If it's not safe, tell your mates

A leak suddenly developed, spraying Charlie with an octane-boosting product similar to petrol. Temporarily blinded, he ran from the scene past his truck.

In a split second, Charlie realised his mistake: he'd left his engine running. Too late. A spark from the truck's ignition lit the vapours and Charlie was enveloped in a fireball. He dived into a puddle of water but had received burns to over half his body. Five years of agonising rehabilitation and more than 50 operations followed.

“At first I was bitter with the company for allowing me to get into that situation,” Charlie says.

But ultimately he blamed the person who had allowed him to go out without wearing safety glasses, to roll up the sleeves of his fire-retardant suit and to leave his vehicle running – all against regulations.

“That person was me,” says Charlie, who's now a safety consultant in the US.

Workers at Caltex's Lytton and Kurnell refineries have been watching a video presentation by Charlie in orientation sessions for the Incident and Injury Free (IIF) program that's been rolled out to the refineries' 1,600 employees and contractors.

Afterwards they discuss safety. What does it mean to each of them? Are they prepared to approach workmates to speak about working safely and to be approached in turn? Do they take the initiative and make their own judgements about safety issues?

The Caltex refineries' IIF program started early in 2007 with consultants interviewing a cross section of people about Refining's safety culture. “The results made for sometimes painful reading,” admits IIF Project Manager Michael O'Sullivan.

Honest feedback

Many respondents felt managers paid lip service to safety and were only concerned about their own jobs. Suggestions for improvements often disappeared into “black holes”, they said, and were never heard about again.

As a first step in introducing IIF, all Refining managers and team leaders attended a two-day commitment workshop and 34 employees were trained to conduct IIF orientation workshops for all refinery people. The Refining Leadership Team received regular coaching from the consultants as well. An intensive program, IIF Supervisor Skills, followed, aimed at superintendents and managers. This is based on the premise that reinforcing “more safe” behaviour is the key to success. About 90 per cent of supervisors have now been trained.

The reaction from participants has been outstanding, Michael says. “Some blokes who were sitting with their arms folded at the start of meetings were saying by the end, ‘Okay you've convinced me – I don't want to get injured, I don't want to see my mates get injured and I'd like us to be more open in the way we talk to each other'.”

Adds Operational Excellence specialist John Newby: “IIF is about building relationships. The better relationships you have with your workers, peers and bosses the more open they'll be to talking about how they can improve safety and other factors influencing performance.”

So ideas don't fall into “black holes”, teams at the refineries are working on improving communication and understanding. A group led by Lytton Event Manager Joe Callaghan is looking at ways to get better feedback to people on issues raised and making safety jobs more visible and Reliability Improvement Specialist Kynan Baker is working on a similar project at Kurnell.

Authority to Stop Work cards

Under IIF and LPS all refinery workers are authorised to stop work if they believe a situation is unsafe. This has always been the ruling, Michael points out, but some people have felt that unless they had something in writing, it wasn't really “official".

This has been rectified with a formal Authority to Stop Work card that states Caltex approves and supports such action. These are being issued in December at Kurnell and Lytton.

IIF principles were clearly evident in a recent decision to shut down a major plant at Lytton following a small fire on the line into a fractionator. After the fire was quickly extinguished, rather than continuing to run the plant in a potentially unsafe way the team took the decision to shut it down, says General Manager Refining Brian Waywell.

“When IIF becomes ‘the way we do things around here', we won't notice these examples," Brian says, “because they'll just be part of how we normally operate."

Gradually, they're getting it

A recent “pulse survey" has shown that while there's still potential for improvement, IIF is leading to significant movement in Refining's safety culture and that people are more receptive to talking about it.

Confidence to speak up

“I've noticed a change around the place," says Col Groth, maintenance fitter for the Lytton reliability team. “People are more friendly and approachable which is a side effect of the program. They have more confidence to speak to their mates to see if they're okay, when they're struggling or if there's a safer way to do something."

Showing they care

“Gradually they're getting to know what it's about," says Kurnell Loss Prevention System Coordinator Alex Mann. “I've really noticed a difference. People are coming up to me these days and asking me about my family. That shows me they want me to go home safely."

Show, don't tell

Kurnell Production Manager Ray Greenup agrees colleagues are slowly adopting the system, but says more effort is needed. “Until they see changes across the board, IIF is not going to work to its full potential so we must improve further," Ray says. “We tell people safety is our number one priority; we must continue to show them that it is – and that means everyone."

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