Do you use STAR cards, Take 5’s etc.? Would you know if the data was made up?
I found the interesting example below from a legal deposition of a worker on Deepwater Horizon. It’s from an audit commenting on pre-start risk assessments on the rig. This isn’t a study, but I thought it was interesting enough to post here.
I mention these observations not because I think they’re exceptional but because they’re likely to be the norm in any organisation using processes that aren’t valued or useful to workers or that are driven by targets.
Some problems with pre-start risk assessments (source: deposition July 12, pp. 49-50):
- The policy of one START card per day from all the personnel on board
- High number of made-up cards being submitted into the system
- High numbers of positive ‘atta boy’ cards which do not offer any real learning opportunities
- The majority of corrective action cards focus on low-risk safety issues”(for example “trailing hand technique, untidy equipment state) and not on major hazards
- The system creates a significant amount of paperwork which adds to the workloads of supervisors … reducing time mentoring and supervising
- The START card system is seen in a negative light and many crews still feel like they ‘tell tales’ on others instead of viewing it as a learning opportunity
Further, under testimony, one witness described how they “sometimes” observed people to just make up START cards in order to meet targets.
Link to the LinkedIn post: https://www.linkedin.com/posts/benhutchinson2_do-you-use-star-cards-take-5s-etc-would-activity-6846918766027268096-09xY?utm_source=share&utm_medium=member_desktop
SafetyInsights.org 