Managing occupational health and safety (OHS) is most successful when it considers a range of perspectives or disciplines in identifying practicable solutions. Books are often successful in a similar multidisciplinary way but it is becoming rarer for books to contain a collection of perspectives. A new book has been published on Safety Culture which matches this multidisciplinary approach.
Recently the 20th anniversary of the Esso Longford disaster was commemorated in Victoria. Coinciding with this anniversary was the release of a book about the disaster and its personal aftermath, Workers’ Inferno, written by Ramsina Lee.
This book has been in development for many, many years and the Lee’s writing talent is on display in the structure of the book and the stories within. These stories largely linear But the multiple strands allow Lee to jump from one to the other providing a variety tone.
Many have been claiming that the era of neoliberal economics and the associated politics is over or, at least, coughing up blood. However, occupational health and safety (OHS) is rarely discussed in terms of the neoliberal impacts, and vice versa, yet many of the business frustrations with red tape, regulatory enforcement strategies, reporting mechanisms and requirements and others have changed how OHS has been managed and interpreted.
One of the most readable analyses of neoliberalism in Australia comes from
A reader recently asked why I haven’t written about the recent retirement of Professor Michael Quinlan. Michael has featured in many SafetyAtWorkBlog articles over many years and has been a major supporter for industrial, labour relations and occupational health and safety research in Australia and elsewhere for a long time.
He has many legacies but this article will focus on one tool he developed with his associate Phillip Bohle – the Pressure, Disorganisation and Regulatory Failure (PDR) model. PDR is explained at length in this excellent 2011 research paper written with Elsa Underhill and is summarised in the table below:
Tonight, SafetyAtWorkBlog will be attending the launch of a new book that includes personal stories about the 1998 Esso Longford explosion – Workers’ Inferno. The book is being released on the 2oth anniversary of the explosion that killed two workers, injured many others, disrupted gas supplies to the State of Victoria, resulted in a then-record fine for occupational health and safety (OHS) breaches and generated a Royal Commission. It is also, perhaps, the best example of a company trying to blame the worker for a major incident.
The Federal Opposition leader, Bill Shorten, was an official of the Australian Workers Union at the time and today he published an opinion piece Continue reading “Bill Shorten reflects on the Esso Longford disaster”
It is a common tactic for procrastinators to acknowledge a problem and then point to an ill-defined, fluffy concept as the problem because that fluffiness makes it almost impossible to change, some use the phrase “wicked problem” similarly. The fluffy concept may be too difficult for most to understand, or the benefits will not be quick enough or not fit into an unrealistic preconceived schedule. “Safety Culture”, or the currently preferred term “organisational culture that includes safety”, is often used to justify this procrastination.
At the end of August 2018,
Many consultants publish books on the understanding that a published work provides legitimacy and authority to their advice. Sometimes these books are vanity productions but increasingly, and particularly in the safety sector, small-run publications are appearing that are well-written, well-edited and well worth reading. The latest of these, in Australia at least, is “Workcover That Works” by Mark Stipic.
Stipic has been planning this book for some time and developed a clear strategy for this book to address the workers compensation processes in just one Australian State – Victoria. It is not a workplace safety book but it acknowledges the role of occupational health and safety (OHS) and devotes one of its four parts to “Foundations of Success” in which Stipic discusses safety climate and culture and those management practices that minimise the likelihood of a workers compensation claim being lodged. Continue reading “A WorkCover book that works”