Die Dissertation setzt sich mit der Thematik der Arbeitssicherheit in produzierenden kleinen und mittelständischen Unternehmen der sächsischen Metall- und Feinmechanikindustrie auseinander. Dabei untersucht die Autorin mögliche Einflussfaktoren auf das Sicherheitsverhalten von Arbeitnehmer/innen, um Hinweise für verbesserte personalwirtschaftliche Methoden zu identifizieren. Dabei liegt der Schwerpunkt der Arbeit auf dem Einfluss, den direkte Kolleg/innen auf das individuelle Sicherheitsverhalten haben. Bisher standen in erster Linie die Aktivitäten von Manager/innen und Führungskräften im Fokus der Untersuchung. Jedoch liefern theoretische Grundlagen, wie die Theorie der sozialen Vergleichsprozesse, die Theorie der sozialen Identität, die Soziale Kategorisierungstheorie sowie Theorien des hilfreichen Verhaltens deutliche Hinweise, dass direkte und alltägliche Interaktionspartner/innen einen wesentlichen verhaltensbeeinflussenden Faktor darstellen. Dieser Aspekt wird mit dieser Dissertation aufgearbeitet. Es ist von Interesse, welchen Einfluss soziale Faktoren auf das individuelle Sicherheitsverhalten im Unternehmen haben. Neben Gruppenfaktoren werden deshalb auch Führungs- und Unternehmensfaktoren erfasst. Darüber hinaus sind individuelle Faktoren Gegenstand der Untersuchung. Dabei wird unter Sicherheitsverhalten einerseits das sicherheitsrelevante Verhalten, wie die Einhaltung von Sicherheitsregeln sowie das Auftreten von Beinahe-Unfällen, Verletzungen und Arbeitsunfällen verstanden. Ebenso zählt dazu das sicherheitsbezogene hilfreiche Verhalten zwischen Kolleg/innen in Form des gegenseitigen Hinweisens auf mögliche Gefahren bei der Arbeit sowie das Beseitigen von Gefahren. Die empirische Untersuchung erfolgt an einer Stichprobe von 358 Mitarbeiter/innen aus den produzierenden Bereichen sächsischer Industrieunternehmen, die mittels Fragebogen befragt werden (Rücklaufquote 67,2%). Zusätzlich kommt eine egozentrierte Netzwerkanalyse zum Einsatz, die insgesamt 328 Netzwerke von Arbeitnehmer/innen erfasst (Rücklaufquote 61,5%). Die Ergebnisse zeigen, dass für das Entstehen von Verletzungen und Unfällen bei der Arbeit neben individuellen und Führungsvariablen vor allem Gruppenvariablen verantwortlich gemacht werden können. Dabei ist auch festzustellen, dass Beinahe-Unfälle sowie die Einhaltung von Sicherheitsregeln als zusätzliche Sicherheitsindikatoren genutzt werden können, um Ursachen für Verletzungen und Arbeitsunfälle frühzeitig aufzudecken. Darüber hinaus ergibt die Untersuchung, dass das sicherheitsbezogene hilfreiche Verhalten zwischen Arbeitnehmer/innen dazu beitragen kann, das Auftreten von Verletzungen und Arbeitsunfällen zu reduzieren. Dabei wird das sicherheitsbezogene hilfreiche Verhalten neben individuellen Variablen vor allem durch Gruppenvariablen bestimmt. Der Einsatz der egozentrierten Netzwerkanalyse gibt Hinweise dafür, dass direkte Kolleg/innen durch ihr Sicherheitsverhalten wesentlich dazu beitragen, ob sich Individuen sicherheitsgerecht verhalten. Somit liefert die Dissertation Hinweise dafür, dass Gruppenprozesse zwischen direkten Kolleg/innen für das Ausbilden von individuellem Sicherheitsverhalten relevant sind und für Führungsmethoden im Unternehmen beachtet und auch genutzt werden müssen. Durch die Festlegung von Arbeitssicherheit als ein wichtiges Teamziel können Führungskräfte dazu beitragen, dass sich Arbeitnehmer/innen damit identifizieren und zu ihrer Erreichung stetig beitragen. Dabei muss das Management besonders in kleinen und mittelständischen Unternehmen – wie sie in dieser Studie untersucht wurden – ihren Führungskräften die zeitlichen Ressourcen und Kompetenzen zur Verfügung stellen, um diesen Anforderungen der Personalführung gerecht werden zu können.

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While the literature surrounding the negative effects of stress on health and well-being is plentiful, there is a distinct lack of research applying stress frameworks to an organisational safety context. This study investigated the impact of stressors and strains on safety in the workplace, using the Job Demand-Control model as a research framework. In order to maintain a proactive approach to safety management, safety climate, safety compliance and safety participation were used as study variables as they have been established as antecedents to accidents and injuries in the workplace. From questionnaire data from employees with regular safety issues it was found that a positive relationship exists between safety climate and safety behaviours. Satisfaction was found to mediate the relationship between safety climate and one dimension of the safety compliance measure used. Providing support for the buffer hypothesis of the Job Demand-Control model, safety control moderated the relationship between safety climate and safety participation. Control over work scheduling, and decision latitude moderated the relationship between safety climate and safety participation but were indicative of an enhancing effect, rather than a buffering effect. The results suggest that control is an important variable to consider in terms of safety.

In spite of the vast technological progress and improvement in the standard of management systems within hazardous industries around the world, occupational health and safety incidents and fatalities continue to devastate thousands of lives each year. Throughout the last decade, significant improvement has been achieved in the reduction of health and safety incident rates across the South African petrochemical environment. However, a persistent roller-coaster fatality rate still prevails. Recent studies have shown that in order to conquer the relentless battle in realizing sustainable world-class health and safety performance, an organisation has to move beyond the traditional compliance orientated safety focus towards an interdependent safety culture in which safety is ubiquitous and embedded in the hearts of all employees. The root causes of more and more occupational health and safety incidents are no longer as a result of mechanical or systems failure, but instead originate from the attitude, values and beliefs of management and employees with regard to the significance of safety, also known as the safety culture. This has ignited a rising interest in the concept of safety culture among organisations because of the positive impact on occupational health and safety in reducing the potential for fatalities, injuries and workplace incidents. Hence the primary objective of this study is to determine the maturity of the current safety culture in the South African petrochemical environment by identifying particular culture shortfalls which could lead to hesitant progress towards the desired interdependent state. In order to reach this objective, three secondary objectives have also been set. Firstly, an understanding of the concept of organisational culture and safety culture is crucial. In simple terms, organisational culture can be described as the shared values, assumptions and beliefs in an organisation that ultimately direct employee behaviour. Organisational culture is characterised by three layers known as artefacts, espoused values and basic assumptions. These layers represent the manifestation of the organisational culture and vary in terms of outward visibility and resistance to change. Understanding and analysing these layers provide the reasons why employees behave in certain ways. Safety culture is a subset of organisational culture; in other words, it is the manifestation of the organisation?s attitude, values and commitment in regard to the importance of health and safety. Companies which have developed effective safety cultures have demonstrated unequivocal results in closing the elusive health and safety performance gap. Secondly, the fundamental components conducive of an effective safety culture were explored. These components include management and employee commitment to health and safety, accountability and involvement, communication and trust, risk awareness and compliance, competency and learning and finally recognition. Most of the components can be assigned to the artefact level or a combination of the level of artefacts and espoused values with only a small number more appropriately associated with the level of basic assumptions. The effectiveness within each of these areas ultimately dictates the nature of the safety culture and the success in preventing health and safety incidents. The focus of the last secondary objective was to determine the development stages leading to an effective safety culture known as an interdependent safety culture. Each of these stages represents the degree of maturity of the attitudes and commitment of management and employees in relation to the ongoing health and safety improvement in the organisation. The DuPont model suggests that in a reactive safety culture, safety is merely a natural instinct with no real perceived value for the individual or organisation. Moving towards a dependent safety culture, employees start to value safety but only so they do not get caught. The next stage called an independent safety culture is characterised by self preservation. In this stage, the mindset of employees changed towards an attitude of ?I do things safe so I do not get hurt?. In the final stage known as interdependent safety culture, employees embrace safety as a personal virtue not only for their own safety but also in contribution to the safety of their peers. In such a culture it is employees? desire to do things safely so that no-one gets hurt. An empirical study was conducted through a quantitative research approach in the form of a safety climate questionnaire. The target population consisted of first-line managers and non-managerial personnel within the production; maintenance; laboratory; technical, and the safety, health and environment departments in a petrochemical organisation. In light of the results emanating from the empirical study it can be concluded that an overall positive perception was observed towards the selected safety culture components indicative through the mean response scores above the neutral scale of 3. Older and more experienced employees demonstrated a more positive response to the safety compared to younger employees. However, several distinctive safety culture shortcomings were also identified. In the current safety culture, health and safety is sometimes overlooked due to productivity or cost implications. Employees tend to withhold safety related information to themselves as a culture of guilt prevails and mere compliance to safety standards is considered adequate. Solutions to health and safety problems are most of a short-term nature and do not address the root cause. It therefore provides evidence that the organisation under evaluation has not yet reached the desired safety culture maturity stage of interdependence. Although the study population is limited to a single organisation, the shortfalls identified could relate to the larger petrochemical environment and thus could explain the recent fluctuating health and safety performance. This assumption, however, can only be validated through further research within a much greater sample size inclusive of more than one organisation in the petrochemical environment. It is thus clear that the existing safety culture within the petrochemical organisation could lead to potential health and safety incidents if the shortcomings are not appropriately addressed. / Thesis (M.B.A.)--North-West University, Potchefstroom Campus, 2011.

In spite of the vast technological progress and improvement in the standard of management systems within hazardous industries around the world, occupational health and safety incidents and fatalities continue to devastate thousands of lives each year. Throughout the last decade, significant improvement has been achieved in the reduction of health and safety incident rates across the South African petrochemical environment. However, a persistent roller-coaster fatality rate still prevails. Recent studies have shown that in order to conquer the relentless battle in realizing sustainable world-class health and safety performance, an organisation has to move beyond the traditional compliance orientated safety focus towards an interdependent safety culture in which safety is ubiquitous and embedded in the hearts of all employees. The root causes of more and more occupational health and safety incidents are no longer as a result of mechanical or systems failure, but instead originate from the attitude, values and beliefs of management and employees with regard to the significance of safety, also known as the safety culture. This has ignited a rising interest in the concept of safety culture among organisations because of the positive impact on occupational health and safety in reducing the potential for fatalities, injuries and workplace incidents. Hence the primary objective of this study is to determine the maturity of the current safety culture in the South African petrochemical environment by identifying particular culture shortfalls which could lead to hesitant progress towards the desired interdependent state. In order to reach this objective, three secondary objectives have also been set. Firstly, an understanding of the concept of organisational culture and safety culture is crucial. In simple terms, organisational culture can be described as the shared values, assumptions and beliefs in an organisation that ultimately direct employee behaviour. Organisational culture is characterised by three layers known as artefacts, espoused values and basic assumptions. These layers represent the manifestation of the organisational culture and vary in terms of outward visibility and resistance to change. Understanding and analysing these layers provide the reasons why employees behave in certain ways. Safety culture is a subset of organisational culture; in other words, it is the manifestation of the organisation?s attitude, values and commitment in regard to the importance of health and safety. Companies which have developed effective safety cultures have demonstrated unequivocal results in closing the elusive health and safety performance gap. Secondly, the fundamental components conducive of an effective safety culture were explored. These components include management and employee commitment to health and safety, accountability and involvement, communication and trust, risk awareness and compliance, competency and learning and finally recognition. Most of the components can be assigned to the artefact level or a combination of the level of artefacts and espoused values with only a small number more appropriately associated with the level of basic assumptions. The effectiveness within each of these areas ultimately dictates the nature of the safety culture and the success in preventing health and safety incidents. The focus of the last secondary objective was to determine the development stages leading to an effective safety culture known as an interdependent safety culture. Each of these stages represents the degree of maturity of the attitudes and commitment of management and employees in relation to the ongoing health and safety improvement in the organisation. The DuPont model suggests that in a reactive safety culture, safety is merely a natural instinct with no real perceived value for the individual or organisation. Moving towards a dependent safety culture, employees start to value safety but only so they do not get caught. The next stage called an independent safety culture is characterised by self preservation. In this stage, the mindset of employees changed towards an attitude of ?I do things safe so I do not get hurt?. In the final stage known as interdependent safety culture, employees embrace safety as a personal virtue not only for their own safety but also in contribution to the safety of their peers. In such a culture it is employees? desire to do things safely so that no-one gets hurt. An empirical study was conducted through a quantitative research approach in the form of a safety climate questionnaire. The target population consisted of first-line managers and non-managerial personnel within the production; maintenance; laboratory; technical, and the safety, health and environment departments in a petrochemical organisation. In light of the results emanating from the empirical study it can be concluded that an overall positive perception was observed towards the selected safety culture components indicative through the mean response scores above the neutral scale of 3. Older and more experienced employees demonstrated a more positive response to the safety compared to younger employees. However, several distinctive safety culture shortcomings were also identified. In the current safety culture, health and safety is sometimes overlooked due to productivity or cost implications. Employees tend to withhold safety related information to themselves as a culture of guilt prevails and mere compliance to safety standards is considered adequate. Solutions to health and safety problems are most of a short-term nature and do not address the root cause. It therefore provides evidence that the organisation under evaluation has not yet reached the desired safety culture maturity stage of interdependence. Although the study population is limited to a single organisation, the shortfalls identified could relate to the larger petrochemical environment and thus could explain the recent fluctuating health and safety performance. This assumption, however, can only be validated through further research within a much greater sample size inclusive of more than one organisation in the petrochemical environment. It is thus clear that the existing safety culture within the petrochemical organisation could lead to potential health and safety incidents if the shortcomings are not appropriately addressed. / Thesis (M.B.A.)--North-West University, Potchefstroom Campus, 2011.

This research examines the structure of safety climate in the manufacturing sector. It does so by examining and comparing attitudes to, and perceptions of, safety issues in two manufacturing organisations and one organisation involved in the supply of construction materials. The concept of safety climate, and the associated concept of safety culture, have been the subject of much research and theory building in recent years and this thesis builds on previous work. The research framework used here employed a mainly quantitative methodology in order to investigate the architecture of safety climate using structural modelling. Statistical modelling has been applied in other safety studies, often involving safety climate as one variable in a global description of safety systems. However it has rarely been used to model and describe the structure of safety climate as an indicator of safety culture, as in this research. The structure of safety climate described in this research is characterised by the interaction of organisational, group interaction, work environment and individual variables, which provide indicators of influences on individual levels of safety activity. Structural models of the data from all three participating organisations fitted the broad pattern of organisational variables influencing group and work environment variables, which, in turn influence individual variables. A more detailed comparison of organisational structures, however, highlighted slight differences between the two manufacturing organisations and more pronounced differences between these and the construction material supply organisation, suggesting that most elements in the structure of attitudes to safety described here are industry specific. These results are explained in terms of working environments. Differences in structure, consistent with job roles, were also apparent between occupational levels. The research, in line with previous work in the field, has highlighted the importance of management commitment to, and actions for, safety, as well as the role of individual responsibility in the promotion of safety activity. The work reported here has emphasised their importance in developing and maintaining an organisational culture for safety.

ABSTRACT Objectives: To develop and validate in an Australian setting, an instrument to effectively measure patient safety culture; to survey health care workers (HCWs) in a large public healthcare system to establish baseline patient safety culture; and, using the Theory of Planned Behaviour (TPB), to use behavioural modelling to identify the factors that predict and influence Patient Safety Behavioural Intent (PSBI) Eg. Reporting clinical incidents and speaking up when a colleague makes an error. Design: Cross sectional survey analysed with multiple logistic regression (MLR). Setting: Metropolitan, regional and rural public hospitals in Queensland, Australia. Participants: 5294 clinical and managerial staff. Main outcome measures: 1) Behavioural models for high-level Patient Safety Behavioural Intent (PSBI) for senior and junior doctors, senior and junior nurses, and allied health professionals. 2) Odds ratios to compare levels of PSBI between professional groups. Results: 1) The factors that influence high-level PSBI for each professional group give rise to unique predictive models. Two factors stand out as influencing high-level PSBI for all HCWs (R2 0.21). These are: i) Preventive Action Beliefs (Adjusted Odds Ratio (AOR) 2.38) (HCWs??? belief that engaging in the target behaviour(s) will lead to improved patient safety) and ii) Professional Peer Behaviour (AOR 1.79) (HCWs??? perceptions of the safety behaviour(s) of one???s professional peers). 2) There was a six-fold difference in the level of target behaviour (PSBI) across the clinical groups with few (29.6%) junior doctors having a high-level of PSBI. When compared with the junior doctors, the senior doctors were nearly 1.5 times more likely (Odds Ratio (OR) 1.46, 95% Confidence Interval (CI) 1.01-2.13), allied health staff 2.7 times more likely (OR 2.71, 95%CI 1.91-3.73), junior nurses 3.9 times more likely (OR 3.86, 95%CI 2.83-5.26), and senior nurses 6.0 times more likely (OR 6.01, 95%CI 4.78-9.16) to have high-level PSBI. Conclusions: This is the first published study to develop behavioural models of factors that influence HCWs??? intention to engage in behaviours known to be associated with improved patient safety. The findings of this study will greatly assist in the future design and implementation of targeted and cost-effective patient safety improvement initiatives.

År 2013 införde Arbetsmiljöverket ett nytt webbaserat enkätverktyg som skall kunna ge ett mått av säkerhetskulturen hos företag och organisationer. Denna enkät baserades på tidigare forskning som tog fram en enkät, NOSACQ-50, för just detta ändamål. Värt att notera är att Arbetsmiljöverkets version är förkortad där vissa påståenden togs bort och vissa skrevs om. Det är detta som analysen behandlar. Hur påverkas resultaten av dessa förändringar som genomfördes av Arbetsmiljöverket? Analysen undersöker den möjliga felmarginalen på två olika sätt. Först räknas en teoretisk felmarginal ut som påvisar hur mycket resultatet kan skilja sig. Därefter analyseras resultaten från enkätundersökningen med samma variabler som fastställdes i den teoretiska analysen. Det visar sig att Arbetsmiljöverkets version av enkäten kan ge upphov till en felmarginal på närmare 0,8175 poäng. Denna marginal är förvånansvärt stor även om den baserar sig på en väldigt osannolik situation. Vid nästa del av analysen visar det sig att enkätundersökningen har en felmarginal på <0,00 poäng, vilket innebär att resultatet inte påverkas i någon större utsträckning. Detta ger ett intressant slutresultat där det påvisats en stor felmarginal i teorin, men som i praktiken är närmare obefintlig. Hur resultatet skall tolkas är inte helt klart. Det finns ett antal felkällor som måste beaktas, såsom lågt deltagarantal i undersökningen. Analysen bygger även i stor utsträckning på subjektiva bedömningar, vilket minskar trovärdigheten för resultaten. Därav har författaren dragit slutsatsen att det finns en uppenbar skillnad i resultaten mellan analysobjekten i teorin. Dock finns det inte tillräckligt med data för att fastställa någon skillnad i praktiken. Det går inte heller att avgöra huruvida den teoretiska analysen och dess resultat stämmer, endast att skillnaden finns där.

Denna kandidatuppsats syftade till att mäta säkerhetsklimatet bland ledarna i en organisation verkandes inom elbranschen och jämföra detta med branschgenomsnittet samt andra branscher. Vidare undersöktes säkerhetsklimatet i relation till safety performance inom organisationen. Studien syftade även till att finna samband och skillnader relaterade till upplevelsen av klimatet som baseras på faktorer såsom individens erfarenheter och sociala omgivning. Dessa faktorer låg till grund för kategorierna ålder, år i organisationen och yrkesbefattning. Frågeställningar uppsatsen ämnade att besvara var: Skiljer sig denna organisations resultat jämfört med andra branscher? Hur ser sambanden ut mellan ledarnas säkerhetsklimat och safety performance? Finns det samband mellan social omgivningen såsom yrkesbefattning, ålder och antal år i organisationen som påverkar säkerhetsklimatet? För att mäta säkerhetsklimatet användes frågeformuläret nordic safety climate questionnaire (NOSACQ-50). Resultatet visade att organisationens säkerhetsklimat var högt jämfört med andra branscher men likväl fanns ändå rum till förbättring. Vidare visade resultatet att det var möjligt att observera samband mellan det goda säkerhetsklimatet och ökningen av riskobservationer/tillbud. Resultatet påvisade samband mellan lågt antal olyckor och högt upplevt säkerhetsklimat. Den sociala omgivningen kopplat till yrkesbefattningar tenderar att påverka uppfattningen av säkerhetsklimatet. Detta då chef/projektledare och ledande montörer svarar höga värden beroende på om frågorna rör ledning eller medarbetare. Analyserna visade på samband mellan upplevt säkerhetsklimat och erfarenheter, äldre individer skattade säkerhetsklimatet högre samt att de med fem år eller mindre hos organisationen skattade högre. Detta resultat skulle kunna ha influerats av organisationens ökade fokus i nutid gällande säkerhetsarbetet. Slutligen var det 60 respondenter med ledande positioner som deltog i denna studie.

Syftet med kandidatuppsatsen var att undersöka hur chefer uppfattar säkerhetsklimat och sinroll i säkerhetsklimatet. Studien tillämpar en kvalitativ metod där det empiriska materialet harsamlats in med hjälp av åtta semistrukturerade intervjuer.Resultatet av studien visar på att det finns olika uppfattningar av begreppet säkerhetsklimat menatt cheferna ser att de har en betydande roll för det upplevda säkerhetsklimatet. Detframkommer även i resultatet att cheferna har ett likvärdigt sätt att arbeta med säkerhetsklimatsom innebär att anamma organisationens systematiska arbetsmiljöarbete i vardagen. Studiensteoretiska ramverk redogör för att arbetet med säkerhetsklimatet även kräver insatser utöver detsystematiska arbetsmiljöarbetet. Chefens roll i säkerhetsklimatet är att agera förebild utifrån detorganisationen förespråkar. Cheferna beskriver att deras roll och arbete med säkerhetsklimatethar utvecklats i och med organisationens ökade prioritering av säkerhet. Resultatet frånintervjuerna samt teorier inom området belyser att arbetsgruppens inställning till säkerhet haren stark inverkan på det individuella säkerhetsbeteendet. Detta eftersom gruppens normer ärstarkare än individens vilket kan generera både positiva och negativa effekter för klimatet.Kulturen inom arbetsgruppen kan skapa ett risknormaliserande beteende och för att ökariskmedvetenheten krävs det att organisationen arbetar konsekvent och att det utförs insatserbåde på individ- och gruppnivå. Det framkommer i studien att det krävs både kortsiktigt ochlångsiktigt arbete med säkerhetsklimatet. Ytterligare en aspekt som går att utläsa ur resultatetär att medarbetarna tillämpar ett mer säkert beteende om de vet att en chef är i närheten. Enslutsats av studien är att ett svagt säkerhetsklimat kan indikera på att det finns ögontjänare blandmedarbetarna. En ytterligare slutsats som framkom i studien är att organisationens prioriteringav säkerhet har en avgörande roll för det upplevda säkerhetsklimatet. / The aim of this Bachelor’s essay was to investigate how managers perceive the safety climateand their role in the safety climate. The study takes on a quantitative approach where data hasbeen collected through eight semi-structured interviews.The result of this study shows that there are different perceptions of the safety climate concept,but supervisors agree that they play a significant role in the perceived safety climate in thestainless-steel industry. The results also indicate that supervisors have a similar way of workingwith the safety climate which is based on the systematic work environment management of theorganization. The study's theoretical framework explains that working with the safety climatealso require specific contributions in addition to the systematic work environment efforts. Thesupervisor´s role in the safety climate is to act as a role model with regards to the organization´sstandards. Supervisors describe that their role and work with the safety climate has developedwith the organizations increased prioritization of security. The results from the interviewscombined with theories in the studied area highlight that the collective safety attitude of thework group has a strong impact on the individual safety behavior. That is because the norms ofthe work group are considered stronger than the individual’s, which can generate both positiveand negative effects to the safety climate. The culture within the work groups can create asituation where risk blindness becomes normalized. It requires consistent work on the part ofthe organization and to carry out initiatives at both individual and group level to increase therisk awareness. The study also shows that it takes both short-term and long-term work with thesafety climate. Another aspect that can be deduced from the results is that employees apply amore safety-oriented behavior if they know that a supervisor is present. A conclusion from thestudy is that a weak safety climate can indicate that there are eye servants among the employees.Another conclusion is that to what level safety is prioritized by the organization is crucial forthe perceived safety climate.