Beyond Numbers: Strategic Approaches to OHS Metrics and Measurements
The December edition of the Australian Institute of Safety (AIHS) magazine included a cover story titled “Measuring What Matters” featuring FEFO Consulting and case studies from two of their client BSA Ltd and Journey Beyond. 1. How well do most organisations fare in general when it comes to effective metrics/measurement for OHS? 2. Where […]
The December edition of the Australian Institute of Safety (AIHS) magazine included a cover story titled “Measuring What Matters” featuring FEFO Consulting and case studies from two of their client BSA Ltd and Journey Beyond.
1. How well do most organisations fare in general when it comes to effective metrics/measurement for OHS?
The topic of workplace health & safety performance measurement has been a longstanding debate for decades, which suggests many organisations are still struggling to apply effective OHS metrics/measurement.
When applied well, OHS metrics/measurement should support effective decision making, promote desired behaviours, create optimal workplace conditions and ultimately assist with improvement. If applied ineffectively, reporting on OHS metrics/measurement can be an administrative burden that adds little value. So why not start with understanding was does add value?
OHS performance measurement should align with a clear set of strategic objectives to create value and enable high performance.
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2. Where are the most common challenges/issues for them in this regard?
When discussing this topic, it is important to differentiate between metrics (numbers) and performance (relative progress). Too often organisations overdose on metrics and rely solely on numbers as the only way to measure performance. Although quantitative performance metrics are important, it’s not the only way and often not the first place to start.
Metrics can be used in conjunction with other qualitative methods to engage workers, measure relative progress (performance), learn and improve from workplace experiences. Organisations that are more mature apply both Objectives and Key Results (OKR) and Key Performance Indicators (KPI) in a complimentary way.
The most common challenge with performance measurement is verifying how it adds value. Common issues include:
Challenge #1 Output vs Input
Focusing on the goal/KPI first (outputs), rather than the systems, conditions, practices or behaviours (inputs) that impact performance, e.g. both the winning and losing football coaches have the same goal/KPI to win. The goal is not the differentiator, it’s often the systems, conditions, practices and behaviours that positively influence the desired habits to achieve objectives and differentiate winners from losers.
Similarly, setting a goal of Zero Harm might be considered inspirational, but also will not on its own provide a winning ingredient for safety success. In some circumstances setting the goal of zero harm can lead to unintended consequences, e.g. underreporting and not sharing lessons learned.
Challenge #2 Short vs Long-term
Distraction by the goal/KPI dashboard rather than the destination of where you/your organisation are headed. Changes in metrics are often momentary and could be a distraction from learning about underlying systemic contributing factors. Similarly, blaming the worker, team behaviours or symptoms, rather than learning and addressing the cause.
Challenge #3 Balance
Not applying a balanced scorecard based on the strategy, e.g. balancing the right lead vs lag, and compliance vs performance measures. Adapting the balanced scorecard and being open to change is critical to align with changes to the strategy.
Challenge #4 Reliability
Not using statistically reliable and valid climate surveys with credible benchmarks. Seeking feedback at scale is a great way to understand relative progress. Survey benchmarks lose their value unless statistically reliable and valid. For more information refer to “Why is Survey Reliability and Validity Important?”
Challenge #5 Quantity vs Quality
Counting the volume (Quantity) of activities, e.g. number inspections or toolbox talks completed, rather than effectiveness (Quality), e.g. critical control effectiveness. Criticality is important to ensure a focus on what is important.
Challenge #6 Injury Classification vs Potential Consequence
Using injury classifications (Lost time, medical treatment, first aid injury) as an indicator of performance is often a mask of the potential consequence. Often the classification of an injury is luck, and can mask the real potential consequence, e.g. there can be no injury, but a near miss activity working at height or contact with electricity could potentially have fatal consequences.
Case Studies
Journey Beyond
Journey Beyond also launched a safety culture survey through FEFO Consulting to its geographically diverse employee base, and delivered a WHS maturity assessment, including a macro level review of safety systems and interviews with key operational leaders.
“The overall recommendations of this approach have informed the development of operational action plans for each business unit, using their safety culture levers for improvement, as well as strategic recommendations that have informed our new group-wide HSE strategy 2024-2027,” said Kidman.
This approach has enabled a clear roadmap to be developed that is easily monitored, adjusted, and scaled for growth. Aligning our strategic activities to KRAs and measuring the success of those outcomes using OKRs will also allow us to more easily remeasure our safety culture in the future.” – Nicole Kidman, General Manager
BSA Limited
“For example, one of our strategic objectives is to better engage, communicate, and consult with our workforce so we foster empowerment, fairness, and trust (under our engagement strategic pillar). We then measure our success as it relates to this objective through our health and safety index survey score annually, which has an overall target. Each strategic initiative or program we have is designed and linked to ensure we are influencing our objective because we understand that is the ultimate goal, rather than the KPI or target.” – Kynan Ford, Group Head of HSEQ, Compliance and Sustainability
3. How can OKRs (for example) help address these challenges/issues? Examples?
If Objectives and Key Results (OKR) are based on an effective strategy, by default you are tracking activities that are important, i.e. strategic choices that are aimed to have a positive impact and add value.
For example, a strategic choice might be to invest in traffic control equipment in NSW and QLD due to the unique risk profile. Rather than tracking traffic incident data or the number of traffic control inspections, why not create a set of robust organisational OKR’s that cascade into the respective regions with local ownership that are tracked and updated quarterly. Engage owners to review OKR progress by sharing lessons learnt, evaluate effectiveness of critical controls and report on the financial return on investment.
Objective: Improve forklift warehouse safety performance in QLD and NSW
Key Results:
100% forklifts fitted with sensors by Q1 FY25
25% improvement in critical control effectiveness by Q4 FY25
100% of lessons learned from reviews shared across the organisation quarterly.
KPI: Costs to fix damaged forklifts resulting from incidents.
4. What advice would you offer OHS professionals who might be considering a change in their approach?
Start with a set of clear strategic objectives that are selected to add value. This begins with aligning a health and safety strategy with the direction of the business. Remember, a strategy is not plan with a list of actions. A strategy is a set of conscious choices with known trade-offs and effective methods to monitor progress. If the above-mentioned strategic choices are ineffective, there is risk organisations are measuring the wrong things. This often adds little value and prevents optimal outcomes. Therefore, spend time to get the strategic choices right.
Regardless of an organisations maturity applying OKRs and KPIs can be applied in a pragmatic and engaging way that are aligned to strategic objectives. OKRs should also be bold, relatively flexible and verifiable. Avoid the “set and forget” trap by engaging OKR owners and evaluate progress on a quarterly basis. KPIs can be used as an indicator in a balanced way, e.g. bias attention on OKRs rather than KPIs to focus resource on what matters most to create achieve objectives.
“Approx. 10% of businesses effectively engage their frontline operations on quarterly basis to track health & safety OKR performance.” – Mark Wright
5. How can they best go about the process?
A robust process for an effective health and safety strategy should inform an aspiration, where to play, how to win, resources needed and methods to measure performance. Engage a range of stakeholders on creating strategic objectives, a balanced scorecard and innovative was to track progress.
For more information refer to the following article and free resources:
