Accidents at work and a "pat on the back"

Getting the best out of employees and avoiding potential accidents at work can mean much more than simply enforcing health and safety measures, educating employees and instructing them in workplace safety. Although it is an area often overlooked, providing workers with encouragement and positive reinforcement of health and safety messages is also an invaluable tool in protecting workforces from workplace accident and injury.

When undertaking such a approach it is absolutely vital that workers are rewarded for doing the right thing. However obvious it may seem, there are indications that some UK employers may neglect this approach, being more ready to castigate workers for doing the wrong thing than they ready to offer a "pat on the back" when they adhere to good practice.

Training and consultancy manager with Norwich Union Risk Services (NURS) John Phillips believes that encouragement is essential in fostering a positive attitude in workforces and can help minimise the numbers of accidents at work in the UK. He recently said, "Employers should encourage a positive attitude towards safety in the workplace. This means rewarding safe behaviour, as well as clamping down on poor practices.

"People don't always appreciate a dictatorial approach - but let's be honest, health and safety is sometimes seen in this way. Rather than beating people up with a stick, organisations ought to introduce simple measures that minimise the potential for accidents by promoting positive behaviours."

Despite its neglect in some quarters, the idea should hardly be seen as revolutionary as it follows many fundamental principles long advocated by behavioural psychologists.

There are many dangers inherent in a criticism-centric approach, not least in its tendency to isolate and demotivate employees through absence of positive feedback. John Phillips explains these pitfalls, "Nobody wants to suffer an injury, but research suggests that this kind of 'negative reinforcement' encourages only the bare minimum of change in behaviour necessary," said John.

"On the other hand, positive reinforcement - let's say linking safe practices to individual appraisals, and therefore to reward and recognition - produces better results, because people go the extra mile and do more than is expected of them.

"In essence, people operate more safely and actually influence others to do the same as a result of positive reinforcement, because they 'want to' rather than because they 'have to'."

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