Although safety professionals have long acknowledged that the promotion of safety is an important component of a safety management system, many organizations have had limited success in promoting safety throughout their own companies. For example, one way many companies attempt to promote safety is through the use of slogans. Safety slogans such as “Think Safety”
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The clichéd phrase “incidents and accidents are unavoidable” is not acceptable to today’s safety management professional. Everything happens for a reason, including incidents and accidents. For years, safety professionals have been striving to detect, prevent, and eliminate incidents. We tend to assume that the majority of safety incidents are caused by untrained or inexperienced workers.
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Safety management systems stabilize safety performance and provide greater management clarity and structure, but to what extent do they affect safety culture and promote employee safety? This article explores the relationship between safety management systems and safety culture and introduces a new model showing the complex interplay of systems and culture.

Businesses use key performance indicators (KPIs) to measure progress toward specific health and safety goals or simply to monitor trends associated with corporate and facility activities or special projects. KPIs are used as a means to collect data and communicate trends, which can then be used to indicate where further improvements and resources are required. This article reviews the basics of establishing and managing KPIs.

The U.S. Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) announced last month that 15,000 employers were notified by letter that injury and illness rates at their work sites were higher than average. OSHA is urging these businesses to seek the expertise they might need to address the root causes of their poor performance. OSHA was also
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