The Power of Pyramids: How Using Outmoded Thinking about Hazards Can Be Deadly
I really enjoyed this recent blog by Phil LaDuke. It’s understood by modern, thinking safety people that most injuries are not caused by unsafe acts and that reducing the frequency of injuries will not automatically reduce the severity of injuries. So, why do people still vehemently defend this 80 year old premise? Phil discusses why we still hold Heinrich’s work so dearly, why it is so dangerous to do so and what safety people can do about this fixation (that we created!) – READ THE FULL ARTICLE HERE
Extract:
Gallons of virtual ink have been used in writings condemning Heinrich’s Pyramid. But even though a significant population in the safety industry question its validity not only does the malarkey still persist, it thrives. What’s more, people believe accept it as a universal truth in industries where Heinrich had no standing. Throughout my storied career as an organizational change agent and safety strategy consultant I’ve met with resistance in the form of “that won’t work here, we’re not…” fill in the blank. Whether it be mining, Oil & Gas, Chemicals, Aerospace, Heavy truck, the entertainment industry, construction, or logistics the first time I worked in those industries (and yes, I have actually WORKED in those industries) I was met by this objection. Early on I believed that the objection was absolute hogwash but eventually came around to a way of thinking that caused me to stop hawking my one-size-fits-all solution in favor of co-designed and co-developed, shaped interventions that consider the challenges of a given client culture, geographic location, industry, and even site. The solutions tailored to the specific needs of a customer are universally better (or at least as good) as something that the safety conglomerates and mom-and-pop snake oil salesmen have been successfully selling for decades. I even defend this in another blog post In Defense Of Not-Invented-Here-Thinking.
If executives in Oil & Gas, Mining, Energy, and Construction et al, rightfully believe that other safety tools and methodologies are not necessarily applicable to their worlds why are they so quick to drink the Heinrich Kool-Aid? Before I answer that, I guess I should provide a bit of background information.
For the uninitiated, Herbert William Heinrich was an American statistician who in the late 1920’s and early 1930s studied worker safety in an industrial setting (specifically manufacturing) He created a pyramid based on his “law” that for every accident that causes a major injury, there are 29 accidents that cause minor injuries and 300 accidents that cause no injuries. He arranged it in a neat little pyramid and claimed that because many accidents share common root causes, addressing more commonplace accidents that cause no injuries can prevent accidents that cause injuries. He also found that more than 80% of all injuries were caused by unsafe behaviors. It makes sense which is what makes it so dangerous. READ THE REST HERE
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