White Paper now available following largest ever Process Safety Workforce Survey
Member-led safety organisation Step Change in Safety has released a white paper on the findings from its Process Safety Workforce Survey, the largest-ever survey of its kind (Thursday 29th August 2024).
The industry-wide initiative was originally launched at Step Change in Safety’s bi-annual Safety Rep Forum on 18th April, and was developed, delivered and analysed in association with Empirisys – a data science company specialising in helping high-risk organisations save lives, avoid loss, and strengthen growth.
The survey examined the eight Principles of Process Safety Leadership and follows Step Change in Safety’s 2023 Process Safety Leadership Survey, which received responses from more than 450 senior leaders from 73 companies.
This year, nearly 2,000 workforce members from 90 companies participated in the Process Safety Workforce Survey, leading to the most significant understanding of the sector’s process safety culture.
The majority of respondents have worked in the industry for 10 – 20 years with high-hazard workers in operations well represented. Over 25 departments were captured in the survey, including over 11 roles, and 10,301 comments were left.
White paper insights into the values, beliefs and actions have been distilled into several key takeaways which include:
Process safety culture is firmly embedded in most organisations, with almost everybody confirming that they are comfortable reporting hazards and stopping the job when needed
Sharing major accident hazard information across the industry is still an issue with fewer than half of respondents knowing how their organisation compares to others
The biggest change from the leadership survey is senior leadership perception vs workforce experience around leaders engaging on-site and sharing their own process safety experience.
Conclusions in the paper show that there is a consistently strong and positive safety culture, but there are opportunities in training, incident reporting, and sharing of information. The workforce also believes that senior leaders should be more present at the worksite.
Craig Wiggins, CEO of Step Change in Safety says, “Step Change in Safety is pleased to share the results of the 2024 Process Safety Workforce Survey. The insights from this survey, along with those from the 2023 Process Safety Leadership Survey which measured executive and senior leadership opinions, can help us understand our actual position regarding the implementation of the Principles of Process Safety Leadership.”
Craig concludes, “As we expected, there is much agreement between the two surveys. However, this report highlights some key areas of difference between what executive and senior leaders believe is in place versus the reality at the front line
“The safety of our workforce always comes first. It is the responsibility of everyone associated with our industry to demonstrate chronic unease daily, and to ensure that we all go home safe. Therefore, I encourage all our member companies to digest this report and incorporate the insights into their HSE and Process Safety Improvement Plans. I would like to take this opportunity to thank everyone who completed the survey and for playing their part in preventing incident and injury across the energy industry.”
Gus Carroll, CEO and co-founder of Empirisys added, “We are immensely proud to have partnered with Step Change in Safety to deliver this survey, ensuring high-hazard operations continue to manifest a culture of safety. Our values strongly align with Step Change in Safety in our joint commitment to protecting and, where possible, enhancing the safety of the workforces within these environments.”
“Empirisys’ ability to design a survey that yields reliable data to inform real change meant that we were ideally positioned to partner with Step Change in Safety on this invaluable project. To ensure we were collecting the most relevant data, we developed and refined a set of questions based on process safety theory whilst applying our wealth of industry and data-science expertise. Through analysis of the results, we are able to make a real difference in Major Accident prevention and move towards a safer future.”
Step Change in Safety is hosting a webinar discussion during which they will delve into the survey's findings, explore strategies to elevate the industry's process safety standards further and engage in a vibrant Q&A session with esteemed panellists. The free webinar takes place on Wed, 4 Sept 2024, 10:00-11:00. To register visit: https://www.stepchangeinsafety.net/events/
To download the 2024 Process Safety Workforce Survey white paper, with full results and breakdowns, please visit: https://s3.eu-west-1.amazonaws.com/resources.stepchangeinsafety.net/Resources/Process-Safety-Workforce-Survey-Report-2024.pdf
