Many professionals have learned about proper management techniques including avoiding negative silo management. What is silo management? One way to look at this often poor management style is when multiple departments in an organization work on their own and fail to work together. For example, an organization may have a CEO with three or four executive directors reporting directly to the CEO. If these directors don’t like each other or disrespect the work each department does, it leads to all the employees working in their own department “silo.” If the CEO fails to address this lack of cooperation, it affects the performance of the entire organization including a negative impact on the corporate safety culture.
How does poor silo management affect safety? A great way to avoid silo management is to work together and collaborate on safety as part of your company safety culture. Employees should be aware of the safety culture and understand how they can contribute as an individual as well as within the team. Each company should identify regular safety and health activities that promote a team approach. Training is a perfect way to address a collaborative approach to protect workers from workplace hazards. Safety hazards often cross department “boundaries” and responsibilities so addressing the commonalities within safety, and training to prevent the concerns, can bring departments and employees together. Another way to work together is to have representatives from all departments conduct safety inspections together. Workers and supervisors from one department may see safety issues and unsafe work practices that personnel with that department may take for granted.
Look at professional sports teams to see a good comparison to why silo management can have a negative impact on organizational safety. Each member of the team (baseball, football, soccer, etc.) has a “title” and role to play. The middle linebacker of a football team knows his specific responsibilities but also knows how to interact with the linemen, secondary, and other linebackers on defense. Imagine if the coach allowed linebackers to group together in “silos” for training and on-field execution of plays. How can the coach identify areas in need of accountability and improvement? The same goes for upper management and safety. Management needs to know that safety is the same group priority for all workers (players) with known expectations for performance.
Done properly, safety incentives can bring departments together but incentivizing employees with a silo management style could have opposite results. That is, too much “departmental competition” for recognition and awards can create dishonesty, and ultimately, distrust of the system. Misreporting and under reporting safety hazards, injuries and incidents is what OSHA warns employers to avoid in safety incentive programs. Therefore, avoid silo-managed incentive programs and provide incentives through an open, honest policy.
Supervisors can be the key to avoiding negative silo safety management as they are the “bridge” between management and workers with the ability and responsibility to affect positive change and communication. Safety often requires changing how work gets done and effective communication between workers and departments is key to successful safety performance. Therefore, supervisors should be provided with the tools they need to promote effective departmental communication and changes as part of a positive safety culture.
To summarize, companies can work towards positive safety culture by avoiding negative silo management practices that serve only to divide workers and departments. Workers will develop many negative work practices if they feel isolated and left out of the corporate culture. Establishing collaborative work practices and safety policies that cross departmental lines will lead to better safety performance and results.
