| C.A.T.S. – Changing Awareness towards Safety |
Description
At Tarmac’s Buxton Lime and Cement a team of workforce colleagues consisting of both employees and regular contractors developed their own “Behavioural Observation” process. From this the C.A.T.S. (Changing Awareness towards Safety) was born. This was owned, led and managed at a “shop floor” level, with no management or supervisor involvement other than facilitation of the process. It involves the entire workforce and is completely anonymous. The process is built on trust & engagement!
The C.A.T.S. steering committee analysed all accidents from the previous four years and identified “at risk” behaviours that had contributed to them. The analysis helped the team develop their own list of “critical behaviours” and this is what they look for when carrying out an observation.
The C.A.T.S. process is based on observations. The observers watch their colleagues performing a routine task and looks for both safe and at risk behaviours. The observers provide feedback on what they have seen, which involves a short two way discussion. The observer captures and records anonymously the feedback from the person observed. The entire process is totally transparent and no names are recorded.
Data collected from the observations is analysed, trended and reported back to the C.A.T.S. steering committee. The committee make recommendations to the management teams on where things that encourage at risk behaviour could be changed or improved.
BENEFITS
• Improved safety culture and safer working environment
• Ownership by the group – safety is demonstrably the responsibility of everyone
• Engagement and willingness to challenge unsafe behaviour at all levels
• Accurate and real data to demonstrate what needs to be done
• Enhanced credibility of workmate to workmate interventions on safety issues
• Anonymous process without blame encourages feedback on issues
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