SLG on Leadership - Who CARES Wins ®
Effective leadership is the most powerful and ethical force multiplier available to organizations today. It is the most powerful because in nearly all circumstances it is under utilized - and yet it possesses the ability to leverage the entire human potential within the group. It is the most ethical because, at its core, leadership is about maximizing the growth and development of your people. This quote from Albert Einstein nails it:
"The intuitive mind is a sacred gift and the rational mind is a faithful servant.
We have created a society that honors the servant and has forgotten the gift."
The rational mind drives the science of management and has led to the oxymoron "performance management". You cannot manage performance in people - you must lead to get performance from your people. And leadership requires the intuitive mind.
In safety today there are two competing paradigms: one a behaviourally based view and the other a values based view. The former view is based on the principle of external control or compliance while the latter is based on the principle of internal commitment and engagement.
Compliance is the world of management - you manage things, you manage processes, you manage systems. You can't manage people - you have to lead people. Its the COP (Control, Order, Prescribe) style Manager compared to the SEE (Support, Enable, Empower) Leadership approach. An underlying difference between the two is the belief that people are capable of and freely choose self-governance when they are empowered and committed to shared values. It's important here to not be under any misconception about values based safety compared to behaviour based safety and what they are focused on. They are both focused on creating safe work places and both involve the need to address unsafe behaviours that put people at risk and lead to accidents. The difference is that BBS is based on the ABC model which is incomplete and is why BBS programs don't of themselves lead to the elimination of injuries. This is because behaviour cannot be directly controlle'; behaviour is in fact a by-product. Values based safety is about engaging the workforce and commitment to a set of standards that says this is how we do it around here.
While leadership is critical in all aspects of business, in the fields of Safety the impacts of strong leadership are immediate and far-reaching. Good leadership creates an engaged and committed workforce. Good Safety performance is created at all levels of an organisation - it is up to each and every one of us to not wait for it to get better, but to work with the skills and understanding we have now. We all serve as role models for the members of our work groups; the actions of our people reflect our leadership approach. We have found that when organizations and individuals truly become leaders they can make an incredible difference to Safety performance.
As Bobby Kennedy once asked:
If not you, who? If not now, when?
It is important to understand what safety leadership actually is and the very powerful role that leadership has in engaging the workforce to create a culture of safety.
Safety Leaders Group - Definition of Safety Leadership - Who CARES Wins ®
Creating an
Achievement oriented,
Relationship based,
Endeavour,
Sustainably ®
