Dear Friend and Colleague,
Many of you likely have a well written vision statement for safety or at least some form of it. However, is that vision regularly expressed through your senior leaders? The most important aspects of your vision occur through the expression and execution of that vision by your senior leaders and their subordinates. Having a substantial budget that supports your various programs, processes, and system-wide improvements is critically important, is it not? And it captures a great deal of safety alignment, execution, and improvement, right? But is that enough?
Even if we throw lots of money at safety, the one thing that managers, supervisors and workers really want to see, is more of your senior leaders. Most want to see visible support and ongoing communications from your senior leaders, on the floor or in the field. And when these leaders connect through very simple ways, like smiling, shaking hands, and asking important safety-related questions, again on the workers’ turf, not from the phone or from behind a desk, the vision is being expressed and enlivened in very real ways.
Are you getting your senior leaders out from behind their desks, and helping them get a bit dirty with their workers? Are you helping them have a “purposeful presence” with their front-line leaders?
Never underestimate the purposeful presence of your leaders, on the floor or in the field. This is especially true when your leaders show concern by spending valuable time with your front-line leaders and workers; smiling, shaking hands, asking important questions, affirming, speaking the language of safety, and taking action to make safety-related improvements. Sounds so simple but these connections and expressions of support are critical to your leaders’ credibility, your vision, and sustained success.
A vision without purposeful presence is folly. We need to make it easier for our senior leaders to have a profound and purposeful presence, are you?