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Personal attributes of supervisors: are these the key to transforming construction safety in the UK?

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journal contribution
posted on 2019-03-06, 16:00 authored by Babajide Talabi, Francis Edum-Fotwe, Alistair Gibb
The UK construction industry accounts for a disproportionately high number of major and fatal injuries. The industry has a poor worker safety record and several stakeholders have made efforts to improve its performance. Much of such efforts have however targeted reactive control measures. Research indicates that there is a positive correlation between a proactive alternative - safety behaviours, and safety performance. These behaviours are shaped by the personality of individuals or determined by their social sphere of interaction including supervisors. Thus, the role the supervisor plays in influencing frontline workers’ (FLW) behaviours was investigated. Using a survey and statistical tests, the perspectives of FLW were obtained and analysed respectively to establish the vital supervisors’ qualities that improve their safety behaviours. The emerging qualities were found to rank from highest to lowest potential as follows: integrity/trust, openness/transparency, genuine care, accountability, flexibility, respect, fairness, consistent high personal standards, ability to empower and beliefs. The findings from this study suggest that organisations can improve their safety performance by focusing on the above qualities in three stages. The findings also highlight the need for organisations to focus on subtle but significant human qualities that are often ignored in safety management.

History

School

  • Architecture, Building and Civil Engineering

Published in

Proceedings of the Institution of Civil Engineers - Management, Procurement and Law

Volume

172

Issue

3

Pages

101 - 111

Citation

TALABI, B.O., EDUM-FOTWE, F.T. and GIBB, A.G.F., 2019. Personal attributes of supervisors: are these the key to transforming construction safety in the UK?. Proceedings of the Institution of Civil Engineers - Management, Procurement and Law, 172 (3), pp.101-111.

Publisher

© ICE Publishing

Version

  • AM (Accepted Manuscript)

Publisher statement

This paper was accepted for publication in the journal Proceedings of the Institution of Civil Engineers - Management, Procurement and Law and the definitive published version is available at https://doi.org/10.1680/jmapl.18.00028.

Acceptance date

2019-02-19

Publication date

2019-05-13

ISSN

1751-4304

eISSN

1751-4312

Language

  • en