supervisors as safety leaders - carrillo &...

Carrillo & Associates, Inc. (562) 596-8537 Spring 2016

Supervisors as Safety Leaders Rosa Antonia Carrillo, MSOD

Safety Conversations at Work! The Secret to a Strong Positive Safety Culture

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Power and politics run organizations. It is all about who is in and who is out. When employees feel included, they contribute. When they feel excluded, they withdraw. Everyone wants employees who are willing to stop an unsafe action and take responsibility for safety but no one wants to take the time to build the relationships that would help people do just that!

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The conversations your leaders have create the relationships in your organization. If you do not take the time to have the right conversations people will not build the trusting relationships they need to stop an unsafe action. Neither will they report the vital information you need to avoid a failure.

We can help you establish the process if Continued on page 4

Practical Application

Focus your conversations on your desired outcomes.

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Scientific Evidence for “Schmoozing” People are motivated to act based on their perceptions and self-interests.

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Below the Waterline Conversation Process™

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Relationships are the basis of engagement and participation.

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You want everyone to be willing and able to stop an unsafe act or condition. But that won’t happen unless your workplace has a high level of trust.

Trust decreases when managers make decisions based solely on the physical evidence they see such as cost, quality, time, equipment, behavior or output.

Managers who fail to address the less visible forces such as relationship are misusing a powerful motivational tool. It is relationship that influences the emotions, feelings and thinking that ultimately determine how people choose to behave.

Working on relationships is much harder than working on the concrete stuff because results are not immediately measurable. This creates resistance to working with the very elements that will improve trust and communication levels.

Face-to-face communication, conversation and dialogue are the tools to manage relationships and influence power and politics.

Building the trust necessary to maintain the free flow of information needed to run a successful organization is an ongoing task and challenge. Continuous conversation and

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face-to-face communication are the primary means of creating the culture you desire.

The Trust and Open Communication (TOC) Iceberg is a metaphor for the relative importance of managing the visible and invisible aspects of an organization. At the tip of the iceberg, the visible aspects typically receive the most attention because they are concrete and easier to measure. However, the invisible aspects pose a much larger threat when not managed properly.

Managers receive very little education in how to handle relationships, feelings and emotions. The emotional intelligence concepts are helpful, but a system-wide application and structure are needed to embed EI into the culture. Helping all of your employees acquire the Below the Waterline Conversation™ skills they need to maintain strong relationships is the key to achieving a culture where everyone is willing to prevent an unsafe act or condition.

Practical on the Job Application Why relationships and conversation matter.

Rosa Antonia Carrillo, MSOD

Rosa is president of Carrillo & Assoc., an internationally recognized author in the field of safety leadership and organization development.

C&A has worked worldwide from Bahrain to Latin and North America. We have designed and implemented leadership development programs for major corporate and government clients, including General Electric, Honeywell, NRC, World Bank, Altamed, Aramco, Exxon-Mobil, Southern California Edison, Johnson & Johnson, UC Berkley, and Lawrence Livermore Laboratories. In addition, we provide management consulting to family owned businesses. Through effective and inspirational management coaching, Carrillo & Assoc. outlines fresh approaches to improving productivity, enabling the progress of diversity, and boosting the bottom line.

www.carrilloconsultants.com

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Scientific Basis for “Schmoozing” People are motivated to act based on their perceptions and self-interests.

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After years of failed attempts to change people’s behavior through programs, policies, laws and rules, we have a more successful option open to us. It is one that has dominated human existence since the early day, our human reliance on relationship for survival and advancement. It is why people’s thoughts and actions are so deeply affected by their relationships. (See more about the neuroscience on page 5.) If managers want to effect change they have to actively form relationships and participate in conversations with the people they are trying to influence. Ralph Stacy and others who have dedicated their lives to studying complex systems brought our attention to the fact that we should be paying attention to the most

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important driver of organizational outcomes and business results—that is the ordinary everyday human interactions and communications. It may seem counter intuitive to focus on a micro level, but if we look at the “butterfly effect” from quantum physics it is chance unpredictable interactions that produce larger outcomes. Similarly, connections and relationships evolve in ways that are radically unpredictive. This means leaders need to play an active role in conversations and pay close attention to the quality of relationships.

(Stacey: Strategic Management and Organisational Dynamics, 2007)

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you don't have internal expertise. We can:

1. Build your integrated safety team to support you. Establish the connections and conversation here.

2. Provide them with training and facilitation skills to create the change and train everyone in conversation skills.

3. Set up an effective meeting structure and train team members in problem solving skills--including managing conflict and inclusion.

4. Continuous learning--keep adding to your team's skill base.

Lots of research has shown us that supervisors are the most important link to employee engagement. In safety, they are the primary communicator and reinforcer of safety as a priority. They cannot play this important role effectively if they don’t understand or believe in the importance of conversation and relationship building.

Conversation at Work! is our program constructed to help supervisors understand why these elements are so important and how they affect an element they know to be quite important—the levels of trust and open communication in the workplace.

Conversations at Work!

Conversations at Work! is a

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program designed to improve leadership skills including motivation, employee conflict, performance improvement, delegation, and overcoming resistance to change by teaching positive communication models that focus on self awareness and building relationships with others. Participants learn and practice skills that are demonstrated by experienced facilitators. To date thousands of managers and employees have been trained in a wide range of industries such as government to manufacturing.

Conversations at Work! involves six central components: 1) Assessment; 2) Learners see the skills demonstrated by expert facilitators and strict rules of conduct are set to guide discussion or real work issues; 3) Skill practice—Learners practice using and applying skills in a group conversation that mirrors life at work; 4) Feedback—Participants receive feedback on how well they used the skills; 5) Application on the job—Learners select a skill or issue they will practice on before the next session; and 6) Structure is set up for continuous follow up and improvement.

Measurable Results

In a recent study, a major manufacturing firm assessed

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the effects of Conversations at Work! by evaluating employees’ lost-time accidents before and after their supervisors were trained. Lost-time accidents were reduced by 22 percent. Investigation of formal grievances and productivity were also evaluated. Formal grievances were reduced from an average of 7 per year to 1 per year. The plant exceeded productivity goals by $1,000,000.

After supervisors in a manufacturing plant received training, communication competencies such as how to listen better and solicit feedback for better understanding, lost-time accidents were reduced by 50 percent, formal grievances were reduced from an average of 15 per year to 3 per year, and the plant exceeded productivity goals by $250,000 (Pesuric & Byham, 1996). In another manufacturing plant where supervisors received similar training, production increased 17 percent. There was no such increase in production for a group of matched supervisors who were not trained (Porras & Anderson, 1981).

Conversation at Work! develops emotional intelligence skills, which like technical skill, can be developed through a systematic and consistent approach. However, unlike technical skills, neuroscience

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shows that it takes work over a long period of time to bring about change.

When you hire Carrillo & Associates, we begin with an assessment of your communication culture as it relates to safety environment and health. C&A utilizes the Relational Coordination survey to determine where the communication and collaboration breaks down to the detriment of getting the work done safely, profitably, and with a high level of customer satisfaction.

The extensive research of Jody Gittell, PhD, provides measurable data proving that the quality of relationships in an organization affect the bottom line. Her data includes extensive application in health care and the airlines industry.

The survey measures relational coordination using seven survey questions including four questions about communication (frequency, timeliness, accuracy, problem-solving) and three questions about relationships (shared goals, shared knowledge, mutual respect).

Respondents from each of the functions believed to be most central to the focal work process are asked to answer each of the following questions with respect to each of the other functions, with responses recorded on a five-point Likert-type scale.

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Experiments have proven that the human brain is threatened by loss of relationship in the same way it reacts to potential loss of life.

David Rock reports these findings in multiple books and articles, such as Managing with

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the Brain in Mind (2009). He summarized the research into four main themes:

1. The rational is overrated 2. Pay attention to emotions 3. Social issues come first 4. Attention changes the brain

Neuroscience Research on the Importance of Relationship

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Carrillo & Associates has an extensive network of uniquely trained facilitators for this process. Each has field experience both as a manager and team facilitator.

For more information visit www.carrilloconsultants.com

Cheryl Archer, MAOM is a former CEO, has 30 year experience worldwide as business coach and expert in Lean management as well as team building.

Kelly Bernish, CSP has managed corporate safety teams for the Fortune 100. She is an avid student of safety culture and has built many outstanding teams.

Neil Samuels led leadership development for BP Oil and currently runs his own practice. He is co-author of Mindful Conversations: Catching Drift and Weak Signals.

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Carrillo & Associates, Inc. (562)596-8537 Spring 2016

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Building relationships through conversation is the foundation of organizational effectiveness because:

§ Relationship, inclusion and recognition are as important to humans as food and safety.

§ What we believe to be true is constructed in conversation with others.

§ What we experience as our thoughts is the internalization of social relationships.

§ Relationship is a pre-requisite condition for the transfer of information.

§ The threat of exclusion is equal to the threat of violence (real or perceived)

§ Everything is created in relationship. There is no such thing as a powerful autonomous individual or lone creator.

§ We thrive within a web of relationships that provide identity, purpose and meaning.

Contact: [email protected] for a complete description of the Below the Waterline Conversation Change Model

Step Process Description ©2016 Rosa Antonia Carrillo 1. Initiation Meet with corporate or site leadership for overview and buy-in for the Below the

Waterline Conversation Process™. 2. Survey Administer Relational Coordination Survey™ 3. Focus Groups Focus groups analyze survey results

o Who is being overlooked? Who do we need to include? o Do people get accurate information? o Is the frequency & repetition of information sufficient? o Is there a common understanding of goals? o Do individuals feel respected and valued?

4. Team Building A safety team is launched focused on building the relationships that will transform the organization. The team building process utilizes the conversation process used for safety culture transformation. Highest-ranking managers approve the team charter with commitment to resources.

5. Facilitation & Training Skills

Team receives in depth training in facilitation and communication to deliver skills to the organization. This includes the Below the Waterline Conversation Process™.

6. Effective Meeting and Problem Solving

Team skill development in meeting effectiveness, ongoing relationship management, project management and problem solving. Team members are systematically engaged in conversations with employees, supervisors and managers.

supervisors as safety leaders - carrillo &...

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