An organization can optimize its efforts in this area by supporting individuals who play vital roles at each key level: lower-level managers, department heads, and senior executives. When the right people are chosen, the three roles they fulfill provide the organization with unprecedented opportunities.
Of these three aspects, leadership has proven to be the most effective for improving safety levels within an organization.
While no one disputes that leadership is a necessary factor for achieving results, there is no consensus on how this leadership should be exercised. What allows a leader to effectively monitor and improve safety? What qualities should such a leader possess? What tasks should be included in a leader's responsibilities to achieve the desired results?
How Does Leadership Affect Safety?
How does leadership ensure improved company performance?
The primary goal of safety programs, whether at the site level or across the corporation, is to reduce the number of hazardous situations. While not all hazards are equal in severity, all incidents stem from the organization's exposure to risks. Therefore, strengthening organizational defenses is the primary mechanism for improving safety. Exposure arises from management and systemic issues, as well as the influence of the organizational climate.
In most organizations, especially those operating in high-risk sectors, these two functions are seen as conflicting. Managers often believe that to fulfill one, the other must be sacrificed. Although there is an obvious imbalance between these functions that must be minimized, our research has shown that organizational leaders who integrate both tasks are capable of maintaining the necessary balance. The activities of such leaders contribute to the growth of safety within the organization.
Successfully achieving this balance, both at the interpersonal level and the organizational level as a whole, depends primarily on the leader's personality and priorities. These factors are decisive when choosing methods to influence employees on matters important to the company. A leader's personality traits are also reflected in their daily responsibilities and how those duties are performed. Furthermore, these characteristics influence the formation of nine elements of organizational culture and safety climate — elements directly linked to safety within the organization.
Personality and Values
A leader's personality and values lie at the core of their essence as a leader and, consequently, predetermine their effectiveness in an HSE leadership role. These two elements determine what the leader focuses on and the likelihood that they will choose or apply the most effective work style and best safety leadership practices.
How Does a Leader Influence?
Leaders use various influence styles. An influence style refers to the manner in which a leader communicates with subordinates to direct their efforts for the benefit of the organization. Research indicates that a transformational style is characteristic of the most effective safety leaders.
What Does a Leader Do?
A leader brings their personal qualities, values, and leadership style into daily interactions with people. These recurring behavioral patterns are used effectively (or not) by leaders to control the safety climate and form/create a robust safety system.
Organizational Culture.
Safety climate is the most rapidly changing aspect of organizational safety culture; it is easily assessed and highly accessible. This area provides the leader with levers to influence the culture — in other words, it allows them to dictate "how we do things around here." Certain aspects of organizational culture and safety climate can signal the potential for achieving high safety levels in the future.
Personality and Values.
A leader's essence, and consequently their behavior, is defined by two key concepts: personality and values. Research has shown a direct link between a leader's personality and many areas of employee performance. The concept of personality includes inherent traits referred to in scientific literature as the "Big Five." The "Big Five" includes the following characteristics: Extraversion — warmth toward others, sociability, self-confidence, activity, a sense of joy, optimism, and positive emotions.
Agreeableness — trust and respect for others, openness, adherence to rules, modesty, and empathy.
Conscientiousness — competence, orderliness, a sense of responsibility, achievement striving, self-discipline, and deliberation in actions.
Emotional Stability — confidence in oneself and others, an optimistic approach to difficulties, and the ability to handle stress.
Openness to Experience — curiosity, an investigative approach to challenges, and a developed imagination.
Furthermore, a leader's set of personal values must align with the values required for the job. Based on personal experience, we can say that the most successful safety leaders prioritize helping others, solving problems, and work quality above all else, and strive never to put others at risk under any circumstances. A leader's personal qualities and value priorities determine the choice of leadership style, as well as the optimal solutions for creating an organizational safety culture.
Although our personalities are fully formed by adulthood and the set of traits described in the "Big Five" theory stops changing, leaders learn to be flexible, and new horizons open up to them through a deep understanding of their own value orientation and personality structure. An effective leader knows themselves and their values, and therefore, how to most effectively use their resources and fulfill their obligations.
How a Leader Influences Others.
There are many different influence styles used by leaders. Research results suggest that leaders who use a transformational leadership style generally lead groups whose performance is significantly higher across many indicators, including safety. Transformational leadership consists of four components. The first is charisma. Is the leader capable of developing a vision and mission for the company, instilling a sense of deep pride, respect, and trust, and boosting employee optimism? The second component is inspiration, which is sometimes included in the concept of charisma. Essentially, it determines whether the leader is a role model, whether they can communicate the essence of the company's vision, set high standards, and use symbols to focus employee efforts in a specific area. The third component is individualized consideration. Does the leader, coach, or mentor provide feedback, consider individual needs when developing the mission, and give employees personal attention? The fourth element is intellectual stimulation. Is the leader capable of providing subordinates with a flood of new and interesting ideas aimed at rethinking old ways of doing things, restructuring dysfunctional paradigms, and promoting rationality and careful problem-solving?
Interestingly, leaders who use a transformational style understand the priority of safety issues in the organization without being prompted by management. Their methods ensure safety even if such a task was not explicitly set by superiors. This is likely related to the leader's personality type: a transformational leader is more likely to care about the well-being of their subordinates. The desire to protect employees is driven by factors deeper than the organization's management itself. Another interesting fact related to transformational leadership is the purely preventive nature of the measures taken by leaders of this type to ensure safety. In other words, it is not just the leadership style that matters, but the leader's actions themselves: managers who maintain good relationships with subordinates (transformational style) communicate with workers and take safety measures after the conversation (preventive measures), leading to a reduction in workplace injuries.
What a Leader Does: Best Practices.
A leader's personality is manifested in their actions; values influence the choice of style and the depth of self-understanding. In turn, typical behavioral patterns or leadership methodologies have a significant impact on the organization's safety climate and culture as a whole.
Organizations with a successfully functioning culture apply specific management and leadership practices. By comparing their version with information from published sources on the impact of leadership on safety and organizational culture, the author and their assistants concluded that there are at least 8 distinct leadership practices associated with developing and maintaining high levels of safety culture. These include: Vision, Trust, Collaboration, Feedback and Recognition, Accountability, Communication, Safety Value, and Action Orientation.
Vision — An effective leader, having defined the strategic role of safety for their organization, can "see" what the company's ideal operation looks like and present this vision in an engaging way.
Trust — An effective leader trusts the people in the organization, willingly and openly admits their mistakes, supports their subordinates and the group's interests, and provides subordinates with truthful information despite the possibility of a negative reaction.
Collaboration — An effective leader works easily with others, promotes cooperation and interaction in the field of safety, actively seeks employee action on issues that concern them, and encourages any initiatives and solutions to improve safety.
Feedback and Recognition — An effective leader is good at providing feedback to employees, as well as rewarding them for achievements and recognizing merit. Such a person publicly announces their subordinates' contributions to the company, uses praise more often than criticism, and specifically highlights safety achievements.
Accountability — An effective leader adequately assesses employee contributions to strengthening safety, clearly distributes roles in safety initiatives, and maintains a sense of personal responsibility for safety within the employee's unit.
Communication — Above all, an effective leader possesses good communication skills. They encourage truthful and complete information, even if that information puts the reporter in a bad light.
Action Orientation — An effective leader strives to prevent safety-related problems. Such a leader acts in a timely and thoughtful manner, demonstrating personal interest in the fastest and most effective resolution of safety issues.
Organizational culture and safety climate created by the leader.
Experience working with organizations interested in improving their performance, and subsequent research, has shown that organizational culture and safety climate are integral elements of organizational life whose effects can be described and measured. Successful organizations demonstrate commitment to characteristics such as trusting relationships, effective communication, trust in management, and the value of organizational safety. Among the priorities of less successful companies, opposite characteristics prevail. We have identified nine aspects of organizational culture that can signal the potential for establishing high safety levels in the future. These include:
1. Teamwork — effective cooperation of workgroups to achieve set goals within established deadlines. Leadership practices that encourage interaction and feedback help foster productive teamwork.
2. Group Relationships — the degree of respect between colleagues. A transformational leader can instill a sense of pride, earn the respect and trust of subordinates, set an optimistic tone for workgroup members, and implement practices that stimulate emotional exchange among coworkers.
3. Procedural Justice — how objective the actions of immediate supervisors are. A good transformational leader gives personal attention to all subordinates equally, rather than selectively. This method supports procedural justice. Furthermore, procedural justice must be backed by concrete actions: systems and methods must align with the concept of fairness.
4. Perceived Organizational Support — the degree to which an employee feels the company cares about their well-being. This requires a transformational style and additional measures to guarantee success. Transformational leadership includes individualized consideration, which can change the perceived level of support only if the leader takes concrete steps demonstrating care for the well-being and interests of subordinates.
5. Leader-Member Exchange — the strength of the relationship that a subordinate believes they have established with their immediate supervisor. To maintain the strength of this connection, it is necessary to constantly give employees attention, provide them with challenging and interesting tasks, and inspire them not just with words but with deeds — for example, being ready to provide any help the employee needs. In this case, action-oriented methodologies alone will not suffice. They must be accompanied by the building of effective communication and trust.
6. Trust in Management — how fair and consistent management is in its actions toward subordinates. Transformational leadership includes the ability to win over employees and earn their respect, as well as serving as a role model. These skills correspond to leadership practices used to create an atmosphere of trust. If most of the management team successfully masters them, the overall level of trust in management will increase significantly.
7. Organizational Safety Value — or "safety climate," the degree of concern and care the company has for safety. Interestingly, this factor receives less attention if the leader possesses the necessary set of values and characteristics. Even if the organization does not maintain a high level of safety, an effective leader can easily handle this task independently. Conversely, a leader who avoids elements of the transformational style will be forced to rely on company support in safety matters.
8. Upward Communication — the adequacy of information provided to management about safety in the organization. The effectiveness of the transformational style will largely depend on the ability to listen to subordinates.
9. Within-Group Communication — the likelihood that employees will share opinions about safety with each other. In a company with well-organized feedback, people are more open to communicating with one another. Companies that include all nine elements in their organizational culture prove to be more successful in business, capable of adapting and changing quickly, and achieving better results in their core areas of work compared to organizations that pay little attention to these nine aspects.
Conclusion:
The type and quality of leadership style adopted in a company have a significant impact on the organizational culture and safety climate, which in turn determines the safety of the organization itself. Leaders are capable of gaining a deep understanding of their values and personality structure, and how these are reflected in their style and influence methods. Understanding the relationship between these factors allows leaders to use their own resources to control safety. Here, leaders find a guide on what needs to be done to strengthen the level of safety in the company.