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113 Introduction to Safety Leadership
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Tough-Caring Leadership

Managers are tough on safety because they have high expectations and they insist their followers behave, and they care about the success of their employees first. This is a selfless leadership approach.

Tough-caring safety leadership is most effective.

The tough-caring leadership model represents a major shift in leadership and management thinking away from the more selfish tough-controlling model.

  • Managers understand that complying with the law, controlling losses, and improving production can best be assured if employees are motivated, safe, and able.
  • Management understands that they can best fulfill their commitment to external customers by fulfilling their obligations to internal customers: their employees.
  • Communication is typically all-way: information is used to share so that everyone succeeds.

Real improvement in safety (and all other functions) occurs when employers adopt a tough-caring approach to leadership. Rather than being the safety cop, the safety manager is considered an internal consultant who is responsible for helping all line managers and supervisors demonstrate leadership by "doing" safety. Line managers must be the cops, not the safety department. This results in dramatic positive changes in corporate culture which is success driven.

Positive Reinforcement

Although positive reinforcement is the primary strategy used to influence behaviors, tough-caring leaders are not reluctant in administering discipline when it's justified because they understand it to be a matter of leadership. However, before they discipline, managers will first evaluate the degree to which they, themselves, have fulfilled their obligations to their employees. If they have failed in that effort, they will apologize and correct their own deficiency rather than discipline.

You can imagine that in a tough-caring safety culture, trust between management and labor is promoted through mutual respect, involvement and ownership in all aspects of workplace safety.

Knowledge Check Choose the best answer for the question.

1-7. Which leader uses positive reinforcement as the primary strategy to influence behaviors but is not reluctant to discipline when justified?