Organisations today collect more safety data than ever before. Incident statistics, audit findings, safety climate surveys, behavioural observations and performance indicators provide enormous amounts of information. Yet an important question remains: are we using this information to make better decisions, or simply producing more reports? asks Adel Lawson, CFIOSH, managing partner, Demoura Lawson Consulting.
Having spent over two decades working with organisations across the Middle East, I have seen how easily safety performance can become focused on numbers rather than understanding what those numbers are telling us.
A reduction in reported incidents, for example, may suggest improvement. But does it reflect better risk management, or are employees becoming less willing to report concerns? Similarly, a positive safety climate survey may indicate strong employee confidence, while behavioural observations reveal inconsistent application of critical procedures.
NEITHER DATASET TELLS THE COMPLETE STORY
The real opportunity lies in connecting three important elements:
– Safety Climate – What people perceive;
– Decision Intelligence – How people think, assess risk and make decisions; and
– Behavioural Intelligence – What people actually do.
Understanding the relationship between these elements provides leaders with a more meaningful picture of organisational safety.
Consider a supervisor working under considerable operational pressure. Climate data may reveal that employees believe production takes priority over safety. Behavioural observations may identify shortcuts. However, understanding how that supervisor evaluates risk, responds to uncertainty and balances competing priorities helps identify where leadership development is needed.
This approach has influenced the development of SDIA™ (Safety Decision Intelligence Assessment) by Demoura Lawson Consulting. The framework examines six dimensions of individual safety decision-making and connects these insights with organisational climate and behavioural information.
Rather than categorising individuals as good or poor decision-makers, the objective is to identify decision-making tendencies, recognise strengths and support more targeted coaching and development.
For organisations, this represents an opportunity to move beyond generic training and reactive reporting towards more informed leadership interventions.
Ultimately, collecting safety data is only the beginning. Its real value comes from understanding the relationships between organisational culture, individual judgement and everyday behaviour.
The future of safety leadership will not be determined by how much data we collect, but by how intelligently we use it to make better decisions.
