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Safety is not punitive
April 19, 2007

This morning we had visitors at the Control Engineering offices here in Oak Brook. Paul Miller from Invensys, Luis Duran from Triconex and Bob Adamski from Premier Consulting Services. These companies are all part of Invensys, and they were here to discuss their process safety hardware (Triconex) and safety certification training under TUV. The talk went on for a while and the details will emerge elsewhere.

There was one point that struck me. Bob has been in the business for many years, coming up through the refining industry. He said that most of the big, well known refiners and chemical companies generally have very thorough safety programs, although there have been notable exceptions. (Go back to my 'Scary but True Stories' blog posting from March 30 for a prime example.)  The companies to worry about are often smaller and less visible. The unfortunate comment he has heard from management of such companies is often to the effect that, "if I have to implement safety systems, I'll go out of business."

In those cases, implementing appropriate safety devices, systems, and training is considered punishment. Companies that take that kind of attitude either assume nothing will ever go wrong, or that plant assets, people and the surrounding community are simply disposable. A manager who takes that attitude ought to have his or her office located in a trailer inside the plant.

Posted by Peter Welander on April 19, 2007 | Comments (0)