Demystify: 

Firstly, I applaud the move toward focusing on a safety culture. That is
critical and wise [--and was very long overdue].
One thing that impressed me then and now is that at one company I was in,
service on the safety committee was required and rotational, i.e. everyone
had to serve, thus even the 3resisters2 or those who thought 3the safety
people will take care of it2 had to focus on and deal with the current
safety or health issues for that department or section. My recollection
is that terms were relatively short, [maybe one quarter?] so that it was
not that long since any one person had last served, or would serve again.
Another aspect of safety organization?-interestingly at the same
company--that impressed me was that in each section was displayed a
picture of that section1s current rep to the larger unit safety committee,
so even the newest employee knew by sight and name the person to whom s/he
could bring a question, concern, or suggestion.

I have no data on how those policies worked, and they don1t fit any of
your three approaches, but at least the rotational idea might help improve
some attitudes via required communication.

Good luck!
Steve Stepenuck
Keene State College, ret.

You wrote:

>I am helping to develop a fall CHAS workshop on building safety cultures
>in labs and one topic we would like to cover is ways of organizing groups
>to support proactive safety cultures in the academic lab setting.
>
>At broad level, the three approachs we are considering discussing are:
>- Traditional safety committees (at all of the various scales that they
>arise - department, college, institutional);
>- Laboratory Safety Teams (active groups of lab workers who focus on
>safety); and
>- Embedded safety professionals (departmental staff whose job assignments
>include a significant portion of safety responsibilities)
>
>I would be interested in people who have experience with one or another
>of these approaches to lab safety culture as to what are the top three
>pros and cons of each approach. This is still a rapidly evolving field
>with many different variations, so I would appreciate as diverse a set of
>replies as possible in thinking about what to highlight in the workshop.
>
>Thanks for sharing any thoughts on this.
>
>- Ralph
>
>Ralph Stuart, CIH, CCHO
>Environmental Safety Manager
>Keene State College
>603 358-2859
>
>ralph.stuart**At_Symbol_Here**keene.edu
>
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