Management by Objectives – an Effective Tool for Developing a Safety Culture
From Task Management to Management by Objectives
The development of a safety culture requires a transition from strict control of procedures to the conscious achievement of results. In his presentation, Serik Mazhkenov, Candidate of Physical and Mathematical Sciences and partner of the global Vision Zero concept, examines in detail the concept of Management by Objectives as an effective tool for transforming employees' attitudes towards HSE. The speaker emphasizes that traditional management methods based on controlling tasks and rules often fail to provide the necessary level of staff engagement.
Management by Objectives, on the contrary, is result-oriented and allows uniting the efforts of all elements of the organizational system. The objective acts as a system-forming factor that sets the vector of development and shapes the enterprise's philosophy. It is important to understand that the strategic goal of "zero injuries" is not just a number in a report, but the creation of an environment that sustainably generates safe behavior over a long period of time.
State Objectives and Driver Objectives: How to Avoid Accidental Results
The speaker analyzes the critically important division of objectives into two categories: state objectives and driver objectives. State objectives (for example, the LTIFR indicator) describe the desired result but do not provide an understanding of exactly how it was achieved. Relying only on them, a company risks mistaking a random coincidence for systemic success.
To ensure a sustainable result, it is necessary to use driver objectives — indicators focusing on the process of transition to a safe state. These are specific actions: the number of identified and eliminated violations, participation in safety audits, and conducting behavioral conversations. The speaker shows, using a real case study, how the active identification of non-conformities (risk hunting) directly correlates with a decrease in the injury rate. The more violations are identified and eliminated in the early stages, the less likely they are to escalate into accidents.
Cascading Objectives and Staff Engagement
The effectiveness of Management by Objectives directly depends on proper cascading — communicating global objectives to every department and employee. Normalizing target indicators (for example, per 100,000 man-hours) allows for an objective assessment of each area's contribution to the overall result. The presentation details the mechanism of linking the achievement of driver objectives to the motivation system, making the process transparent and understandable for employees.
Special attention is paid to the formation of collective responsibility. When the achievement of target indicators affects the performance evaluation of the entire team, employees begin to more actively monitor the actions of their colleagues, stopping unsafe behavior. This promotes the development of openness and trust, turning workers from passive executors into active participants in the safety assurance process.
What you will learn from this webinar:
- What is the fundamental difference between Management by Objectives and traditional procedure control?
- How to properly combine state objectives and driver objectives to achieve a sustainable reduction in injuries?
- How to cascade safety objectives down to the level of line personnel and link them to the motivation system?
- Why is it important to investigate near-misses as thoroughly as actual accidents?
- How does the introduction of collective responsibility affect the formation of a safety culture in teams?
Comments 6
Sapabek Kuzhemuratov:
Isn't it time to build Occupational Safety (management, risks, engagement...) based on the philosophy of "Kama Sutra" — Employer+Employee?
Answer: This is a very good question and, from a systems theory perspective, it relates to revising the fundamental principles of achieving a common goal by stakeholders. Today, in most organizations, relationships are built on the "system-tool" principle, where a person is a cog (a tool, a mechanism on a biological basis) in the production process, whose main task is to precisely follow instructions. But there is a different paradigm of relationships based on the "system-system" principle. Here, a person acts as an equal participant in the production process, who has their own interests and goals, the achievement of which is aligned with the goals and interests of the organization. The popular idea of "teal organizations" is based on this principle, which assumes harmonious alignment of interests and goals of the parties. Practice shows that successful development of a safety culture is impossible without the active, conscious, and equal (system-system) participation of all employees of the organization in production activities.
Ivan Bobrov
The number of identified violations is a reactive indicator. Should it be used as a personal or collective driver-goal? I think it can only be used as a state-goal.
Answer: Not entirely correct. Any department has the ability to regularly monitor the process of identifying violations (daily, weekly, etc.). If it is projected that by a certain period this indicator will not be achieved, the department head has the ability to mobilize employees to fulfill it. In this sense, this indicator relates to driver-goals.
Ilya Kolomiets
Regarding driver-goals — I would like to know your opinion on indicators related to so-called near misses, where an incident almost occurred but the causes, hazards, and risks are obvious. How clear is the benefit of tracking such "near-misses" for building statistics and subsequently taking measures from your perspective?
Answer: A near miss differs from all other incidents only by the absence of harm (lucky!). The absence of damage should not distract the OHS department from investigating the causes of the incident in full. This chance must be fully utilized. If this is not done, the incident will recur, but with much more severe consequences.
Rustem Kalimullin:
What do you do if the zero goal is accepted in words, but in practice no high engagement is observed?
Answer: This simply means that the organization has only well-developed state-goals, but no driver-goals, meaning that performers and managers don't have an answer to the question: what actions (measures) need to be taken to achieve the set result. For management by objectives to actually work, one must develop not only state-goals but also driver-goals.
Ivan Bobrov,
What is the role of the OHS Department in the Goal-Setting System?
Answer: The OHS Department should be the initiator and methodologist in properly setting and promoting OHS target indicators. For successful achievement, it is important for the OHS department to ensure timely information and explanation of the importance of management by objectives and their mechanisms at all levels of the enterprise: from top management to performers. The OHS Department should also ensure monitoring of proper achievement of target indicators and establish effective feedback for their timely evaluation and analysis for making effective corrective decisions.
Ivan Bobrov,
What would be the optimal weight of OHS goals in the overall scale of goals across all areas (quality, production, etc.)?
Answer: The weight of OHS goals should be no less than the weight of indicators in other areas of activity. The rationale is as follows: quality and production indicators are aimed at the efficiency of the enterprise's operations (short-term), while safe work indicators are primarily aimed at ensuring the viability and sustainability of the enterprise's operations in the long term. For an enterprise, successful performance in all areas is important.