Corporate financial decision-makers' perceptions of workplace safety

This study, through a random national survey, explored how senior financial executives or managers (those who determined high-level budget, resource allocation, and corporate priorities) of medium-to-large companies perceive important workplace safety issues. The three top-rated safety priorities in resource allocation reported by the participants (overexertion, repetitive motion, and bodily reaction) were consistent with the top three perceived causes of workers' compensation losses. The greatest single safety concerns reported were overexertion, repetitive motion, highway accidents, falling on the same level and bodily reaction. A majority of participants believed that the indirect costs associated with workplace injury were higher than the direct costs. Our participants believed that money spent improving workplace safety would have significant returns. The perceived top benefits of an effective workplace safety program were increased productivity, reduced cost, retention, and increased satisfaction among employees. The perceived most important safety modification was safety training. The top reasons senior financial executives gave for believing their safety programs were better than those at other companies were that their companies paid more attention to and emphasized safety, they had better classes and training focused on safety, and they had teams/individuals focused specifically on safety.     

公司治理视角下基于VPRS的公司经营困境预警

从公司治理的角度,构建了一套比较全面的综合预警指标体系。以2006-2009年首次被ST的160家上市公司及其配对公司作为研究样本,基于变精度粗糙集理论(VPRS),分别构建仅包含财务指标和包含所有指标的上市公司经营困境预警模型。通过理论分析和实证研究发现:健康公司和困境公司在早期的公司治理方面就存在着显著差异,晚期差异逐渐减小;加入公司治理变量后的变精度粗糙集模型的预测精度得到了提高;仅包含财务数据的模型在经营困境的晚期预测精度较高,早期预测效果不佳;对早期预测来说,包含财务指标和公司治理指标等多方面因素的模型更加适合。     

Corporate cost of occupational accidents: an activity-based analysis

The systematic accident cost analysis (SACA) project was carried out during 2001 by The Aarhus School of Business and PricewaterhouseCoopers Denmark with financial support from The Danish National Working Environment Authority. Its focused on developing and testing a method for evaluating occupational costs of companies for use by occupational health and safety professionals. The method was tested in nine Danish companies within three different industry sectors and the costs of 27 selected occupational accidents in these companies were calculated. One of the main conclusions is that the SACA method could be used in all of the companies without revisions. The evaluation of accident cost showed that 2/3 of the costs of occupational accidents are visible in the Danish corporate accounting systems reviewed while 1/3 is hidden from management view. The highest cost of occupational accidents for a company with 3.600 employees was estimated to approximately US$ 682.000. The paper includes an introduction regarding accident cost analysis in companies, a presentation of the SACA project methodology and the SACA method itself, a short overview of some of the results of the SACA project and a conclusion. Further information about the project is available at http://www.asb.dk/saca.     

The effect of a low and high resource intervention on older drivers’ knowledge,behaviors and risky driving

This study aimed to compare an in-class Seniors on the MOVE (Mature Operators Vehicular Education) interactive multi-session driving curriculum with a self-guided MOVE curriculum for older adults. Using a two group randomized design, we sought to determine if there are between-group differences in older drivers’ knowledge and safety behaviors among participants. Forty-four participants with an average age of 79 years (SD = 7.1) were randomly assigned to the original MOVE program (SOM-A) or a lower resource (SOM-B) self-guided intervention. SOM-A is a four session program designed to improve older drivers safety knowledge and better understand skills for safer driving. SOM-B is a self-guided program with one required in-class session and one optional session. Subsequent to completion of both curricula, participants were offered CarFit, a comprehensive check of how well a senior driver and their vehicle work together. Baseline, post-intervention and 6-month follow up questionnaires were completed by participants. We found significant differences (p = .01) in the mean driving safety knowledge scores when comparing participants in SOM-A (3.7, SD 2.0) to those in SOM-B (0.87, SD 2.6). With regard to behavioral outcomes, we focused on always wearing a seatbelt, talking with a health care provider about driving ability, and sitting 10–12 inches from the steering wheel. The vast majority of participants reported always wearing their seat belts (SOM-A 100%, SOM-B 92%, p = 1.0), and very few reported talking with their doctors (SOM-A Baseline – 0%, Follow up 1 – 0%, p = n/a). Mean behavior change scores for participants sitting 10–12 inches from the steering wheel were significantly more likely among SOM-A (mean = .65, SD = .5) participants than those in SOM-B (mean = .29, SD = .5, p = .01) at first follow-up. Taken together, these findings suggest that the more intensive program is more effective and that driving safety programs focused on behaviors to self evaluate driving abilities continue to be needed to help older drivers remain safer on the road as they age. The involvement of health care providers in such efforts may be an untapped potential.     

Economic worry and the presence of safety hazards on farms

In recent years the agricultural sector has experienced historical levels of economic challenges. Yet, the effects of these economic conditions on the physical safety of farm work environments remain poorly understood. We studied these possible etiological relationships in a cross-sectional analysis. A baseline survey of 2390 Saskatchewan farm operations was conducted in 2007. A single respondent from each farm provided information about the farm operation, its residents, perceptions of worry surrounding farm economic conditions, and the presence of six types of physical hazards. Binomial regression analyses were used to study the focal relationships between economics and safety while simultaneously adjusting for confounders at the farm level. Farms with high perceived levels of economic worry experienced elevations in risk for: the absence of well maintained buildings (RR 1.52; 95% CI: 1.27–1.87), the absence of safety shields on combines (RR 1.41; 95% CI: 1.05–1.89), and the absence of safety shields on augers (RR 1.15; 95% CI: 1.02–1.30). No apparent differences were observed by level of economic worry for the presence of ROPS on tractors, ladder safety cages on grain bins, and barriers around water hazards. We observed that financial conditions on farms appear to contribute to the decisions that farm operators make about safety. These are not innocuous choices as they in turn affect the health and safety of the entire population that works and lives in these occupational environments. Farm operators need to be supported in decisions to invest the physical safety of their farms. They also require evidence that investments in safety are indeed economically sensible and healthy management decisions.     

An evaluation of costs and benefits of a vehicle periodic inspection scheme with six-monthly inspections compared to annual inspections

Although previous research suggests that safety benefits accrue from periodic vehicle inspection programmes, little consideration has been given to whether the benefits are sufficient to justify the often considerable costs of such schemes. Methodological barriers impede many attempts to evaluate the overall safety benefits of periodic vehicle inspection schemes, including this study, which did not attempt to evaluate the New Zealand warrant of fitness scheme as a whole. Instead, this study evaluated one aspect of the scheme: the effects of doubling the inspection frequency, from annual to biannual, when the vehicle reaches six years of age. In particular, reductions in safety-related vehicle faults were estimated together with the value of the safety benefits compared to the costs. When merged crash data, licensing data and roadworthiness inspection data were analysed, there were estimated to be improvements in injury crash involvement rates and prevalence of safety-related faults of respectively 8% (95% CI 0.4–15%) and 13.5% (95% CI 12.8–14.2%) associated with the increase from annual to 6-monthly inspections. The wide confidence interval for the drop in crash rate shows considerably statistical uncertainty about the precise size of the drop. Even assuming that this proportion of vehicle faults prevented by doubling the inspection frequency could be maintained over the vehicle age range 7–20 years, the safety benefits are very unlikely to exceed the additional costs of the 6-monthly inspections to the motorists, valued at $NZ 500 million annually excluding the overall costs of administering the scheme. The New Zealand warrant of fitness scheme as a whole cannot be robustly evaluated using the analysis approach used here, but the safety benefits would need to be substantial – yielding an unlikely 12% reduction in injury crashes – for benefits to equal costs.     

现金流量与公司投资决策--从公司规模角度的实证研究

根据现代公司金融理论，将融资因素引进公司的投资模型，研究不同规模的公司投资与现金流量的关系，并探寻不同规模公司投资决策行为差异的背后动机。实证研究发现：大规模公司投资对现金流量的敏感性要高于小规模公司，动因检验的结果表明大规模公司投资依赖于现金流量源于信息不对称理论，小规模公司源于自由现金流量的代理成本理论，这为我国完善资本市场、制定合理政策提供了借鉴的依据。     

Pressure to produce = pressure to reduce accident reporting?

Each year, more than 4 million U.S. workers are injured on the job – several thousand die (Bureau of Labor Statistics, 2008). Despite these staggering numbers, research suggests that they are gross underestimates of the true volume of workplace related illnesses and injuries due to accident under-reporting. Although accident under-reporting has been well-documented, less is known regarding why this occurs. The current study suggests that under-reporting may in part be due to high levels of perceived production pressure. Specifically, this study tested the hypotheses that production pressure would be related to more experienced accidents overall and more negative attitudes toward reporting accidents. Further, we expected that production pressure would exacerbate the under-reporting of accidents. Survey data were collected from a sample of 212 copper mining workers located in the southwestern United States. The survey measured employee perceptions regarding production pressure, attitudes toward reporting accidents, perceived consequences of reporting accidents, and actual reporting behaviors (e.g., types and numbers of accidents experienced vs. reported). As predicted, the average number of experienced accidents per employee was significantly higher (M = 2.84) than the number of reported accidents (M = .49). In addition, production pressure was related to more negative reporting attitudes. Individuals who had positive reporting attitudes were injured less frequently; however, when an incident occurred, they were more likely to report it. Finally, higher levels of production pressure were related to greater accident under-reporting. Additionally, employees who perceived high levels of production pressure not only experienced more accidents overall, they also reported fewer of them to the organization. Implications for occupational safety initiatives – particularly in the current economic climate – are discussed, as are methodological challenges of conducting research in this area.     

Estimating the costs of occupational injury in the United States

This article estimates workplace injury costs in the U.S. These costs have been studied in less detail than most injury costs. Our methods, which mostly use regularly published data, produce order-of-magnitude estimates. Overall, workplace injuries cost the U.S. an estimated $140 billion annually. This estimate includes $17 billion in medical and emergency services, $60 billion in lost productivity, $5 billion in insurance costs, and $62 billion in lost quality of life. One sixth of the societal costs result from the 3% of workplace injuries in motor vehicle crashes. Motor vehicle costs per injury are almost 6 times the workplace injury average.     

设计师幸福感提升路径的案例研究

目的 后工业时代背景下,设计越来越重视用户的情感和体验价值。设计师作为制造幸福的主体,有必要审视自身的幸福感状况,寻求提升幸福感的途径。方法 通过问卷调查和案例研究,分析设计师在工作中的情感需求和行为特点,归纳并总结在职场中提升设计师幸福感的措施和方法。结论 建立共情的思维模式,创造良好的工作环境、开放的学习空间,建立自我提升的平台等方法,可以提升设计师的工作幸福感和实现价值。通过对相关因素的分析和总结,为提升设计师工作幸福感和完善以人为本的设计公司的企业文化,提供新的思路。     

The organizational costs of preventable medical errors

BACKGROUND: Preventable medical errors are associated with additional costs that tend to be borne by patients, but little is known about organizational costs associated with such errors. Two composite case studies (a fall and a delay in diagnosis) were used to identify the organizational costs of preventable medical errors. ANALYSIS: Legal, marketing, and organizational costs--direct, indirect, and long term--were associated with each of the preventable medical errors. A model was generated to examine the theoretical relationship between the costs and four determinants of corporate performance--price, wages, cost of capital, and efficiency. DISCUSSION: Organizations may also have a financial incentive to improve patient safety, for beyond patient and societal costs, preventable medical errors appear to account for significant legal, marketing, and operational costs for the organizations that deliver health care. Some of these costs are not so much the cost of the error but the costs of organizational responses to the error. Three broad areas of inquiry could be used to test the model and improve our understanding of the organizational costs of errors: market response to patient safety interventions, before/after studies of interventions, and case-control studies. SUMMARY AND CONCLUSION: Health care leaders have a moral imperative to implement systems that reduce medical errors and improve patient safety. An understanding of the costs associated with medical errors may help leaders understand the importance of patient safety from a financial perspective, develop measures to evaluate the impact of patient safety initiatives, and efficiently allocate resources to address this important health concern.     

Functional declines as predictors of risky street-crossing decisions in older pedestrians

The experiment investigated the extent to which risky street-crossing decisions by older pedestrians can be explained by declines in functional abilities. Sixteen young (age 20–35), 17 younger-old (age 60–67), and 18 older-old (age 70–84) participants carried out a street-crossing task in a simulated two-way road environment and took a battery of tests assessing perceptual, cognitive, and motor abilities. Older-old pedestrians were more likely than young and younger-old participants to make decisions that would have led to collisions with approaching cars, especially when traffic coming from two directions was approaching at a high speed. Regression analyses identified several functional performance measures as predictors of these dangerous choices. Walking speed, which determined the time needed to cross, was shown to play the most important role. Time-to-arrival estimate, which informed the pedestrians about the time available for crossing, was found to be the second most predictive factor. Visual processing speed and visual attention abilities assessed via the UFOV^® Test also came into play, allowing participants to focus their attention on the relevant available information and to make timely, correct decisions. Attention shifting was the fourth significant predictor, allowing pedestrians to adapt their crossing strategy to the oncoming road-traffic information. The results suggest that the greater risk of being involved in a collision as age increases calls for a multi-dimensional explanation combining age-related physical, perceptual, and cognitive performance declines. These findings have implications for improving older pedestrians’ safety in terms of speed limits, road design, and training.     

Occupational driver safety: Conceptualising a leadership-based intervention to improve safe driving performance

Occupational driving crashes are the most common cause of death and injury in the workplace. The physical and psychological outcomes following injury are also very costly to organizations. Thus, safe driving poses a managerial challenge. Some research has attempted to address this issue through modifying discrete and often simple target behaviours (e.g., driver training programs). However, current intervention approaches in the occupational driving field generally consider the role of organizational factors in workplace safety. This study adopts the A–B–C framework to identify the contingencies associated with an effective exchange of safety information within the occupational driving context. Utilizing a sample of occupational drivers and their supervisors, this multi-level study examines the contingencies associated with the exchange of safety information within the supervisor–driver relationship. Safety values are identified as an antecedent of the safety information exchange, and the quality of the leader–member exchange relationship and safe driving performance is identified as the behavioural consequences. We also examine the function of role overload as a factor influencing the relationship between safety values and the safety information exchange. Hierarchical linear modelling found that role overload moderated the relationship between supervisors’ perceptions of the value given to safety and the safety information exchange. A significant relationship was also found between the safety information exchange and the subsequent quality of the leader–member exchange relationship. Finally, the quality of the leader–member exchange relationship was found to be significantly associated with safe driving performance. Theoretical and practical implications of these results are discussed.     

The safety climate and its relationship to safety practices, safety of the work environment and occupational accidents in eight wood-processing companies

Employees continuously observe their work environment and the actions of their fellow workers and superiors, and they use such observations as a basis for the creation of cognitive models associated with safety. These models regulate their actions in the workplace and thus have an influence on safety. This study attempts to define the structure of the safety climate as perceived by workers and the correlations between the safety climate, on the one hand, and the safety practices of the company, the safety level of the work environment and occupational accidents on the other. The variables used in this study were the same as those employed in two previous Finnish safety climate studies carried out in the plywood industry, shipyards, the forestry industry, building construction and stevedoring. The safety climate was measured by means of a questionnaire. Workers from four sawmills, two plywood factories and two parquet plants participated. The total number of participants was 508 in 1990 and 548 in 1993. The variables formed four factors, whose contents and reliabilities closely resembled the results obtained in the earlier studies. These results indicate that the structure of the safety climate among Finnish workers is quite stable. The safety climate correlated both with the safety level of the work environment and with the safety practices of the company, but the correlation between the safety climate and the safety of the work environment was stronger. This result differs from those of the previous studies, in which the safety climate was defined specifically in terms of an individual’s perceptions of the safety practices of the company and of the behavior of other employees. The two safety climate factors that described a company’s attitudes to safety and its safety precautions correlated with the accident rates. The better the safety climate of the company was, the lower was the accident rate. Four companies with an accident rate below the average for the wood-processing industry had a better safety climate than four similar companies with an accident rate above the average.     

Job demands,job resources and safety outcomes: The roles of emotional exhaustion and safety compliance

The aim of this study was to assess the effectiveness of the job demands–resources (JD–R) model in explaining the relationship of job demands and resources with safety outcomes (i.e., workplace injuries and near-misses). We collected self-reported data from 670 crude oil production workers from three sub-companies of a major oilfield company in China. The results of a structural equation analysis indicated that job demands (psychological and physical demands) and job resources (decision latitude, supervisor support and coworker support) could affect emotional exhaustion and safety compliance, and thus influence the occurrence of injuries and near-misses. The implications of the present findings regarding both the JD–R model and occupational safety research were discussed.     

Job Demands–Control–Support model and employee safety performance

The aim of this study was to explore whether work characteristics (job demands, job control, social support) comprising Karasek and Theorell's (1990) Job Demands–Control–Support framework predict employee safety performance (safety compliance and safety participation; Neal and Griffin, 2006). We used cross-sectional data of self-reported work characteristics and employee safety performance from 280 healthcare staff (doctors, nurses, and administrative staff) from Emergency Departments of seven hospitals in the United Kingdom. We analyzed these data using a structural equation model that simultaneously regressed safety compliance and safety participation on the main effects of each of the aforementioned work characteristics, their two-way interactions, and the three-way interaction among them, while controlling for demographic, occupational, and organizational characteristics. Social support was positively related to safety compliance, and both job control and the two-way interaction between job control and social support were positively related to safety participation. How work design is related to employee safety performance remains an important area for research and provides insight into how organizations can improve workplace safety. The current findings emphasize the importance of the co-worker in promoting both safety compliance and safety participation.     

The safety of urban cycle tracks: A review of the literature

Cycling has to be a safe activity, and perceived as such, if bicycle trips by all populations are to increase and the public health benefits are to be realized. A key characteristic of developed countries with a high cycling mode share is their provision of cycle tracks – separated bikeways along city streets – on major routes. This literature review therefore sought to examine studies of cycle tracks from different countries in order elucidate the safety of these facilities relative to cycling in the street and to point to areas where further research is needed. The review indicates that one-way cycle tracks are generally safer at intersections than two-way and that, when effective intersection treatments are employed, constructing cycle tracks on busy streets reduces collisions and injuries. The evidence also suggests that, when controlling for exposure and including all collision types, building one-way cycle tracks reduces injury severity even when such intersection treatments are not employed. However, the extent of this effect has not been well examined, as very few studies both look at severity and control for exposure. Future studies of the safety of cycle tracks and associated intersection treatments should focus foremost on examining injury severity, while controlling for exposure. In the U.S., where the obesity epidemic and its health consequences and costs are well documented, the benefits of increased cycling should be a focus of research and policy development in order to provide the infrastructure needed to attract people to cycling while minimizing injuries.     

An integrated quality function deployment and capital budgeting methodology for occupational safety and health as a systems thinking approach: The case of the construction industry

In this paper, an integrated methodology for Quality Function Deployment (QFD) and a 0–1 knapsack model is proposed for occupational safety and health as a systems thinking approach. The House of Quality (HoQ) in QFD methodology is a systematic tool to consider the inter-relationships between two factors. In this paper, three HoQs are used to consider the interrelationships between tasks and hazards, hazards and events, and events and preventive/protective measures. The final priority weights of events are defined by considering their project-specific preliminary weights, probability of occurrence, and effects on the victim and the company. The priority weights of the preventive/protective measures obtained in the last HoQ are fed into a 0–1 knapsack model for the investment decision. Then, the selected preventive/protective measures can be adapted to the task design. The proposed step-by-step methodology can be applied to any stage of a project to design the workplace for occupational safety and health, and continuous improvement for safety is endorsed by the closed loop characteristic of the integrated methodology.     

Financial assessment of health and safety programmes in the workplace

In evaluating health and safety improvements for performance improvement, it is necessary to account for both the contributions of a healthy workforce and the resources required supporting it.

The Economic Assessment of the Work Environment (EAWE) is a financial framework that helps management forecast the financial benefits of health and safety implementations. The five-step process comprises (1) a health assessment to identify critical elements in the work environment, (2) an action plan to address gaps, (3) performance targets based on internal goals and external benchmarks, (4) transformation of the expected improvements in health and safety into expected performance outcomes, and (5) implementation in stages, starting from individual jobs to entire organisation.

EAWE offers a dynamic framework for corporate decision-makers when evaluating health and safety programmes. Further research should explore the bounds of EAWE across different types of organisations and the evolution of performance over time.     

Labor unions and safety climate: Perceived union safety values and retail employee safety outcomes

Although trade unions have long been recognized as a critical advocate for employee safety and health, safety climate research has not paid much attention to the role unions play in workplace safety. We proposed a multiple constituency model of workplace safety which focused on three central safety stakeholders: top management, ones’ immediate supervisor, and the labor union. Safety climate research focuses on management and supervisors as key stakeholders, but has not considered whether employee perceptions about the priority their union places on safety contributes contribute to safety outcomes. We addressed this gap in the literature by investigating unionized retail employee (N = 535) perceptions about the extent to which their top management, immediate supervisors, and union valued safety. Confirmatory factor analyses demonstrated that perceived union safety values could be distinguished from measures of safety training, workplace hazards, top management safety values, and supervisor values. Structural equation analyses indicated that union safety values influenced safety outcomes through its association with higher safety motivation, showing a similar effect as that of supervisor safety values. These findings highlight the need for further attention to union-focused measures related to workplace safety as well as further study of retail employees in general. We discuss the practical implications of our findings and identify several directions for future safety research.