Clients of Lloyd-Jones Meakin Group achieve success using safety to drive improvements in leadership, management systems, and employee culture.

Our belief is that to improve safety performance, safety must first take its proper place among other key business drivers and be adopted by the company as a core value.

Successful companies stand together in adopting safety as a core value, to care for their employees, and to drive their business outcomes. These companies have a clear culture that is shared by everyone from the Chief Executive to the most junior member of staff. Safety is viewed not as a cost, but as an opportunity to achieve superior business performance.

We believe that improvement in safety performance impacts on a company's culture, and on the attitudes and behaviour of its people. The outcome is a shared sense of initiative, cooperation, loyalty and commitment. Morale is lifted, and so is performance. All companies are looking for these outcomes, but the issue is how to get there, and to understand the next steps.

The place of safety

Traditionally, business has focused on operational and administrative activities. Safety tends to sit on the side, its importance recognised, but its potential as a business driver ignored. While safety performance figures may be talked about around the executive table, responsibility for safety is delegated to middle ranking line managers or safety professionals. The cost of workers compensation and safety systems may be a headache but it is regarded in much the same light as taxes — unavoidable. Safety can also become an industrial battleground. Yet, safety can be used in a very different way, to drive profitability through a combination of savings and efficient production, effective industrial relations and a highly motivated workforce.

Safety as a core value

Organisations that adopt safety as a core value understand that their success depends on the ability of their people to appreciate and exceed agreed standards. Accordingly, they care for their employees, understand their issues in the workplace and deal with them.

The cost of safety

There are clear costs associated with safety. Insurance premiums, medical costs, compensation and lawyers' fees can all be reduced with effective safety management. The direct and indirect benefits of safety improvement will outweigh any additional costs. Efficiencies gained through improved safety performance have a direct impact on the business and flow into business performance, operating costs and profitability.

How to get there

No company can achieve a zero incident operation overnight. The safety journey takes a long time and requires relentless commitment, tireless focus, and hard slog. The journey starts with the careful setting of standards and the creation of robust systems. At the same time safety needs to be integrated into all processes and people must be engaged. Ambitious targets are set and the CEO and senior leadership must be personally engaged and lead by example.

What's the next step?

Through safety, there is a window of opportunity to achieve a dramatic step change in business performance. The organisation can jump to a much higher platform and use continuous improvement to make the position sustainable. The first step is a clear understanding of the current state based on an independent analysis. The critical success factor is the genuine, heartfelt and passionate commitment of the leadership team.

Additional details of our philosophy include: safety as a core business process; using safety to generate a competitive advantage; integrating safety into business processes; and the safety journey.