The SafeStart Story Series continues with a bit of a twist—it starts by giving you the Critical Error Reduction Techniques (CERTs) along with a vivid off-the-job near-miss story before pausing for discussion and coming back to identify the states and errors involved.
Host: Danny Smith
Guest: Cindy Wilson
The SafeStart Story Series continues with a bit of a twist—it starts by giving you the Critical Error Reduction Techniques (CERTs) along with a vivid off-the-job near-miss story before pausing for discussion and coming back to identify the states and errors involved.
Host: Danny Smith
Guest: Cindy Wilson
Welcome back to SafeTalk with Safe Start I'm Danny Smith. We continue our story series, but this time with a bit of a twist. We're going to give you the Critical Error Reduction Techniques, or CERTs, and then we'll pause for a discussion, and then what we'd like for you to do is to talk about the states that were involved. So joining me today is Cindy Wilson, and Cindy is Safe Start's People and Culture Manager. So, Cindy, Cindy of all, welcome to the podcast.
Cindy Wilson:Thank you so much, Danny, and thank you for the invitation. I'm really happy to be here today.
Danny Smith:It's great to have you. Cindy's predecessor for those of you who don't know was our Director of Operations and Human Resources, and Cindy's title is different it is the People and Culture manager. I believe I got that correct and that really reflects a bit more of her focus and the values of the organization of Safe Start itself. Cindy, tell our listeners a little bit about a People and Culture manager and how that really is different from the traditional role of an HR manager.
Cindy Wilson:Well, Danny, from my view, HR focuses on the management of the company's relationship with its employees, while People and Culture management focuses on the aspects of the employees' relationship with the company. The Culture manager flips the scripts and puts the employees first. So it's about a transition from a transactional HR mindset to a more strategic and consultative people and culture approach. It's a people-based method rather than a policy-based method. Our employees aren't our resources or assets. We don't own them. They have a choice to come to work for us or not, so we strive to provide a culture and environment that helps ensure they want to come to work every day. So, for example, at Safe Start, we are One Team. We work hard to be inclusive, we embrace diversity and we encourage everyone to be their authentic selves. As the Safe Start PCM, my role is to embrace and support our culture, goals of respect, growth, innovation and fun.
Danny Smith:That's great. I love the way you put that and it does fit so much into what we as an organization really are all about right? So now that we have that kind of out of the way and I think that's an important thing to start with you have a story of when you were first exposed to the Safe Start concepts and how you use the Critical Error Reduction Techniques to avoid, at best, what could have been a very messy situation, at worst, a serious injury. So tell us a bit about your experience.
Cindy Wilson:So, Danny, last summer was a very wet summer for us, and the pond in our yard had flooded and made half of our yard a complete swamp land. So one evening after a long day at work, I was at home and getting ready to start preparing dinner when I realized that we didn't have enough green beans. I was absolutely starving, so went down to the garden bed with my scissors to harvest some more. As you may know, harvesting green beans can be challenging. As they like to hide behind the leaves, it could be pretty tricky to find.
Cindy Wilson:I was searching for beans while walking around the raised yard in bed, keeping my eyes firmly on the plants. As I was doing this, I remembered my recent Safe Start training and the habit that I was currently working on, which was moving your eyes before moving your body, and I became aware of the risk of what I was doing. I stopped and looked at the ground to my left before taking my next step. Thank goodness I did, because if I hadn't, my next step would have taken me into the flooded part of the yard and I likely would have fallen in the swamp, since there was no solid footing. I could only imagine how bad that would have been, since I had scissors in my hands. In addition, I can't even begin to imagine the amount of bacteria and other hazards in that swamp water.
Danny Smith:Thanks for this, story, in that example that's a great, great example of this. So, all right, gang, here's where we pause the podcast for you, and what we would like for you to do is to think a bit about the states and errors that could have been a part of Cindy's near-miss situation that we just talked about. So I'd also like for you to talk a little bit more about how bad this could have been. We touched on it just a little bit. Add to that a bit, if you would. Cindy, and I'll be back in just a couple moments here and we'll talk a bit about it more. So pause the podcast and we'll be right back. Okay, we're back. So, Cindy, let's start out with the states that you were in there. What states do you think were kind of leading to this potential situation?
Cindy Wilson:Well, it was at the end of a long day, so definitely fatigue. Working on the habit of looking before I moved is to compensate for complacency, so we can definitely check that one off as well. And I believe rushing as well. As I mentioned, I was preparing dinner and I did want to get back to the kitchen as quickly as possible. Looking back on this near miss, I could have triggered on the rushing and fatigue, but I just wasn't that familiar with the concepts at that time. I had just completed my training. But here's what I found really interesting by working on the habit of moving my eyes first, it helped me compensate for my lack of self-triggering skills.
Danny Smith:Sure, and with that, thinking about the errors that were involved there. Certainly there could have been line of fire with the scissors, right, and I guess perhaps balance, traction and grip, but both of those really stemmed from the fact that you were focused, both mentally and with your eyes, more so on the plants themselves and not where you were stepping right, until you had that moment of realization there, right.
Cindy Wilson:Absolutely.
Danny Smith:So thinking a bit about this how much course could this have been? We kind of alluded to a bit of that earlier, but what else could have happened here?
Cindy Wilson:Well, as we talked about the scissors, they absolutely could have punctured me if I had not been working on the habit or I had fallen. In addition, the swampy water and the bacteria that's in there. You don't have to be in the medical professional to figure out that bacteria and an open wound could seriously spell trouble, perhaps even life threatening.
Danny Smith:Absolutely. I was just thinking. You know, that's kind of the beauty behind that question of how it could be worse. It takes a near miss, something we typically dismiss as a one-off, and it really puts it into risk perspective. And once that risk comes into proper perspective, we really find the motivation to do the work required to improve the skills. So one final question here were the green beans good?
Cindy Wilson:You bet Danny, SafeS tart thank you for helping ensure that my vegetable harvesting was safe and successful. Dinner was absolutely delicious that night.
Danny Smith:I am a big green bean fan myself, so I'm sure they were great. So, Cindy, thanks for joining us first of all, but second of all, thanks for sharing the story. It really underscores the value of near- miss reporting and really of analyzing close calls, which is another one of those SafeS tart Critical Error Reduction Techniques. Giving us that opportunity when we have that free learning opportunity to look back and see how things could have been worse and, more importantly, how those Critical Error Reduction Techniques can help us from doing, in your case, working on that habit. And you know that one habit, as many of our listeners have heard me say, is that one habit has helped me so much through the years, so I certainly can see how you kind of latched onto that one for sure, right?
Cindy Wilson:Absolutely.
Danny Smith:Well, thanks again for joining us today. On behalf of Cindy and the entire Safe Talk team, thank you all for choosing to spend some of your day with us and for Safe Talk with Safe Start. I'm Danny Smith. Have a great day.