Testing our Safety Resolve

The word resolution implies a steadfast intent to succeed or
change something.  While this may be true for the New Year,
the word is better used to describe the movement or change
between things. 


On this episode of the MEMIC Safety Experts Podcast, I discuss
how a resolution should be a living thing, especially when it
comes to safety.


Peter Koch: [00:00:04] Welcome to the MEMIC
Safety Experts podcast, I'm your host, Peter Koch, manager of
digital technology for Lost Control and a safety management
consultant here at MEMIC. I'm recording this episode as we
transition into two thousand twenty two and wow, what a whirlwind
it's been. One of those eddies of that whirlwind has really been
this podcast. It's hard to believe that the podcast has just
celebrated its two year anniversary in November of 2021. It's not
something that we could do without you listening, and because of
you, we've resolved to keep it going. And you know, that got me
thinking about the word resolution. And at this time of year,
more than any other, it's a word that gets tossed around a lot at
one that I expect some of us have been less than successful with
over the years, myself included. In general, that word has come
to represent that a decision has been made around an intention
like the New Year's resolution. Of [00:01:00] course, like I
firmly resolved to change or I firmly resolved to do or not to do
whatever. However, that tends to be a fairly narrow definition.
The word resolution has more uses in depth than what we have come
to connected with this time of year. So get beyond the New Year's
resolution, and the word connotes something opposite of an
unwavering decision to do something. Consider, like in music
theory and composition, the term resolution means to progress a
chord from dissonance to consonants, or from something that
sounds unstable or creates tension to a note that is more stable
or creates a sense of release. This clip that you're going to
hear next is Howard Shore's Score The Hobbit and is a good
example of movement from the tension of dissonance and the
release of resolution.


Peter Koch: [00:03:11] In [00:03:00] this case,
this is a part of the theme from The Trolls from The Hobbit, and
that their bad guy status has really made clear, by the use of a
semitone dissonance at the end of the musical phrase and I'm sure
you heard it, and if you were paying attention to it, you might
actually get that emotional sense of movement, of tension, of
something that's going to happen and that doesn't resolve. And
then finally, it does resolve. Another definition of the word
resolution is used when analyzing a complex notion into simpler
ones or solving. Again, this has a feeling of movement. I'm going
from a bucket of stuff, lots of complex things together, and I'm
trying to break it apart into its component parts. So going from
one state to another, like when separating a chemical compound
[00:04:00] into its constituent parts through process of
distillation, chromatography or even extraction, another use for
the word resolution is for the subsidence of a pathological
state, such as inflammation. So like, it goes away, it's
resolved. It's change. It's gone from a painful area to something
that's no longer painful. Last, the use of the term resolution is
used when making something more distinguishable or to make
individual parts clear, such as in optical resolution. And we
hear that all the time in photography, especially digital
photography, or when you're trying to pick out an LCD projector
for your presentations or a television, right, you're looking at
the number of pixels per inch or the resolution of the particular
device that you're trying to choose.


Peter Koch: [00:04:48] The higher the
resolution, the better clarity that there's going to be for the
detail that you'll have. These alternate uses of the word
resolution describe much more than a decision to [00:05:00] or
not to do something, and more often than not, resolution
describes the movement of something or a change. I see the word
resolution being one that describes the dynamic relationship
between one thing and another. It refers to the release of the
tension between the state of what something is and what you want
it to become. In my opinion, this is how we should see our
resolutions. Not a concrete decision, right? I'm going to stick
to this and nothing is going to make me waver because I know in
the past that has not been a successful place for me to start.
Whenever I do that, I tend to fly off the handle sometimes or
things will change. Circumstances in my life will change.
Circumstances around the resolution will change and all of a
sudden, I'm no longer firmly resolved the way I was before. So
it's not a concrete decision, but it should be the journey
between where you are and what you want to become and the path
that you're going to take. That's the resolution. How do I know
[00:06:00] where I am and where am I going to go?


Peter Koch: [00:06:02] So with that in mind, and
as it is the season for New Year's resolutions, I think it's a
good time to reflect on what safety resolutions we can make for
the coming year. And the way I see workplace safety is that it's
a journey and all of the things that we do to help us move or our
company move in one direction or another. That's the resolution.
And because safety has everything to do about the human being and
how they interact with the workspace, that journey is not always
easy, nor is it exponential. However, in order to move forward,
we do need to recognize the reality of where we are and where we
can go. So consider again the example of music. If you've ever
heard dissonant chords or the musical phrase never resolved, you
would be in constant tension, but kind of like a frog in the pot.
You wouldn't realize that you're in constant tension, but there
would be all the effects of that constant tension. You would
have, you [00:07:00] know, maybe an increased heart rate or
increased anxiety, or you would get really focused on what's
going on in front of you instead of seeing what's happening
around you because you have nothing to compare it to. You
wouldn't realize that you could change your circumstances or even
want to change it because, well, some people like living in
tension and an overall living in tension sometimes isn't a bad
thing, but we want to make sure that we're able to recognize the
tension that we're in and maybe that there's a better place for
us to go. Because while some tension is good, constant tension
fighting against the desire or the need to produce and the
looming potential for injury or death is not good. So first,
recognize where you are. Do you know what your injury rate is?
Well, how does it compare to your injury across the nation? So,
for example, it's an interesting story. I was at a workplace
discussing with the leadership what I had found to be an
inordinate number of injuries for that particular [00:08:00]
company. And while we were talking, I was really surprised to
receive a true lackluster or a resigned response from the team.
And when I had asked them how they felt they were doing, their
response was that they felt they were doing the best they could.
And of course, most of the injuries were the fault of the
workers, not their particular issue. So I left it in. We
continued our discussion and it was clear as we went on that they
believed that they were a top tier business when it came to what
they produce and the quality of the product that they had, and
that they had a team of workers that were critical to the mission
of the business and the success that they were enjoying. Well, I
asked the safety questions again in a different way. I asked if
they felt that they were in the top ranking nationwide for their
company and how do they think they compared to their peers in
safety? The response was that other businesses like theirs had
just as many injuries and they were right in line with everyone
[00:09:00] else.


Peter Koch: [00:09:01] Well, this was in
February, so I asked them what their OSHA injury rate was or
their DART rate. So they pulled it from their OSHA 300 log and
what they found was a five point three. So their injury rate was
about a five point three. So not huge. I've certainly worked with
other industries that had a much greater OSHA overall injury
rate. However, five point three is still a significant number of
people when we pull the BLS data for their NAICS code. That rate
was two point five, so two point five nationally for the NAICS
code, where theirs was specifically a five point three for their
company, more than twice the national rate. So when we dropped
that bomb, you would imagine that there might have been a pause
and there was. And then right afterwards there was a rash of
excuses and all the normal ones. Well, it's the employee's piece.
They don't listen, we have to we really have to push productivity
in order to maintain our [00:10:00] income levels and our
business levels. But as we kept going through those excuses, they
gradually realized that they were not in the place that they
should have been or really could have been. And it was only then
that we started to discuss the inconsistencies in the safety,
culture and what was said or written down in policy and the
reality of what was happening on the ground level where employees
were actually doing the work.


Peter Koch: [00:10:28] The leadership's
resolution was to start work at identifying what was causing the
disconnect and make changes that would positively affect the
safety culture. We didn't discuss what incident rate they should
resolve to get to, but we did make a point to evaluate the
incident rate every year to see if the results of what they were
changing affected the injuries at the company. And sure enough,
in three years they had a safety culture survey result that was
more positive and that their injury rate or incident rate had
dropped to a three. It [00:11:00] still wasn't below the national
rate, but what was much better than where they had started, and
they really recognized how they got there and that they still had
some room to grow. So what kind of safety resolutions should you
be making this year? Well, no resolution should be made in a
vacuum, and I need a little more creativity. So I pulled our team
of safety management consultants here at MEMIC to put a wish list
together for what resolutions they want their policyholders to
make. The first suggestion that was given to me, I think, hits
the beginning of movement, from dissonance to consonants or from
chaos to order. It asks that a company should identify what to
measure and what success would look like. This first resolution
comes from Laurette Wright, who works closely with our
policyholders in the health care industry.


Laurette Wright: [00:11:47] Hi Pete it's
Laurette, I would like my policyholders to identify two or three
KPIs or leading indicators that measure [00:12:00] safety
performance for 2022.


Peter Koch: [00:12:04] The next suggestion for a
resolution comes from Jason Hebert. Jason works with multiple
industries here in Maine and makes a recommendation that, if so
implemented, will help normalize the understanding of the
importance of safety and help with buy in around the safety
procedures and policies that need to be followed for success.


Jason Hebert: [00:12:25] If I was able to choose
a resolution for my insurance, it would be to implement a
learning process for their safety training programs. Learning
must be a process versus an event, starting with identifying
business needs or knowledge gaps within the workforce. Next, to
find the training objectives to address each of these gaps and
provide training to educate and reinforce safety expectations.
Equally important, and follow up to the training, managers and
supervisors need to circle back to ensure that new knowledge is
transferred to the job. In my observations, oftentimes training
is provided with no [00:13:00] follow up. Learning needs to be a
process, not just an event, to be effective. With that, my
resolution for twenty twenty two is for each of my policyholders
to review the current training programs, identify opportunity to
improve effectiveness and improve to ensure that business needs
are met.


Peter Koch: [00:13:18] Deb Willard Webb, who
works with all industries on our ergonomics team, is up next. She
has a penchant for connecting the vision of leadership with the
insight of the front line staff. Again, she provides a resolution
that involves gaining clarity, not just an unbending rule or
focus on a number.


Deb Willard Web: [00:13:37] I'd love to hear
policyholders resolve to include line staff in development of
corrective action once they identify root causes for injuries,
and to do that with enthusiasm, believing they can identify
actions that will make a difference to [00:14:00] recurrence. So
I'm not sure how to make that more concise, but that's the gist.


Peter Koch: [00:14:05] Al Brown MEMIC's own
director of ergonomics, has a suggestion that can have a
significant effect on injuries and on employee work capacity.
This involves an understanding of your current situation and what
your workplace would look like if implemented. Sometimes a change
like this one requires you to break down your process and
illuminate areas that small changes can be made too, to best
facilitate the whole.


Al Brown: [00:14:31] My resolution for two
thousand and twenty two is that all industries that handle
material don't put anything on the ground, they don't have too.
Keep it between your knees and shoulders and 35 pounds in
between.


Peter Koch: [00:14:48] The next suggestion for a
resolution comes from Natalie Campaneria and really highlights
the role of leadership and safety. Natalie, like most of the
safety management consultants here at MEMIC, came [00:15:00] from
the industry that she serves, and she has experience with how
company leadership can make or break workplace safety. Again, a
resolution to move.


Natalie Campaneria: [00:15:10] I have a
resolution that I would love to have all of our policyholders
make, and that is that the leaders make safety part of their
priorities when they're walking around. Be a good example. If you
see something on the floor, pick it up, reinforce positive
behavior related to safety and just let the staff know that
you're thinking about their safety, their health, and that you
care about them.


Peter Koch: [00:15:37] Last for this reflection
on what we can do to change safety for the positive. I look back
at the challenges that 2021 has dropped into every business
across the nation, and this recommendation for a resolution comes
from Rob Sylvester, and I think it really hits home. So
regardless of whether the challenge is COVID or reduced
production or supply chain problems [00:16:00] or the aptly named
great resignation, Rob suggestion is at the heart of every
resolution that brings a company safety program or process into
harmony with its other business goals.


Rob Sylvester: [00:16:13] My message to all is
lead with compassion and with empathy and always, always be
genuine. Take care of your people and they will take care of your
clients, your customers, your residents, patients or whomever
they work with. You're happy and healthy employees are the key to
your company's success and always be present in the moment,
especially in your personal life. Here's to a happy and
successful 2022.


Peter Koch: [00:16:38] Take care of your team
and they will take care of your company. No, no, you can't please
everyone all the time. But if your resolutions connect the
well-being of your team to the results, then you are on the path
to long term success. So what's your safety resolution for twenty
twenty two? I know most of us have room to grow or [00:17:00]
move from a place of tension to a place of order in our company
safety programs. So if you have an idea for our resolution or
your company has made a safety resolution for 2022, then send
them into me via email at podcast@MEMIC.com. We'll do a future
episode looking at what different companies have done and maybe
even reach out to you to get some more detail. Well, that about
wraps up this week's Safety Experts podcast. Thanks a lot for
joining us. The MEMIC Safety Experts podcast is written, hosted
and produced by me, Peter Koch. I'd like to thank all of those
other folks here at MEMIC who have supported this podcast like
Rod Stanley, who does a lot of work with coordinating guests, or
Kelly Barton on the communications team, which helps with the
promotion of the podcast. So if you have any ideas for a safety
topic that you would like to hear an expert discuss on the
podcast, email me that as well at podcast@MEMIC.com. Also, check
out this episode's show notes at 
[00:18:00]MEMIC.com/podcast, where you can find more safety
resources, as well as our entire podcast archive. While you're
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support. Until next time, this is Peter Koch wishing you a great
start to the New Year and reminding you that listening to the
MEMIC Safety Experts podcast is good, but using what you learned
here is even better.


Peter Koch: [00:18:55] Before you sign off from
the podcast, listen to a little bit about MEMICs loss control
services. [00:19:00] Integrating workplace safety into your
business is a key part of the long term success for any company.
And like most components of success, there is no one size fits
all solution. MEMIC is committed to partnering with employers
across all industries for workplace safety, and we recognize the
key to that partnership is understanding the unique demands of
the industries that we insure our safety experts bring experience
from the industries that they serve. And this experience provides
unique perspective through a critical eye when it comes to
understanding the particular exposures and challenges of an
industry from construction, retail and manufacturing to
hospitality and health care. Our team of experts will work with
policyholders to identify opportunities to improve safety.
Interested in finding more about MEMIC? Check us out at MEMIC.com
or better yet, contact your local independent insurance agent for
more information. If you're already a MEMIC insured, [00:20:00]
then check out our safety resources at MEMIC.com/WorkplaceSafety
and sign up for access to our video lending library, our LMS
platform, or our Safety Director Resource Library. Thanks very
much for listening.