How safety fits with sustainability

Sustainability is a board level issue in most companies. It is a complex strategic challenge that balances social, economic and ecological issues for sustainable growth of the organization.

In its simplest form, sustainability can be remembered as “People, Profit and Planet.” The question for safety professionals is “where do we fit into this C-suite initiative?” If you have a sound safety process, my suggestion is to make sure that safety is a value within the organization.

Sustainability, “green” and environment are terms often used interchangeably. For clarification and purposes of this blog, let us agree that “green” and environment is essentially the same thing. While key, they are part of “planet” – just one piece of the overall equation for sustainable growth. People and profit need to be there. When safety becomes a 24-7 value, it forms the foundation of respect for people. Add respect for environment and you have the necessary building blocks to link safety to sustainability in your organization.

That building block comes about when you merge safety with lean. That may be happening in some organizations but it is not apparent if one does an internet search.

What is both visible and apparent is that lean production is aligning with “green.” We know this because a quick internet search for “lean and green” will show pages of hits. Lean production not only drives the economic (profit) part of the equation but also is founded on the identification and elimination of waste. Fewer wastes in the production and business process reduce air, water and solid wastes. This is a true “win-win” that explains the alignment of these two pillars of sustainability.

The social or “people” pillar includes both employees and external communities. The concern I have is that when you read the scores of hits displayed on your “lean and green” search, you will note an absence of “safety.” Do we not consider injury and illness waste? Don’t we have safety as a value in our organizations? How can we discuss “people are our most valuable asset” if safety is not forefront with strategic issues such as sustainability?

I know from first-hand experience that many companies are doing an excellent job making sure employee safety is fully integrated into the fabric of daily business. However, it would appear that something is amiss on the national scene. Occasionally, you see safety mentioned as the 6th “S” in the 5S process. (5S is five-step process of 1) sort, 2) straighten, 3) shine, 4) standardize, 5) sustain used to clean and organize the workplace). That is tokenism, not full integration because 5S is only one part of a very large toolkit to improve operational performance. (I’ll have a series of blogs on this topic to help you understand how to use this as a foundation for lean and safe)

We should all strive to have lean, green and safety operating seamlessly and concurrently. We accomplish that by the identification and elimination of waste. Let’s make this a personal challenge within our organizations and professional groups. It is time that we place the health and well-being of employees and their family’s forefront in the strategy of sustainability.

With the understanding that “all models are wrong, but some are useful,” I submit the following for comment using safety as foundation and part of the steps to sustainable growth.