find the right fit for themselves in an organisation aligned to their values and culture. The importance of team building and support in an organisation – particularly in challenging times – and the opportunity to move between organisations and career paths is vital to a professional’s ongoing wellbeing.

“Whether you choose to progress from practitioner to academic or develop leadership skills, you should also look at gaining other developmental opportunities and skills outside of WHS (for example, influencing, facilitation, business management, written and oral communication, and IT presentation skills),” said Zakroczymski.

Coleman has offered all staff in Laing O’Rourke’s OHS function the opportunity to undertake the AIHS certification program on a voluntary basis, and he said there had been a positive response. “For me, this is about providing something to them from the organisation, which is a supportive process for developing their career. We want employees to engage in their own development, and it helps them with their capabilities,” he said.

“The certification program puts a floor down for the profession, in terms of base-level knowledge and capability; it gives us a sense of the bottom rung of that. At the moment, I think that there is no floor, as people come in with a whole range of different qualifications and experiences. The variability of skills, qualifications and experience is very high, so once you’ve established a floor in terms of expectations, that is a base to further grow on. It is a very important step for building capability, competence, and status for the profession.”

Coleman has also undertaken the certification program for an important reason, he said. “I’ve had a long career and some of the biggest health and safety roles in Australia. I have a Masters’ degree in OHS, and I’m taking myself through

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Opening new pathways to recognition through certification

the certification process as well because it’s important for me to demonstrate the value that I see in it. For me, it’s not a career development activity. It is a commitment more broadly to the profession. It’s a standard, and just like other professional graduates such as a doctor, a lawyer, or an accountant, there is an expectation that you will have the correct qualification and have gone through the certification process that sits across the top of it. Most people would argue that these professions are well respected, and you would expect quality advice from such professionals. I would love for health and safety professionals to be perceived in the same way.”

Clarke explained that the AIHS certification program’s next stage had to address its initial weaknesses and respond to what is actually occurring in the marketplace. “We’ve collated feedback from industry and the profession, and these changes make the program more relevant to both. That means lowering some of the entry point requirements to invite the people who are already doing the work into the program, and correspondingly raising the bar in terms of knowledge, assessment, and learning that people undertake on their pathway to certification to ensure our standards remain high,” he said.

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“We need to move from binary thinking to embracing complexity and more sophisticated levels of thinking.

There are those who say health and safety is simple, and that might be said to attract people to the concept that it’s a simple idea to take care of yourself and others. But to do the work of health and safety in influencing culture and change within companies, as a health and safety consultant, leader, or manager, is a sophisticated task. This requires a diverse skill set, deep knowledge of health and safety systems and potential tools and practices, and a deep understanding of the range of business, leadership skills, and qualities needed to influence others and achieve change within a community.

“In the future, what I’d like to see is a much stronger learning framework embedded into the field of health and safety; a greater number of options for people at all levels of health and safety to access core knowledge; a thriving certification program which is sought after; and business which value a community of inquiry amongst the health and safety profession. In other words, a community that discusses and debates issues and openly embraces different thought.” n

The Australian Institute of Health & Safety recently introduced changes to its certification program to better meet the needs of the profession and Australian business. AIHS CEO David Clarke outlined the changes underway, which include: • Liberalisation of entry points to encompass people who are already in the marketplace, functioning in OHS roles.

• Translation from high-bar entry (which excludes many existing health and safety people) to highquality assessment processes that identify knowledge gaps and point to learning must be accomplished before certification can be achieved.

• Development of a practitioner-level exam focussed on an entry-level into certification for those that currently hold a Cert IV in WHS. • Creation of a range of ways to advance from one level of Certification to the next, including recognising a range of micro-credentials.

• Creation of specialist streams for the higher level of certification which recognise that people move into a variety of roles, including HSE Executive and generalist consultant, or specialist functions such as investigation/audit.

“This is simply stage two, after our first five years,” said Clarke.

“The British, Americans, and Canadians have built their certification programs over decades, and this is an intergenerational investment by the AIHS. The profession seeks greater standing, and employers seek greater confidence that they are getting the advice they need. The certification program is all about having a framework that delivers both of those things and supports health and safety people in their careers. As the program continues to grow, so too will the demand from industry for suitably qualified and certified practitioners and professionals.”

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OHS BODY OF KNOWLEDGE

How to bridge the process safety-OHS gap There are both gaps and overlaps between process safety and OHS, and there are a number of important lessons professionals in both fields can learn from each other

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am Pryor, manager of the OHS Body of Knowledge Development, recalls that the process safety chapters in the OHS Body of Knowledge (chapter 13, managing process safety, and chapter 17.4, process hazards (chemical)) grew out of a serendipitous meeting between herself and Trish Kerin, a professional process safety engineer and director of the IChemE (Institution of Chemical Engineers) Safety Centre.

“At this meeting, we informally discussed areas of mutual interest and gaps in our knowledge where we wanted to learn from each other. This was a portent of things to come,” recalls Pryor.

Development of the OHS Body of Knowledge process safety chapters began in 2016, with the convening of a technical panel comprising OHS professionals and process safety specialists. While members of the technical panel were committed to the need for a quality chapter that met the needs of OHS professionals, Pryor said it had a challenging start: “understanding the role of OHS professionals in process safety did not come easily to the group. In fact. the first four or five meetings were dedicated to working though just that issue,” she recalls.

“The subsequent process safety chapters are a tribute to the open-minded collaboration of this group as we explored various perspectives and scenarios to map the roles of process safety specialists and OHS professionals and the overlap in the roles. These discussions are reflected in a significant portion of the chapter ‘managing process safety’ dedicated to clarifying the differences between and areas of overlap for process safety and OHS,” said Pryor.

These discussions led to the realisation that process safety and OHS professionals often operate in silos without recognising

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the significant overlap between the management of process safety and OHS. “Addressing this overlap – ‘bridging the gap’– provides an opportunity to optimise both process safety and OHS,” said Pryor.

Rather than isolating process safety and OHS, there should be greater collaboration between the two disciplines to ensure improved process safety and OHS risk management. Such collaboration will require a change in practice by professionals from both disciplines, according to Pryor, who said they would need to recognise and value their commonalities and potential synergies as well as their specialist expertise.

Through the work of the technical panel and Trish Kerin, the two chapters on process safety in the OHS Body of Knowledge provide the knowledge base to facilitate such engagement by generalist OHS professionals with some specific practice recommendations. “The chapters support process safety specialists in understanding the role and knowledge base of the generalist OHS professional to facilitate communication and collaboration across the two professional groups, and so enhance all aspects of safety in process environments. It is only through such shared understandings that the value of both roles is recognised and respected, and we can look to better management of safety in all technical environments,” she said.

The differences between process safety and OHS

Kerin explained that the difference between process safety and OHS is typically found in two main areas: the first being the mechanism of causation and the second being the magnitude of the events. When looking at the mechanism of causation, Kerin said the failures are

usually more equipment-based (such as corrosion leading to a loss of containment, for example). There are still clear human factors and causes involved (for example, a human managing the corrosion monitoring program). “So, like OHS in process safety, we still need to engage with human factors issues and ensure we build processes and equipment that are resilient,” said Kerin.

“When it comes to the magnitude, while there can certainly be fatal injuries from an OHS event, in process safety, it is more likely to be multiple fatalities. We define process safety as a loss of control event where there is catastrophic actual or potential consequence and a low likelihood of the event occurring. OHS typically has a lower consequence and a higher likelihood

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of an event. We define this in the OHS Body of Knowledge chapter called ‘managing process safety’.”

Similarly, Simon Farrar, director of major hazards & dangerous goods, WorkSafe Victoria, said process safety is about managing major accident risks based on chemical hazards that can lead to fires, explosions, or harmful releases. Process safety incidents have the potential to result in major consequences, including serious injuries and/or fatalities, widespread pollution, and reputational and financial damage to the organisations involved.

“While such events are typically rare occurrences, they usually remain long in the memories of those impacted. Because process safety is usually reliant on multiple layers of protection, including engineering

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design, it is easy for it to be overlooked or taken for granted,” said Farrar.

“Addressing this overlap – ‘bridging the gap’– provides an opportunity to optimise both process safety and OHS” In comparison, he said OHS risks are often quite visible (for example, working at height, moving vehicles or machinery, and manual handling, with the risk control strategies usually relying more heavily on procedures). Consequences such as injuries of OHS risk are also usually

contained to a single person (often the one involved in undertaking the activity).

“Another simple way of thinking about process safety vs OHS is that in terms of Safety (S), Health (H) and Environment (E), Process safety consequences tend towards S&E categories while OHS tend towards S&H,” said Farrar.

Chad Pettitt, lead consultant for health and safety firm AusSafe group, said process safety is generally focused on managing major hazards or catastrophic risk/s and the prevention and mitigation of low probability, high consequence events. “As someone who started their career in a major hazard facility and working in the process industry, I’ve been fortunate to understand both approaches in detail,” he said.

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OHS BODY OF KNOWLEDGE

Process safety can be explained within a framework that considers process (systems and risk process), people (including training and competency, human factors, leadership, and culture), and plant (inherently safer plant, layers of protection, design and operating limits, etc.), said Pettitt, who added plant aspects are (and should be) under the custody of process safety professionals or engineering capability.

“Process and people are often under the custody of an OHS professional (with many elements shared across the organisation), but with deference to process safety expertise relating to matters such as process hazard analysis, operator competency requirements, risk modelling and quantification, design that ensures safety and operating integrity (e.g. pressure relief valves, emergency shutdown systems and flaring design), risk-based inspection, and testing and maintenance programs that ensure process plant integrity.”

“When it comes to the magnitude, while there can certainly be fatal injuries from an OHS event, in process safety, it is more likely to be multiple fatalities” Process safety professionals are also custodians of process safety knowledge and the development of sound process safety information (e.g., operations and maintenance procedures, process and instrumentation diagrams and schematics, hazardous area dossiers, process safety critical equipment, barriers, and performance standards), he added.

Pettitt said the OHS Body of Knowledge identified three key factors that distinguish process safety from OHS • The mechanisms of causation: while both process safety and OHS are concerned with a potential loss of the control of hazardous energy, process safety is usually about managing higher levels of energy • The scale of potential consequences: while process safety incidents are less common than OHS incidents, their consequences are more likely to be severe • The focus on engineering and design: process safety focuses on the safety of the system, while OHS is more about the safety of those who interact with the system.

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“Importantly, a failure to identify these differences and develop appropriate management practices has been a significant factor in many process safety disasters,” he said. “In effect, we can’t expect to manage process safety by applying OHS approaches only.

However, I’d suggest that leading OHS approaches tend to integrate process safety management approaches, including a focus on health and safety by design, and focused programs and practices that target high-consequence risks, critical controls, and assured outcomes.”

Overlaps and bridging the gap

The best approach for both process safety and OHS is to take a systems-based approach – meaning safety is achieved by a conscious choice and not by accident, according to Farrar, who said a properly developed and maintained safety management system (SMS) provides the framework and direction to benefit both areas (especially in common system areas such as training, consultation, maintenance, and operational procedures such as permit to work).

“While the SMS might also provide guidance and direction around safety performance monitoring, it is important that specific performance indicators are in place for process safety, as traditional OHS indicators such as injury rates are poor indicators of process safety performance.

The OHS Body of Knowledge provides some good guidance around this (see table 7 in chapter 13). Leadership commitment is also necessary for both process safety and OHS as leaders set the tone and culture for safety through what they pay attention to,” he said.

Kerin said there are gaps between process safety and OHS, such as the detail of the engineering monitoring programs, for example, “but importantly, there are many overlaps, and we need to be leveraging these,” she said. “Safe work systems, such as permit to work, are used as a control in both OHS and process safety. So, this is an area of common ground for the two disciplines, even though different aspects of the permit are delivering different elements of control.”

For example, PPE is more often implemented for OHS, but the isolation has process safety implications to prevent loss of containment. Induction training programs (where they also cover process safety hazards) are also an area of overlap, as is emergency response, typically. “We need both disciplines to recognise each other and work to the common aim of preventing injury. This requires awareness

of and respect for the other discipline.

When we see something, we think may not be quite right to do with the other discipline, we should be calling each other for advice,” said Kerin.

“Process safety can also benefit from leveraging existing systems like site inspection or walkarounds and adding in some process safety focus. We don’t need to add different inspection processes, but we need to make sure the current embedded systems focus on all the right areas.”

Pettitt has observed an increased overlap in approaches over the past 20 years, and in many ways, he said it’s often a matter of the different lenses that the process industries and engineering professions have applied (and, of course, driven by industrial disasters that have informed broader safety management within sectors).

“In practice, OHS professionals would benefit in improving their knowledge in process safety. Many process safety specialists come from an engineering background (chemical, process, etc.), and they could equally benefit from a broader understanding of the health and safety sciences,” he said.

The OHS Body of Knowledge has sought to identify where process safety professionals and generalist OHS professionals can differ in focus and attention and determine where overlap exists. “In my experience, the leading organisations in this space bridge this gap by integrating processes and capability (without diluting) and with specialist process safety resources and expertise providing effective input into many different elements of the management system(s). Informed leaders are critical in achieving this,” he said.

Process safety and OHS: what can be learned from each other?

In order for process safety and OHS to learn from each other (and improve related safety outcomes), Kerin said this requires a level of respect and recognition of the other. “When we respect what others do, we can learn from each other as well as leverage existing systems for better outcomes,” she said.

This means process safety needs to recognise that OHS has a very important role to play. As Kerin said, it is not all about the engineering, and OHS needs to recognise that process safety is a specialisation. “The key to this is finding our common language to communicate with,” she said.

Pettitt also said there are many existing

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synergies between process safety and OHS and many learning opportunities. “In my view, one of the main opportunities and learnings from process safety approaches is in advanced risk management capability and discipline. While the sophistication of some techniques and approaches may not be warranted for all organisations and hazards/associated risk(s), it should be for many,” he said “Other aspects, such as a design and lifecycle focus, advanced management of change approaches, and asset integrity discipline and programs offer significant value to broader OHS management approaches,” Pettitt added. And in organisations and facilities that manage process hazards, he said OHS and personal safety management approaches are not sufficient on their own. “A more targeted focus needs to be in place.”

A number of organisational processes need to align to ensure an effective focus, according to Pettitt, who gave the example of (1) leadership practices focused on both personal safety (e.g. working at height) and process safety (e.g. isolation and breaking containment protocols), or (2) performance indicators that also consider the loss of process control events (leading) or (3) loss of containment (lagging), or (4) control of work and permit to work systems that ensure safety of process (facility safety) and not only the management of hazardous and high-risk work being performed. “As an example, formal permit to work processes have a history in process industries and have now become commonplace in many OHS management systems,” he said.

“With process hazards traditionally managed by those with engineering expertise who have good technical knowledge, they may not understand or appreciate the broader context of OHS

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and the organisational structures and culture within which process safety and OHS operate. There are opportunities for improving the management of both process safety and OHS through collaboration and shared learning.”

Farrar noted one of the hallmarks of any good SMS is the ability to learn from past events, such as incidents, failures, and audits. He explained that embedding those learnings back into the SMS via improved equipment, procedures, and organisational factors can benefit all areas of safety. “As an example, involving permit to work, the learnings from an incident due to poor handover of control on an electrical job that led to an improved system, could result in the prevention of a future incident when a handover is also required to break containment on a pipeline containing high pressure hydrocarbons,” said Farrar.

Advice for OHS professionals

In light of the above, Farrar said OHS professionals should work to ensure the engagement of their senior leaders around all aspects of safety, which might require educating senior leaders in some cases. In addition, while many of the same principles apply to the management of process safety and OHS, he said it is important to recognise where different approaches are required.

“For OHS professionals without a background in process safety, the OHS Body of Knowledge process safety chapter provides a good summary and points out these differences. OHS professionals might also find it useful to reach into their networks to establish relationships with process safety professionals for specific and/or ongoing assistance,” said Farrar.

As the custodian for safety management systems within the organisation and locallevel facilities, Pettitt said the generalist

OHS professional requires knowledge of the formal processes for managing process safety and facilitating the integration of process safety within the formal safety management system.

“Generalist OHS professionals should ensure that process safety resources and organisational capability exist and, where applicable, are developed and enhanced to enable organisations to become increasingly informed and build broad risk intelligence related to their operations,” he said. “The significant overlap between process safety and OHS professional roles can be better leveraged to ensure improved management of both process safety and OHS risk (risk assessment and auditing, for example). Collaboration between process safety and OHS professionals will require a change in practice by professionals from both disciplines, who will need to recognise and value their commonalities and potential synergies as well as their specialist expertise.”

An OHS professional with fundamental knowledge of process safety management concepts will be more effective, according to Pettitt, who said a good starting place is chapter 13 of the OHS Body of Knowledge and chapter 17.4, which unpacks chemical process hazards.

Kerin also encouraged OHS professionals to seek out information on process safety to understand their part in good process safety outcomes.

She recommended the same chapters in the OHS Body of Knowledge “The AIHS is also currently developing a training module on these chapters to support the ongoing development and education in this field. I was very happy to assist in this development to ensure we can continue to work together to advance both process safety and OHS for the benefit of society,” she said. n

References

Chapter 13 Managing process safety – Trish Kerin Chapter 17.4 Process hazards (chemical) – Trish Kerin The AIHS is running a series of webinars in 2022 discussing the OHS Body of Knowledge. For more information, visit the AIHS events website. www.ohsbok.org.au

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AUSTRALIAN WORKPLACE HEALTH & SAFET Y AWARDS

Leading safety at Schneider Electric from the front

Shelley Levy, leader of high-reliability systems for ANSTO

Pat Vitalone won the Health & Safety Rep of the Year in the Australian Workplace Health & Safety Awards for a proactive, diligent, and focused approach to improving safety at Schneider Electric

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asquale (Pat) Vitalone is an electromechanical design engineer with Schneider Electric, a French multinational and Fortune Global 500 company which provides energy and automated digital solutions for efficiency and sustainability. Vitalone serves as a level 3 HSR representing the research and development business in all matters relating to health and safety.

Vitalone explains that his workgroup is diverse, as is his scope and includes staff working in the research and development electrical test lab, electronics lab,

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workshops, and office settings where staff conduct live electrical testing in a low voltage environment ranging between 6V to 240V. As a level 3 HSR, first aider, and chief warden, he leads risk assessments of plants, tasks, areas, and chemicals.

In the electronics lab, he implements engineering/administration controls for prototype designs with untidy wiring, potentially working with live exposed energised equipment. While in product design, Vitalone says he ensures prototypes are safe for energising and testing, and in software test labs he establishes safe methodologies for

projects and investigates safety issues raised by workgroups, and consults with managers and HSE business partners. He also assists these business partners postincident.

When it comes to leadership, Vitalone assists with developing policies and procedures for departments and sites and plays a key role in undertaking risk assessments and finding solutions to mitigate risks. He was integral in the consultation process for Schneider Electric’s “Workplace of the Future” project, in which safety and emergency preparedness was a top priority. “I

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“Every day I ensure that the voice of my co-workers is being heard regarding safety issues, while providing feedback or recommendations on whether issues should be escalated to management or to HSE business partners”

advised on best practice for emergency stations placement in the company’s new agile working environment and collaborated with emergency wardens and first aiders with transition planning into the new environment,” says Vitalone.

He participates in department manager meetings to report any issues raised by the team and participates in safety changes for the department. “I also attend monthly HSE committee meetings and schedule and perform monthly workplace inspections to drive engagement at three different levels: business teams with workgroups, management teams with middle managers, and senior leadership teams,” says Vitalone. “Senior leadership team inspections are a key part of WHS activities, and I act as an advisor to the leadership team, facilitating discussions

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regarding HSE, and mental health and wellbeing issues.”

Vitalone also delivers safety training to ensure knowledge and competency (such as hazard reporting process, for example) using an Enablon safety app, which is a digital tool available on mobiles or site iPads to report hazards and incidents at Schneider. “I have contributed to building the confidence of our employees to use Enablon, moving away from paper-based reporting, and also maintain current levels of electrical and safety practice by attending training related to workplace safety,” he says.

Walking the safety talk

Vitalone leads from the front and embodies a culture of care at Schneider Electric, advocating and caring for his

own health, safety, and wellbeing and that of others. “I participate in all things safety and have demonstrated this by being a key member of the emergency management team as a chief warden and first aider, in addition to my HSR role,” he says.

“Every day I ensure that the voice of my co-workers is being heard regarding safety issues, while providing feedback or recommendations on whether issues should be escalated to management or to HSE business partners.”

Vitalone supports and enables the team to raise hazards, report incidents and any HSE concerns, and facilitates and trains staff to use the right resources and provide essential guidance. “I take an active role in raising safety opportunities and take action to mitigate the risk. I support staff members who have flagged hazards, and near misses (or safety opportunities as we call them) to implement controls to address these issues. And if not, I liaise with the HSE business partner and management team.

The team are confident and trust me to put their safety first, knowing that I am able to maintain confidentiality and work to resolve sensitive agendas,” he says.

Vitalone has been instrumental in implementing changes to processes and exhibits attention to detail in the risk assessment process and understands how appropriate change can be implemented in risk management processes. For example, he says a key database was missing from a new integrated management system, and he was able to report this immediately to HSE for rectification. “I proactively review processes and systems and consult and communicate changes to the team and management,” he says.

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Building a knowledge base

Vitalone has brought valuable knowledge and experience from previous employment in the white goods manufacturing sector, while working in tool manufacturing and general maintenance led him into a role as an engineering technician, prototyping and testing, similar to research and development at Schneider Electric. “I acquired an electrical license to advance the technical role working on energised parts, equipment and products,” he explains.

Achievements on the job

“Speaking up for safety” has been a major focus for Vitalone, who works with management, staff, and HSE business partners to ensure safety issues are clearly communicated and resolved. “For example, I assisted the procurement team in liaising with overseas suppliers

presenting potential electrical products for Australian markets,” he says.

These products were non-certified to Australian standards and were being energised in an unsafe manner without earthing or RCD protection, and Vitalone says the immediate response was to cease further use and conduct a full investigation

“I proactively review processes and systems, and consult and communicate changes to the team and management” “I continued to develop my mechanical engineering skillset via part-time studies in my past career, I was involved in testing energised electrical equipment, being in the vicinity of potential serious electrical incidents in working with live exposed energised parts. These were key moments in my safety journey,” he says. “Many years ago, safety procedures and policies were not as robust.”

In addition, Vitalone has completed all levels of HSE training, as well as certifications in first aid, CPR, emergency warden and chief warden training, in addition to hazard identification and use of the Enablon app, ergonomic practices, and training provided by HSE business partners. He is currently studying parttime to complete a Cert IV in WHS.

About Schneider Electric Schneider Electric is a French multinational and Fortune Global 500 company which provides energy and automated digital solutions for efficiency and sustainability.

It drives digital transformation by integrating world-leading process and energy technologies, endpoint to cloud connecting products, controls, software, and services.

It has built leadership positions in each of its businesses worldwide and enables integrated company management, for homes, buildings, data centres, infrastructure, and industries. With more than 128,000 employees globally, it generated US$28.9 billion of revenue in 2021, and operates in more than 115 countries around the world.

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and better understand requirements for safe use. A risk assessment was conducted highlighting and mitigating identified risks, and the outcome concluded in manufacturing a portable safety power supply unit, along with policies and procedures and competency training for required personnel.

Another example involved an electrical incident which required an investigation.

Vitalone assisted in preserving the area, liaised with HSE business partners to conduct a risk assessment, and discussed potential controls with the team with post-incident training for staff. “With attention to detail, I assisted with

reviewing safety documents, and piloting new safety systems and feedback. For example, I digitalised a chemical risk assessment,” he says.

Vitalone has also assisted the business with developing new document policies for issues raised in HSE meetings. One issue was the use of personal fan heaters within the office environment, which were a potential fire hazard and led to inefficient energy consumption from an environmental perspective. He conducted a risk assessment, actioned outcomes, and generated new policy documentation.

A final example involved isolated working risks in the business’ research and development lab, which was due to changes in onsite security after work hours. An immediate stop work outside of core hours was implemented, and Vitalone supported the team in finding a solution to enable continued out-of-hours work by conducting a risk assessment to identify the risks and proposed and implemented mitigation controls.

“The solution has always been to work alongside the manufacturing team or two people attending the site and being present in the lab,” he says. n

The importance of safety in life Vitalone says he had a technical mindset from a young age. “Some say I was mischievous; drilling holes around the home using a toy electric motor. I simply thought of this as innovative, exploring and learning which was the catalyst for my journey today,” he says.

He is employed as an electromechanical design engineer, with more than 30 years’ experience in the engineering manufacturing sector and extensive knowledge in tooling, maintenance, R&D testing, and mechanical engineering. Quality and safety is a strong focus, whether at home or work, according to Vitalone, who says a pivotal moment was when his two uncles lost fingers using woodwork machinery, driving home the importance of safety.

“I live and breathe safety as a core value with all life experiences (with more than 200 skydiving jumps, as well as 4WD driving, motorcycling and various water sports),” he says. “What some consider high risk or hazardous, I saw as adventurous, fun, and fulfilling, with safety being of upmost importance in life. It’s my nature, and a safe mindset has allowed me to fulfill my goals in life.”

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BOOK REVIEW

Book review: Do Safety Differently

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eaders will be aware that the so-called ‘New View’ of safety includes insights from ‘resilience engineering’, Hollnagel’s ‘Safety II’, and Dekker’s ‘Safety Differently’. Over the past few decades of reading most of Dekker’s books and many of his academic articles, I have formed a generally high opinion of his writing and referencing, and when I do not agree, I have enjoyed thinking about why not.

I liked Foundations of Safety Science and his 2021 ILO article with Michael Tooma that develops New View workplace safety indicators that are legally robust.

However, Dekker also takes pride in being a ‘safety anarchist’ and in energetic speeches that challenge the oil and gas industry and other leaders, and disparagement of mainstream ‘Safety I’ when spruiking Safety Differently, such as in his ‘I am not a policy wonk’ online piece in 2018.

I reviewed several of Conklin’s books in December 2019 and found merit in his discussion of the US Department of Energy’s human factors material and his concept of a ‘pre-accident investigation’, especially for wellresourced high-risk industries where major accidents to learn from are infrequent. More recent self-published short books seem to be vehicles to help spruik consultancy services and demonstrate sloppy editing and referencing.

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Authors: Sidney Dekker & Todd Conklin Publisher: Pre-Accident Investigation Media ISBN: 979-8413008652 RRP: $60.58 Conklin’s popular ‘preaccident’ podcast suggested that a ‘Project X’ with Dekker would provide details of how to Do Safety Differently that seemed likely to be of interest to OHS Professional readers, so I preordered a copy and duly received and read it on its arrival in February. The origins and intentions of the book were outlined in podcast 378 on 12 February 2022, which features a discussion between the two authors.

Conklin and Dekker explain that the book only took a couple of months to write, and they had adopted Conklin’s conversational style with ‘voices almost one’.

However, differences across chapters are non-trivial, and there are also footnotes using ‘I’, errors in dates of key references, and patchiness in formatting and layout. The target audience is variously described as those familiar with Safety Differently as it is not a book for beginners; those in the workplace who are neither early adopters nor laggards; WHS professionals who wish to influence and support leaders; and the leadership itself – in the field up to board members. A 17-page preface states that “If you are a leader, manager, safety professional, or highly experienced worker, this book will present ideas to help you effectively change the conversations about safety that happen every day”, with the book described as a ‘roadmap’, ‘toolbox’, ‘gathering

of recipes’ and a ‘springboard’.

Do Safety Differently has six chapters covering potentially worthy topics: (1) Safety Differently: From outcome to capacity; (2) When the work done is not as you imagined: Do learning teams; (3) When things go wrong: Do investigations differently; (4) When there is too much compliance: Declutter your safety bureaucracy; (5) When your safety people are dejected: Empower them differently; and (6) When you need to help your leaders succeed. Many parts of the book reinforce ideas previously published by each author and may be of less interest to those familiar with ‘Safety Differently’. An omitted chapter is said to feature in the 5-hour Amazon ‘audible’ version (that can be trialled free).

Concepts such as workforce and safety officer engagement and empowerment (pp23, 71-2) are presented as being ‘New View’ in contrast to traditional safety leadership but have been encouraged as better practice for decades. Ethical professional readers do not need (pp14, 22, 49) to “stop seeing your job as trying to prevent (or rename) bad outcomes just so your numbers look good” or to “question something as important as keeping people safe while at work” and move from the traditional outcome, safety management, and enforcement models to “capacity monitoring

and mentoring” to ‘make things go well’. Professional safety officers seek to use all available data and not just ‘root cause’ accident investigations without learning or lost time data. Carl Macrae’s 2014 book Close Calls could have been cited to show how it is done in aviation, including risk resilience, interpretive vigilance, and participative networks.

Pre-WW2 safety pioneer H.W. Heinrich is critiqued and demonised at length again, the authors seemingly oblivious to the careful rebuttal of fellow New View writer Carsten Busch in 2018 and 2021, as I reviewed in June 2021.

The ‘Swiss Cheese’ investigation modelling developed by James Reason is also unfairly trivialised and considered ‘much the same’ as Heinrich’s ‘Domino’ linear accident model. Rae and Provan discussed such straw man arguments with Busch during their ‘Safety of Work’ podcast episode 17 in March 2020.

In summary, it is difficult to recommend purchasing this book but by all means, read it (or listen free) in a thoughtful and careful manner. n

Reviewed by: Kym Bills FAIHS, Chair, SA Branch of the Australian Institute of Health & Safety

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The Visions 29th Annual Occupational Health & Safety Conference www.visions.org.au