Overcoming a challenge without tapping into the knowledge and information that already exists within a culture or community is one of the oldest human follies.
But we work in an industry that presents us with new knowledge and information on a daily basis. To overcome challenges, whether it’s reducing the number of hydrocarbon releases or adapting to new equipment, we need to be sharing what we know and assessing our attitudes to the challenges that come our way.
So how do you receive this new knowledge or understanding? Are you responsive, or are you resistant?
If you’re the former, you’ll see a renewed opportunity to focus on results, meet goals, develop or review standards or help others. However uncomfortable the challenge may be, it opens possibilities for positive change and relentless improvement.
The alternative is to view the gifts as unwanted or something that you don’t need, perhaps because you’re already good enough, too busy to deal with them or because they’re too complicated. Or maybe it’s because the challenge may undermine your position of responsibility, or open up a vulnerability that you’d rather was left alone.
Here’s the crunch: how you respond to these gifts, wanted or not, can determine how safe our industry is today. It determines how safe it will be tomorrow.
At Step Change in Safety we firmly believe that to make our industry safe, we have to be open, honest and share what we’ve learned – whether this is celebrating a job well done or realising we haven’t done as well as we could have.
But we have to be equally open to learning, and know that a lesson is not learned until something has changed. If challenges are met with resistance and important messages go unheeded, not only do we contradict our attitude to work together and share information, but we risk the safety of our friends and colleagues.
But surely the response to challenges can be left to company directors, media spokespeople or those who drive safety agendas? Wrong. Companies and organisations are made up of individuals who each face challenges every day – regardless of position, experience or responsibility. These individual responses combine to reflect how our industry as a whole responds to the challenges that we face. We each have our part to play.
There was a 20 per cent rise in the number of minor hydrocarbon releases in the past year. This is clearly a challenge that needs to be turned around. But, as individuals, organisations and then as a collective body, will we see this challenge as an inconvenience, something to be ignored and something that can be washed away with a few clever sound bites? Or will it be an opportunity to share what we know, learn lessons and work towards better results next year?
I know what my response is to this challenge: I see it as a gift. What about you?
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