Having a healthy level of chronic unease can help identify weak danger signals, reduce complacency and improve alertness. Just because a catastrophic event hasn’t happened, doesn’t mean it won’t!
Positive reinforcement of reporting near miss events, acting on weak danger signals and freely communicating good and bad news are all signs of a healthy culture. Examples of weak danger signals could include:
Unexpected maintenance results
Variations from good practice that has become tolerated
Noticing a colleague is distracted while carrying out a critical process
A decision to carry on that we think was made too quickly.
Critical Control Management (CCM)
Critical Control Management (CCM) is an internationally recognised approach1 for organisations to improve the management of potentially fatal and Major Unwanted Events (MUE). In particular, enabling organisation to ensure critical controls are effective.
Clownfish vs Sharks?
What’s an underwater diver’s biggest threat – Hundreds of clownfish or one great white shark attack?
Similarly, CCM focuses on Major Unwanted Events (Shark attack), rather than higher frequency events, that might have a lower consequence (Clownfish)!
Four Steps to Effective Critical Control Management
Identify Material Unwanted Events & Critical Controls: Confirm material risks and critical controls
Set Standards, Build Capability & Capacity: Set critical control expectation and confirm resources
Verify & Evaluate: Set methods to check and provide assurance
Review, Learn & Improve: Review to continually improve
To enable effective CCM outcomes, focus on:
Finding the missing controls that are needed, making note of the ones already in place, e.g., act, objects or systems.
Identifying which of those controls are critical, and
Enabling supervisors and managers to be able to monitor those critical controls effectively
To determine how effective your critical control verification activity is, it requires understanding the right mix of acts, objects and systems. At FEFO Consulting, we believe this means focusing on the critical few by asking questions like:
Are your metrics driving the right behaviour?
Are you overly reliant on injury statistics?
Are you focused on quantity, rather than quality of controls?
Do your operations have a healthy level of chronic unease?
Additional resources can be found by viewing our case studies from BSA and JLL success stories.
If you’re looking to understand how you can effectively verify your own critical controls, have meaningful conversations about safety to prevent major unwanted events and enable improvements in your organisation, contact us today to see how we can help.
Download our Simplified Guide to Critical Control Management
Refer to our Resources page for a complete list of all Downloads
The world’s first International Standard to address workplace psychosocial health was published in June 2021. ISO 45003 Occupational health and safety management – Psychological health and safety at work – gives guidance on managing psychological health and safety risks to align with ISO 45001 occupational health and safety management system. It addresses the many areas that can impact a worker’s psychological health, including ineffective communication, excessive pressure, leadership, and organizational culture.
What’s the same with ISO 45001 and ISO 45003?
Both standards ISO 45001 and ISO 45003:
Follow management system principles and structure of Plan-Do-Check-Act.
Emphasise the importance of leadership commitment, risk management, roles, resources, and planning.
Provide guidance on competency, change, procurement, methods of monitoring, responding and review.
A clear distinction is ISO 45001, has great emphasis on both workplace health AND safety (WHS). To understand how to measure WHS refer to the Health and Safety Index article, “An integrated approach for Health AND Safety”.
What is different about ISO 45003?
ISO 45003 provides more specific psychosocial risk guidance on how to identify:
Conditions, circumstances, and workplace demands that have the potential to impair the psychological health and well-being of workers.
Human and organisational factors, their assessment and potential actions required to improve the working environment.
Work-related hazards of psychosocial nature to address social and work factors, such as role conflict, job control, change, time pressures poor communication.
Primary, secondary, and tertiary interventions, e.g., prevention, training, incident reporting, investigations, rehabilitation and return-to-work considerations.
So, what to do?
Given work-related hazards of psychosocial nature are often invisible, we recommend:
Normalising psychosocial risk
Applying surveys based on evidence-based research
Conducting focus groups led by expert facilitators
Evaluating performance to identify trends and risk factors.
FEFO Consulting has partnered with the Health and Safety Index to design integrated online assessments to measure health AND safety performance supported by reliable benchmarks.
We appreciate organisations have different needs, so have developed a range of Diagnostic (Dx) surveys along a spectrum of being broad to more specific.
Diagnostic (Dx) Options
Check out our short Mental Health & Wellbeing Organisation Assessment video covering 17 psychosocial factors is designed to align with a Job Demand-Job Resource-Worker Outcome Model with a particular focus on mental health.
To understand more about our deep dive organisation assessment services into Mental Health & Wellbeing, refer to our Case Study or contact us at info@fefo.com.au
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Supporting Aboriginal Projects
We are proud to be supporting Birubi as they improve their WHS practices.
Since its beginning, BirubiAustralia has made a strong commitment to driving Aboriginal employment outcomes; this was, and always will remain a core objective of the business.
Incident Causation
The modern view of incident causation explains the complexity of incident causation and what to do about it, with powerful questions to discuss as a team, like:
• “What areas of your job are working well?” • “What’s preventing your job from being effective? What’s getting in the way?” • “How can your team operate more productively at work?”
We engaged Mark and his FEFO team to review our Supplier and Contractor management program. Mark is a highly skilled professional who can engage at all levels of an organisation.
His ability to assess the organisation and tailor a program that was suited our organisation were exceptional. I would have no hesitation in recommending Mark or his team.”
Fefo Consulting will be partnering with the Health and Safety Index to present at the National AIHS conference: The Health and Safety Index: An Integrated Approach
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The month of February is flying by. The FEFO team have been collaborating with clients, forging new partnerships and securing speaking opportunities for 2021.
Health & Wellbeing Insight: Hierarchy of Controls
Too often organisations focus on individuals and lower order controls such as training, rather than focusing on job design, resources and demands.
The ‘Hierarchy of Controls Applied to NIOSH Total Worker Health’ provides a conceptual model for prioritising efforts to advance the safety, health, and wellbeing of all workers.
Have you completed a formal assessment to determine the health and wellbeing controls that are relevant to your organisation?
“In the absence of information, we jump to the worst conclusions.” – Myra Kassim
Industry News: Knowledge Hub
Have you checked out the NSW Centre of Work Health and Safety ‘Knowledge Hub’ yet? It’s a repository of research, insights and other valuable information available to everyone. It’s a useful resource for developing harm prevention strategies and being across the current best practice in Work Health and Safety.
Personal Protective Equipment (PPE) is often a final layer of defence that requires effective solutions.
We are excited to announce a new partnership with Paramount Safety Products to provide specialist safety advice and also offer attractive discounts on the full suite of their brands, including:
“Mark and his team are very easy to work with. They have excellent industry knowledge and go above and beyond to answer any queries from us and our clients in regards to safety. Highly recommended.”
The FEFO Consulting team will attend the Australian Small Business Champion Awards this month as a Finalist in the Striving for Excellence and Preventing Harm category.
Being selected as a finalist recognises the tremendous FEFO team effort and the support from our valued clients and partners.
You will find us here in 2021! Come along and be sure to say hello, either in person or virtually!
Fefo Consulting will be partnering with the Health and Safety Index to present at the National AIHS conference: The Health and Safety Index: An Integrated Approach
With specialist skills in psychology, mental health and wellbeing, Sally brings a focus on championing and developing people.
Sally’s career has spanned the public and private sectors, not-for-profit organisations and the management of small businesses offering counselling and consulting services.
Sally is currently leading the design and delivery of mental health and wellbeing training for clients across Asia Pacific (APAC). In addition, Sally is also heavily involved in an organisational assessment of psychosocial risk factors for a national media and broadcast company.
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It’s been a challenging year for many and also a year that risk, health and safety management has never been more critical. Thank you for your support. With the support of our clients, partners and expert team, in 2020 the FEFO team:
Partnered with 30+ new customers
Launched new leadership, health and wellbeing programs to an international audience
Received 120,000+ Health & Safety Index responses
Was humbled to be a Finalist in Australian Small Business Champion Awards.
Psychological safety & high performance: go hand in hand
Managing the risk, health and safety of an organisation goes well beyond the physical.
“There’s no team without trust,” says Paul Santagata, Head of Industry at Google. The results of the tech giant’s massive two-year study on team performance, revealed that the highest-performing teams have one thing in common: psychological safety, the belief that you won’t be punished when you make a mistake.” Harvard Business Review
FEFO’s Mental Health & Wellbeing team specialise in helping organisations apply practical research and informed tools to achieve psychological safety. Hear from Sally Boucher, FEFO Senior Consultant, in this 1 minute video touching on psychological safety and how to build an effective team culture.
Client Review:
“The FEFO Mental Health & Wellbeing training facilitated by Kate and Sally provided excellent, valuable information. It was presented clearly and in an appealing format and we received lots of positive feedback. 94% of attendees surveyed recommended their colleagues to attend the Mental Health & Wellbeing training.”
Caitlin Walkenhorst Asia Pacific ESH Senior Manager Lockheed Martin
Working in Partnership: keeping people safe
FEFO teamed up with Disaster Relief Australia, a not-for-profit organisation supporting communities devastated by disaster, to create a new Workplace Health & Safety Manual.
The Disaster Relief Australia team and all the selfless volunteers do an amazing job for communities throughout Australia. Watch this 30 second Disaster Recover Support video created by JMAcreative to find out more about our collaboration.
Case Study
“Culture eats strategy for breakfast” -Peter Buckley
Building Capability: Facilitating nine interactive workshops across New Zealand
Sustaining: Helping leaders with new learnings and continuous improvement.
Find out more by reading the brief FEFO case study Building an Effective Culture. Be sure to view the video featuring Kate Power, FEFO Director, by clicking the ‘What’s in it for you’ link contained within the article.
Connect with us
We’d love you to jump on-board and join our LinkedIn community. You can expect:
Our take on the latest risk, health and safety industry news
Top tips from our expert team
Case studies showcasing real risk, health and safety challenges and solutions
Brief videos with helpful insights
Events to participate in, both face-to-face and virtual
Senior Experienced and Ready to Partner
The FEFO team is agile and experienced, with a small number of hand-picked, senior-level risk, health and safety experts at the helm. Find out more about our seasoned team, their specialist expertise and our research-backed approach.
Culture eats strategy for breakfast – Peter Drucker
FEFO Consulting recently partnered with a global organisation to create strong health & safety beliefs, effective leaders and a high performance culture. This involved designing a business specific program with three key phases:
Measure: Site visits, engagement of key stakeholders and a formal evaluation using the Health and Safety Index, i.e. combination of organisational feedback and individual self-assessments.
Focus: Nine interactive workshops across New Zealand to build team capability and individual leadership capability. For a quick preview to one of our workshop videos, click on the following link ‘What’s in it for you’
Act: A collaborative approach to support effective implementation of team and individual action plans, e.g. alignment of action plans with organisation strategy and methods to ensure feedback, accountability and continuous improvement.
Contact us to learn more:
M: +61 (0) 417 570 143
E: info@fefo.com.au
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Client Video: Hear what the Head of Safety for BSA Ltd has to say about us in this 1-minute video
Health & Safety Index Launch: Explore our new Health & Safety Index. A simple online assessment enabling organisations to measure, focus and act on health and safety improvements that matter!
OFSC Case Study: FEFO Consulting successfully designed, developed and supported the implementation of a new HSE Management System for Baseline Projects to achieve Federal Safety Commissioner (OFSC) accreditation. Refer to this Case Study and learn more
Safety in Design: Check out our client Review of our Safety in Design of the iconic new Sydney Fish Markets due for completion in 2024
Meet Terry: Mr Terry Swanton (AKA Sir Swanton!) is a senior health, safety and environmental expert with a proven track record in delivering effective outcomes in the areas of safety leadership, health & wellbeing, management systems, safety in design, events safety, training and auditing. Make contact with Terry
FEFO Consulting was engaged to complete a review the Workplace Health & Safety (WHS) function of NSW Government Department of Planning & Environment. Various aspects of safety culture and teamwork were evaluated and reassessed after 12 months. The results demonstrated a remarkable step change and safety culture and team performance.
Challenge
Culture and Team Performance
• Team design did not align with stakeholders, activity & locations
• Job design not aligned to work
• Accountability, trust and morale was low
Solution
Case for Change & Team Re-design
• Safety team and function assessment
• Recruited 17 new roles, including a new WHS Director
• Right people, Right place!
Outcome
Performance Improvement
• WHS Function Overall Performance up 39%
• Greater operational presence up 50%
• Team Engagement & Motivation up 37%
• Team members willingness to call out unproductive behaviour up 36%
• Team role clarity up 27%
What we do
We help organisations simplify critical aspects of health and safety by strengthening controls and enabling high performance.
