In the March 2001 issue of SHP, Andy Shaw offered a somewhat controversial opinion about safety culture, arguing that the search for a safety culture should not be the be-all and end-all for businesses. He describes the difficult task of defining what a safety culture is, and states his own preferred definition as: “The set of norms, roles, beliefs and attitudes, and the social and technical practices within an organisation, which are concerned with minimising exposure to hazards and therefore the management of risk.”
Shaw goes on to state that talking about a safety culture in its own context makes it a bolt-on, rather than an integral part of any business. Instead of a safety culture we should be focusing on risk management as the big picture, with safety making up one part of that picture. That way it will be seen as an equal part of any business, accepted by everyone.
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