Safety Committee Purpose: What You Intend To Do
Now that we correctly see our role as an internal consultant group, we need to figure out how meetings can help us fulfill the expectations of that role.
To do that, we must understand the subtle difference between two important concepts: purpose and function.
- If asked, "What is the primary purpose of your safety committee meetings?" The answer would be a goal statement such as, "to bring management and labor together to identify hazards and make recommendations for improvement."
- How well meetings actually function depends on the success of its activities. For example, if asked, "How well is the safety committee meeting functioning to help identify hazards and make recommendations?" The answer would describe meeting activities and how effective they are.
Achieving the purposes of safety committee meetings is dependent on how well they operate. For example, safety committees naturally intend to fulfill their purpose as an internal consultant group: to do that, they design and perform activities to identify hazards and make recommendations. If, however, the activities are unintentionally designed and performed poorly, they may malfunction; failing to achieve their intended purposes. Bottom-line: The road to failure is paved with good intentions.
Knowledge Check Choose the best answer for the question.
2-4. Achieving the purposes of safety committee meetings is dependent _____.
You forgot to answer the question!