Zen and the Art of Safety Leadership
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Hello and welcome to this week’s edition of Safety Pro Weekly.
The practice of Zen began as a form of Buddhist meditation that originated in India and gradually spread to China and Japan. It has evolved into a discipline of calm, focused awareness that emphasizes the importance of staying in the present moment and responding to reality as it is, not how we might wish it to be.
As a philosophy, the principles of Zen help improve our clarity and sense of calm which we can use to improve our influence as safety professionals.
Let’s take a look at a few of the key principles of Zen and how we can adapt them in our daily work:
Principle #1: Presence — The Power of Being Fully There
Life is busy, work even more so and the temptation is always there to rush.
Rush through traffic, rush through inspections, rush through conversations.
While we’re doing this at work and in our daily lives, the danger is that we miss important things. We don’t hear the tone of someone’s voice that tells us they’re struggling with something, we miss a better solution to a problem because we rush through the meeting, maybe in rushing through traffic we miss a red light and cause an accident.
While a certain amount of time stress is inherent in modern life, we can apply the Zen concept of presence by:
Slowing down your shop floor walks and inspections. Take time to really look at what’s going on.
Put your phone away during conversations.
Block an extra few minutes before a meeting to give yourself a chance to be calm, centered and focused on what you’re going to talk about.
Principle #2: Beginner’s Mind — Seeing the Workplace as if for the First Time
Zen encourages us to take a beginner’s mindset to everything we do. It teaches us to avoid preconceived notions of how things are or how they should be.
In the safety world, we find that familiarity makes hazards invisible. How many times do we inadvertently walk past or even step over a safety hazard that’s been there for so long it’s become part of the landscape the no one even notices anymore. Following the same old routines can cause you to go through the motions, making you less perceptive. Making assumptions about situations, people or hazards clouds your judgement and prevents you from coming up with new ideas.
Instead, strive to:
Treat each task like it’s new.
Ask workers what would confuse a brand-new employee.
Change your inspection patterns regularly.
Pair up experienced committee members with new members for inspections. A fresh set of eyes will often spot hazards more experienced people might miss.
Principle #3: Non-Attachment to Ego — Safety Without Power Struggles
Too often in corporate life, conversations turn into conflict because leaders want to be right. We become entrenched in our point of view and miss an opportunity to learn a new way of doing things or looking at a problem. Worse, excessive conflict leads to added stress, work dissatisfaction and ultimately employee turnover.
Instead, try to avoid defensive reactions.
Lead with curiosity, not judgment.
Be willing to set aside your ego and fear of looking bad or losing authority.
Accept that others may have the best insight in certain situations.
Principle #4: Simplicity — Strip Away the Noise
There’s always a temptation in safety to do more. After all, we want to the best results, we want people to be safe so we should be doing everything we possibly can. More programs, more training, more polices and procedures. Right?
Wrong.
Doing a lot of work is not the same as doing effective work.
Every new program you add takes time, energy and focus from something you’re already doing, making it less effective.
Instead:
Prioritize high-impact activities and discard the extras that don’t really move the needle.
Reduce forms to the minimum needed.
Build procedures simple enough for a brand-new worker. Nobody remembers complicated policies and procedures anyway. Give people a level of information and complexity they can reasonably handle and eliminate busywork.
Principle #5: Compassion & Empathy — Understanding the Human Side
I’ve known many safety professionals who could cite chapter and verse of the most obscure regulations, but didn’t really understand people and how to motivate them to actually follow those ideas.
Regulations and policies are important and are there for a reason, but if you can’t get people to understand them and buy in to the key parts of your program, you’re facing an uphill battle.
To better understand your team:
Ask workers what makes tasks harder than they should be.
Recognize fatigue, workflow pressure, and stress and how they affect your team’s ability to do their job safely.
Investigate incidents with understanding, not blame. Try to de-escalate any stress an injured worker may be feeling and approach with an attitude of trying to learn how to prevent future incidents, not to establish fault.
A calmer, clearer leader creates a safer workplace. Applying these small daily practices on a regular basis gradually compounds into substantial cultural improvements over time. Using these Zen principles in your own life can help you be a better safety leader and contribute to a healthier environment for your co-workers.
That’s it for now, thanks for reading.
Safety Pro Weekly is published every Tuesday on LinkedIn and Substack.
Cheers,
Dan.
