Over the years we’ve presented a number of editorials and articles on safety, but I’ve never been satisfied with the results because of the subject’s almost limitless boundaries. Safety (or its lack) is an implicit element of every aspect of the workplace environment, so that the mere suggestion that “Today we’re going to do an article on safety,” is very nearly an exercise in futility.
In the past I’ve harped on the idea that safety is not just a set of prescriptions or an accumulation of wise practices, but rather a culture…a sort of primordial soup from which a process emerges in which all our actions contain a common element of safety. In this way, whether we’re talking about rear-facing cameras on an excavator, or retrieving a carton of printer paper from a storage room, the same fundamental concepts of safety apply equally and without exception. Only the specific components are subject to debate and change. But for those in leadership and management positions, safety isn’t one of many responsibilities; it’s paramount, and brought down to its simplest level the one you must demand.
My personal view of leadership came to life more than a half century ago on a damp and frosty January night at the Marine Corps’ Basic School in Quantico, VA. You could call it an epiphany inasmuch as it totally upended my sense of who I was and what I was getting into, from the vision I held when I stepped off the bus that conveyed me from the familiarity with a life of ease and privilege to a far different reality…one steeped in the rough-and-ready traditions of service and sacrifice that have characterized Marine Corps life for 240 years.
It was on a night patrol through rugged woodland with me, tapped by luck of the draw, leading a sullen and exhausted platoon of my peers in an assault on a pretend command post of a virtual enemy force. Nearing what my map told me to be the objective—a small shelf near the top of a steep hillside—I detached my third squad to move to a covering position on the far side of the flat. My plan was to give them 15 minutes to get established before attacking with the rest of my small force.
Unfortunately things didn’t quite work out the way I planned, as the third squad’s route led along a steep side slope that would have been a challenge in broad daylight, but an invitation to disaster in the dark as graphically demonstrated by the abrupt departure of the squad leader and two members of his first fire team over the edge and down a rocky ravine.
As it happened, no one was severely injured—a few cuts and bruises accompanied by bitter invective hurled rightfully at yours truly—but nothing to stop our still operational band from mopping up the non-existent foe before heading back to base.
On the return route I found myself soul-searching as to my culpability in what but for a divine providence might have ended in serious injury or death. By the time we sat down to debrief the exercise with the instructor staff I found myself with an entirely overhauledunderstanding of what leadership really entailed. It was not some elevated platform for playing “the big cheese,” rather one rooted in the recognition while issuing orders and detailing activities were part of the equation, responsibility for the performance of my troops in accomplishing its mission is the real basis on which the role is founded.
We may be tempted to believe that troop leading in the military environment is far removed from the situations we face in our civilian world—but stop and ask yourself, just where do the differences lie?
OK, perhaps no forced marches through deadly terrain; no “bombs bursting in air;” not even the likelihood of armed conflict (though you might not want to dismiss the possibility these days). When you turn your attention to the mission of your organization and your role in achieving it, you come to see it’s not about you, but those whom you direct to accomplish the mission. It is at this fundamental level that you recognize that it is your job to provide for the health, welfare, performance, and most importantly the safety of your workforce. In short, you—not a bunch of rules, regulations, platitudes, or nostrums—are the key to it all, with safety at the top of the list.
You may need to log-in or subscribe to our magazine.
