George Irving

Most organizations have done an outstanding job with the hierarchy of controls and overall compliance programs. In an ideal world, that would be enough to solve recurring safety problems yet injuries still persist. One critical area that is often overlooked is how human factors influence safety outcomes. For potential investments in new safety initiatives, addressing human factors may only be on the "nice to have" list. This session will start the conversation on why human factors training is essential in every industry and participants will take away useful strategies to gain leadership buy-in to support the effective management of human factors in the workplace and beyond. Be part of the discussion in this interactive Q&A with two expert safety leaders and your host Rick from SafeStart.

Have you ever been in a situation where you witnessed something unsafe but chose to look the other way? It’s okay to admit if you have—this is a reality on a lot of job sites. When it comes to employee engagement and safety, the human element is often overlooked and this has a big impact on how people respond in safety situations. When you talk about safety, it needs to be in terms of emotions, feeling the emotions, and addressing the real people in those situations—when someone gets hurt, they aren't just a safety stat. Talking about regulations and statistics does not make a sustainable impact on employees but participants will come away from this session knowing how to embed human factors into their safety management system to help engage employees and reduce injuries. In the session, participants will also be encouraged to tell their stories on how to develop a safety culture of “If you see something, say something” and the importance of making safety personal.

It’s no secret that workers are injured and suffer preventable injury-related deaths at a much higher rate off the job versus while they're at work. And logic would indicate that their friends and family members are hurt a lot outside of work too. Companies often notice the impact of their injured workers but have you ever thought about the impact that the injuries and fatalities of workers’ loved ones—especially children—have on employees? Learn how to make the “heart and mind” connection to reduce the impact of human factors beyond the workplace to not only reduce worker incidents but also improve family safety (when they take safety home), increase worker satisfaction, reduce absenteeism, strengthen recruiting and cause companies to have a more favorable perception in the community.