Melony C. James is a Safety, Health and Hygiene Professional who works in the Virgin Islands to assist with the advancement of policy, procedures and safety practices. Photo: Provided

This year’s ILO Day for Safety and Health theme is Anticipate, Prepare and Respond to Crises by Investing in Resilient OSH Systems. This theme forces businesses to think about the full integration of occupational safety and health in their operations.

The integration of safety and health systems into the organisation has various phases as likened to learning to drive. When you are learning to drive, your first thought is to have extreme focus on the 10 and 2 positioning of the hands and steering the vehicle in the right direction. During this phase, businesses are trying their best to meet the basic requirements of the law for workplace safety and health while determining the best way to direct and enforce safety practices. Businesses in this phase can only anticipate what has already been prescribed by the legal framework.

In the next phase of learning to drive, we become comfortable with steering and now are open to learning to multitask in the car, turning on the radio, switching channels, controlling the wipers and much more. While nervously doing these things the learning driver is intent on submerging themselves in the way of the vehicle – they are preparing to be alone on the road. At this stage of safety and health integration the business is understanding how their staff are responding to safety and are creating ways to bring the business from mere compliance to a value-based system. The value-based safety system places first priority on employee wellbeing, safety, security and health; it focuses on establishing behaviours and creating a positive culture.

Once you have become familiar with the vehicle and are aware of its potential, you feel comfortable to make manoeuvres such as overtaking and shun away less from parallel parking. At this juncture you are so confident you think you are truly a boss at driving. In business, you are ready to respond to safety concerns by creating arrangements, behaviour driven operating procedures and standardise operations to be more efficient in implementing safety policies. You are not only ready to respond but are prepared to do so based on the value system you have fostered in the organisation.

A business that is in the responsive phase of OSH integration would have been the type of entity to track COVID-19 before it came to [British] Virgin Islands and establish a plan of action ahead of its impact. While the complexity of the scenario was unknown, basics such as staff awareness and precautionary steps such as minimally stocking hand sanitisers was at the forefront of the mind.

When you have learnt to anticipate, prepare and respond to safety, the time comes to build a resilient safety management system for organisational change, whether incremental or sudden. Organisation resilience is driven by four ‘V’s.

• Value – the behaviours and culture within the organisation and the perceived outlook of the business by outsiders.
• Variety – the diversity of the business portfolio and revenue capacity
• Volume – the quantity of quality work produced
• Velocity – speed of adaptation and doing business

When a company has created the right balance of the four V’s they have a greater chance of creating resilient strategies. However, resilience does not occur without investment into its effectiveness. What should you invest to guarantee resilience? Businesses must invest in the following which maintains their integrated safety and health position.

• Leadership: leaders must be trained in the areas of change management and the management of change (which are not the same) which facilitates safe transition of assets whether human or technological.
• Infrastructure: COVID 19 helped many businesses to move into the future of doing businesses with the investment in Zoom accounts and Microsoft Teams, and VPN access to files to allow work from home. Accident reporting now hosted on online platforms and employee observation forms done via systems such as SafetyCulture or iAuditor.
• Processes: safety systems and other business management systems must be streamlined and the utilisation of Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) software becomes a must. Resilience requires integration and not silo business operation. Therefore, an ERP platform helps to plan and manage core business functions such as core supply chain, manufacturing, services, financial and other processes of an organisation.
• People: of great importance is the training of our human resources. Staff must be equipped to progress in competence and safety standards with or ahead of the business. This means the growth of the business must include the skills required for the future, the safety implications and ensure that staff are kept abreast and are certified accordingly.
• Culture: invest in creating a culture of safety awareness and engagement. This is more that infrastructural or procedural but more so looking at the needs of employees such as employee gyms, wellness seminar, lunch and learns, staff gatherings, team building activities, just to name a few. A positive organisational culture lends to motivated staff who are willing to stick it out with you in times of uncertainty with faith that the business will bounce back.

In recognition of ILO Day of safety, businesses should determine which phase of integration they are in currently and aim to meet the highest standard of integration to support their resilience.

Melony C. James, Bsc, MOSH, GradIOSH, CFM, is a Safety, Health and Hygiene Professional who works in the Virgin Islands to assist with the advancement of policy, procedures and safety practices.