Effective leadership skills are essential for strong safety performance and culture; they are even more crucial in the current environment of uncertainty, uneven morale and reduced resources— and organizations recognize this need. You don't have to look far to see numerous tomes, articles and seminars aiming at transferring the attributes of basic leadership, usually citing the import of continuous improvement; ironically, while many have good intent, information and case examples, focus is often on, "Here are the skills, now you've got it," which can run contrary to a process of continual development.
In our view, "leadership" means getting desired results by working with and through others. It means generating exponential results over time from considered, much smaller, daily actions.
In our experiences—Anil's in several executive positions (currently as CEO of the what is recognized as the safest and most environmentally sensitive oil tanker company in the world) and Robert's as head of a consulting company with worldwide clients such as BP, United Airlines, Honda, Avon, Boeing, DuPont, Harley-Davidson, Johnson & Johnson, Michelin, Textron, Xerox, U.S. Steel, and many more—we have seen examples of levels of leadership, from less effective to extremely so. Not surprisingly, higher levels of leadership are directly correlated with higher levels of safety performance and culture, in a wide array of leading and trailing measures.
We recognize that leadership mindsets, toolsets and skill sets can vary from person and culture. Ultimately, leadership is less taught than learned, and that there is a wealth of leadership skills and attributes that we know about that could fill numerous books, much less this short paper (and that we know we certainly don't have all the answers).
But, in this short space, we wish to offer core skills and attributes to further levels of safety leadership in companies worldwide, to suggest possibilities of significant improvements on multiple levels and to break through the ceiling of what many think of as "just" safety leadership.
