Diversity - The Safety Corollary

Diversity management has been described in terms of CULTURE and CHANGE PROCESS. Terms that are commonly used by Oil and Gas industry organisations for whom Safety is pertinent...so just about everybody.

The safety corollary to diversity presents industry organisations with the opportunity to hit the 'diversity learning curve' at a high entry level.

Following the tragic Piper Alpha Disaster of 1988 the mid 1990's saw the UKCS Oil and gas industry's safety focus move to behaviours and cultures. In 2003 the Step Change in Safety (SCIS) collaborative initiative launched a 'Personal Respnsibility for Safety' programme. This programme recognised the need for actual behaviour change to create further improvement in safety performance. The programme is described in  SPE paper 98114.

The paper describes a growing acceptance that;

changing behaviour would be much more difficult than changing a process or adding a new one.

and report that;

In a recent study undertaken by a major operator there was found to be very little correlation between the root causes of safety incidents and the resulting actions taken.........Very little action was taken in the area found to be the cause of the majority of the accidents - attitudes, behaviours and values.

and

The work group established that "Personal Responsibility for Safety" is about everyone in the industry, regardless of position, working safely, looking after themselves, their colleagues and others and always intervening when unsafe behaviours or conditions are observed.

believes that it is more probable than possible that these lessons from Safety management are relevant to Diversity management. It suggests that organisations starting to embrace diversity include Personal Responsibility, through attitudes values and behaviours, early. Focussing solely on structure, processes and metrics could be an expensive mistake.