Buiding cultures for safer workplaces : how management views its role

This paper is concerned with the role of senior managers in creating healthy and safe working environments in their organisations. Under the current OH&S legislation in Australia, managers have a duty of care to their employees to take all reasonable steps in preventing workplace accidents and illnesses. One approach to doing this is for senior management to take a leading role in creating a culture of safety and ensuring that this culture permeates all systems and processes affecting safety. However, as the link between safety and culture is a relatively new one in HRM research, little is known about the understandings that managers have of this role, the extent to which they see it as a core responsibility, and their approach to enacting it though their management practice. The paper seeks to shed some light on these issues by reporting the results of an investigation into the perceived roles and responsibilities of management in creating a culture of safety, as expressed throughout company annual reports. Annual reports are an important means for management to communicate its goals, strategies and outcomes to stakeholders. Reporting of safety issues and management’s orientation to them is expected to reveal much about their underlying attitudes to these matters and the emphasis given to an active role for senior management in preventing or mitigating problems. The research examines the annual reports of thirty large companies, some from industrial or blue collar environments with a traditionally high incidence of workplace accidents, and others from other sectors where OH&S issues have been less prominent. The contrast between the different groups indicates how historical circumstances influence perceptions of management roles in relation to OH&S. The paper concludes with some implications for HRM practice and an agenda for further research