Safety is everyone’s responsibility

This article has been published in Finnish at blogi.iss.fi >>

Hannele Jakosuo-Jansson, Neste’s Senior Vice President, Human Resources, HSSEQ and Procurement, sees safety as a whole that requires companies to be humble all the time. Safety must be earned again every day.

‘A high level of safety is the sum of numerous small daily actions. It requires continuous effort and commitment from everyone to development actions and the evaluation and monitoring of operations. Safety must not be neglected even for a moment. A lack of attention may seriously affect the continuity of business operations, the reputation of a company and people’s well-being.’

Jakosuo-Jansson knows what she is talking about. Over the last decade, Neste has been able to make significant improvements in its safety performance, and it has also received international recognition for its work on safety. In 2020, Neste improved its performance in work safety from previous years, reaching a record level.

You get what you measure

Neste uses various indicators to monitor and evaluate its safety performance. The key performance indicators include TRIF, the total recordable injury frequency per million work hours, and PSER, the process safety events rate.

ISS Finland also began a shift from measuring LTIF (lost-time injury frequency) to using TRIF around a year and a half ago.

‘Every accident is unnecessary and can be avoided, be it at home, on the way to work or at work. When I started in my current job six years ago, there was a lot of room for improvement in our safety figures. Nowadays, we discuss safety in all our meetings and aim to pay attention to overall safety, not only to accidents. We have developed our approach to safety and we monitor these matters closely throughout ISS Group’, says Jukka Jäämaa, Country Manager of ISS Finland.

Neste also measures the number of safe days. A safe day means a day without accidents at work, fires, leaks, environmental incidents, traffic accidents, process safety events or marine safety incidents. In 2020, the number of safe days rose to 325, and the number of safety incidents reached an all-time record. How has Neste been able to make continuous improvements?

‘There are many factors that explain it. The general developments in our field, our personnel’s views, leaders' and the owners’ increased interest in safety matters have all had a positive impact on the promotion of safety matters in our company’, says Jakosuo-Jansson.

She regards Neste’s global Way Forward to Safety programme, launched in 2014, as a major turning point that has enabled significant improvements in the company’s safety culture.

‘When we launched the programme, we began to think how we could reach the next level in these matters. Our key concepts have been systematic operations, comprehensiveness, and firm and committed leadership. Safety must not be a separate issue; instead, it must be integrated into all our operations and Neste’s high level of expertise. Every one of us is a safety manager in their own role. It requires an understanding of and a commitment to what safety means at Neste.’

Safety is made together

The Way Forward to Safety programme also includes all contractors, customers and partners that are part of Neste’s value chain. One of them is ISS, which has also made positive developments in its safety performance indicators. In 2020, for example, ISS Finland’s lost-time injury frequency rate was the lowest in its history.

‘We have worked on safety matters for many years so that people would actively think about them and implement necessary measures. We have made progress. Last year, for example, we recorded a total of 34,339 safety observations’, Jäämaa says.

At Neste, safety reporting not only includes its own units and employees, but also its service providers, contractors and logistics partners. One of Neste’s focus areas is contractor safety, which also clearly improved in 2020 and reached an all-time record.

‘We continuously have several hundred external employees working in our facilities. We make an effort to build a shared culture of safety with them, and they are committed to complying with our procedures. I don’t think people pay much attention nowadays to which company’s overalls their fellow workers are wearing. This is a shared workplace, and we all want to go home after a safe day at work every day’, Jakosuo-Jansson says.

‘At ISS, we always create our service solutions to match our customer’s needs, and we produce our services where our customers are, in their facilities. Safety is at the core of all our services, whether they are property technology or cleaning services. Our cleaners and their work, for example, affect the comfort and functionality, as well as safety, of our customers’ facilities. Therefore, they implement our global purpose of connecting people and places’, Jäämaa adds.

Anticipation of risks and peer pressure

At Neste, the creation of a shared safety culture involves various measures such as safety discussions, inspection rounds, sharing best practices, and analysing and learning from near-miss situations. Jakosuo-Jansson emphasises that proactive risk assessment is one of the most important factors that contribute to a good safety performance. You must always think before you start work.

‘This also includes measuring. The “you get what you measure” rule applies here too. It is possible to make improvements if we monitor each employee’s work effort and also evaluate it using safety indicators. We must also praise and reward them for reaching the targets’, says Jakosuo-Jansson.

Jäämaa shares this opinion. In his view, measuring and rewarding success are important tools when the aim is to improve safety at the daily level. However, he wonders what the best way to reward employees is.

‘At Neste, do you also reward the team and not only individuals, so that there is also peer encouragement to pursue the targets?’

According to Jakosuo-Jansson, Neste uses both methods.

‘Usually, especially at the level of operations, our principle is to reward the team, because it is always a team or shift that people work in. In this way, there is positive pressure to achieve results.’

An integral part of leadership

Both Jakosuo-Jansson and Jäämaa emphasise that besides daily actions, safety is largely a question of leadership.

‘Safety management and development are defined by senior management and the board. Managers’ and supervisors’ continuous interest, know-how, monitoring, communications and positive encouragement are of utmost importance for the development of safety culture. The board has the responsibility of challenging the management to develop these matters, setting goals and ensuring that the management always has safety on its agenda’, Jakosuo-Jansson emphasises.

Jäämaa thinks that in previous decades, safety used to be of secondary importance to managers. Fortunately, the situation has changed rapidly.

‘A few years ago, I attended an international management meeting, in which each participant was asked to state the KPI most important to them. Many mentioned profitability or cash flow. I suggested LTIF, which we measured at the time. My reason was that if the management ensures good work safety, the other important indicators will follow’, Jäämaa says.

Both Jäämaa and Jakosuo-Jansson have made the observation that over the past decade, companies have begun to view safety and security as a competitive edge rather than merely as an obligation.

‘In Neste’s field of business, safety and security are almost a synonym for productivity, quality and efficiency. If there are issues in our processes, and they result from poor safety risk assessment, our production plant will stand idle. This means that its productivity will also be reduced to zero’, Jakosuo-Jansson describes.