The management of safe business operations requires an ongoing, systematic effort to identify and fix workplace hazards before employees are injured. It’s usually referred to as a Safety and Health Management System (SHMS). An SHMS requires leadership support; worker participation (including the acting involvement of any union if employed in your organization); hazard detection and assessment, prevention and control; opportunities for education and training; and regular evaluation and improvement.

Traditional approaches blame worker-related accidents. Herbert W. Heinrich’s 1930s theory that 85-95% accidents are caused by uninformed behavior of individuals, has triggered what is aswidsagent an array of behavioral-based safety (BBS). More recently the people who advocate for quality approach safety have realized that accidents arise from processes and systems and use quality tools to lower the probability of them occurring.

Managers need to get the message that safe business is a crucial aspect of their job. This can be done via direct remarks, performance reviews, and bonuses. LyondellBasell, for example will inform managers that no matter how low the OSHA recordable injury rate is in the event of a serious accident that occurs on site, they will not receive any bonus.

SAFe is configurable and scalable. This allows each company to tailor the Framework for their particular development environment. SAFe includes a spanning palette that includes additional roles and artifacts, not found in the Essential SAFe. Click each icon in the spanning palette to learn more about how it works to your specific situation.