Notes

WHS TOPICS WE RARELY TALK ABOUT

Work Health and Safety experts pursue many common goals and adhere to similar guidelines. Whether you are a company owner, a PCBU, a Site Safety Officer, or part of my Occupational Safety Solutions group, we have specific subjects we frequently handle, along with things we hardly ever talk about. It's those underlying things that I want to concentrate on today.

Sad to say, my dad departed three weeks ago, and beyond the sorrow and sorrow, his death has me believing outside the boxes we generally live in. Death, and particularly his death, has actually got me thinking about much deeper concerns.

We reside in complex and really misleading times. In the midst of this, the concerns being placed on employers are increasing, not just requiring more of our resources however likewise increasingly requiring compliance to frameworks of believing we and our workers might not always agree with. We're being forced off the well-worn paths, tracks and routes we're used to, and onto side-roads and goat trails and into uncertain terrain.

Do you identify with any of these feelings? Do you as a busy person, as I do, wrestle with managing work, staff, friends and family? Do you likewise discover it hard at times to think beyond the obvious and the essentials? If so, and you also find these to be challenging days, I thought I 'd offer some insights from my off-the-beaten-track thinking. I hope they assist!

3 METHODS OF EXPLAINING WHS
The WHS role can be explained plainly, dramatically or with street-level bluntness:

Stated plainly ... WHS is about foreseeing what can fail, Strategising to avoid it happening, and assisting keep people safe.

Most people run from snakes, but safety experts act differently. WHS needs us to prepare for the snake, keep it in view, understand how to react, train others to do likewise, keep unnecessary snakes out, manage the snakes that are currently inside, and plan for the ones that are birthed every day.

Mentioned candidly ... WHS activities are about helping company owner cover their arse, adhere to the law and keep their people safe.

These are the WHS elements that are apparent. Let's talk about 3 topics that don't get given much time.

A FEW WHS ASPECTS WE DON'T TEND TO DISCUSS
At a top level, we see requirements, checks, balances and procedures. Below these surface behaviours, guiding concepts are at work, with duty of care and due diligence blazing a trail. If we look even deeper, we see a prolonged variety of factors, inspirations, viewpoints and ideas, of which, there are 3 I 'd like to touch on:

1. Ethical awareness,
2. Wrestling with morality, and
3. Allowing and handling feeling,

Consider them as trail guides to assist you browse when federal government, scenarios, or your individuals force you off the well-worn paths that you are used to.

WHS INVOLVES ETHICS

You might not have actually believed much about its application in the safety context. In other words, morality is a system that tells us what is incorrect and ideal, and ethics is the application of those rights and wrongs in a provided scenario. It can be reasonably argued that ethics change over time, however morality is constant.

Where does this fit in the WHS context? Ethics resembles a trail guide that informs you to get the pace, decrease, or step thoroughly. The virtue or morality is in reaching the location; ethics is exercised in getting there properly.

While most employees believe it is best to comment on unsafe circumstances (morality), however not all do (ethics). Most also know it is right for them to remedy a manager who is directing them to do something dangerous (morality), however many would not follow through on this conviction (ethics). There is frequently a gap between morality and ethics and I have a strong suspicion that space was narrower in my dad's day.

The take-away: do not assume that morality is enough, or that the ethical behaviour seen in one work domain will likewise be evidenced in another. Efficient Work Health and Safety isn't practically what is right; it's likewise about developing an office where ethical behaviour is the norm. Some of the ideas that follow will assist.

Work Health and Safety IS UNAPOLOGETICALLY MORAL

We've already pointed out that morality is the art of understanding the distinction in between best and wrong, even when the best thing is less helpful. It's the moral equivalent of having 'a personal reality' - and in a work environment safety circumstance, that is a catastrophe waiting to happen.

Our workers may disagree on how best and incorrect is decided, but employees require to come together when it comes to Work Health and Safety. It's alright for an employee to understand that their opinions and their morality have value, however when it comes to safety decisions, in all but the most remarkable of cases, the ethical thing to do is what the legislation states to do.

What if a supervisor, a fellow employee or government authority acts, needs or manoeuvres in an immoral method? Clearly, there are times when what is legal is also immoral; for example, both previously and throughout World War Two the Nazi SS rounded up Jewish, Homosexual and polish people for damage.

The take-away for me, and maybe for you, is that something doesn't end up being unethical or moral since the law or the crowd says it is. Nowadays, I know that personal morality differs profoundly from person to person - possibly more than ever in the past. That brings a challenge to my work environment because I require to wrestle with the ramifications of a morally unclear reality. Clear communication and decisions will assist - but sticking my head in the sand won't.

Morality offers none of us a free pass, and I reckon my dad's generation understood that better than we do.

WHS INCLUDES EMOTION
When it comes to emotions, there are 2 groups (or extremes) that tend to control. One emotional group is passive, while the other is reactive or proactive. The first group, the passive emotions, tend to consist of worry or unpredictability. These emotions cause hesitancy and trepidation, leading workers to not speak when they should. The second group is marked by emotions like greed, anger, over-confidence and arrogance. These emotions get in the way of reliable communication, shut down open discussion and increase the possibility of risks and mistakes happening.

What are we to do? The workplace requires all kinds of personalities, so all these emotions will make an appearance. We require to find a method to deal with emotional extremes.

My father's generation was big on personal responsibility and just "getting shit done". There was a clear expectation that the individual would flex. Anxieties and world wars will do that to you. My generation was more thinking about self-confidence and understanding ourselves within a team-oriented context. Nevertheless, today's young people seem to think the world focuses on their desires, their needs, and their truth. It's a predicament and a very frustrating one at that.

Possibly there's a winning balance to be discovered in between, and I reckon honesty is an excellent place to start. A group leader can reveal the way by prefacing his remarks to encourage emotional awareness and self-management. For instance:

"I feel a little anxious raising this, but I'm going to ..."
"Wait! Offer me a minute. I'm too f 'n upset and I'm gon na state something we'll both remorse."
"I do not mind if you do 'you' in the house. Heck, I do 'me' at home. But when we're here, we do 'us'! Do you comprehend that?"

WHAT'S THE TAKE-AWAY?
Whatever the specifics of your Work Health and Safety role, knowing these three underpinning problems will absolutely help your outcomes. It seems to me that there is little to lose and much to gain. Ethical awareness, the determination to wrestle with morality, and emotional responsiveness are all locations of investment, not expense.

As we close, you might have noted that I haven't even mentioned an item - and I'm not going to. Today, my item silence is my method of walking the talk. What I've shared with you is so fundamental it deserves an undistracted focus.
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