Safety Accountability – “Personal Safety Scorecards”

January 4, 2015 No Comments

A key to any injury and illness prevention program is accountability.  It is through accountability that management motivates employees, supervisors, managers and executives.

Some companies hold their managers and supervisors accountable for their accident records.  This is a “reactive” (after the fact) measure that is usually not as effective a motivator as “proactive” (before the accident) measures are.  This is especially true for managers and supervisors who have less than 100 employees under their control. 

At one company I worked for once each month, all managers and supervisors were rated on their performance of the below listed “proactive” activities.  This was a high hazard manufacturing company.  Not only were managers and supervisors included on this scorecard, but so was the Vice President of Operations.  We included supervisors and managers in production departments, maintenance, engineering, distribution, purchasing, human resources, safety, logistics, utilities, accounting , R&D, customer service, and environmental.  

• Attend Annual Safety Scorecard Kickoff
• Attend Annual Safety & Policies Training
• Attend Annual MSDS/Right to Know Training
• Attend Quarterly Safety Training Meetings
• Conduct Monthly Crew Safety Meetings
• Perform Monthly Safety Audit
• JSA Audits & Reviews
• Audit Lockout Tagout Procedures
• Perform Annual Safety Performance Reviews
• Safety Policy  Review
• OSHA Recordable Injury Review
• Accident Repeater Review
• Accident Investigation Form Fill Out/Review
• 3 x 3 Form Fill Out/Review
• Daily Safety Talks/Toolbox Topics
• Job Safety Observations
• Conduct Daily Stretching Exercises
• Monthly Department Progress Report of Scorecard

Hold your managers and supervisors accountable for the performance of key “proactive” safety activities.  Each month, track their performance on each of these key activities on a Personal Safety Scorecard.  In their annual performance reviews, assign a 5% to 20% weighting to their safety scorecard scores.  In time, as the overall monthly scorecard scores improve, your accidents will go down!

This is our second in a series of three articles on accountability.   Click here to view the first accountability article on “Insurance Chargeback Programs”.

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