PeopleWork BlogTips and strategies to help you align the people you employ, to build more leaders, to communicate more effectively all while looking out for each other and keeping each other safe.

If they’re not giving you safety, it’s because you’re not giving them what they want.

To paraphrase a quote, the secret to getting what you want is to help enough other people get what they want. Zig Ziglar said that. He wasn’t wrong. Help enough other people get a win for themselves and they are more likely to help you get your win.

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Effective workplaces are those places where employees feel valued, cared for and protected.

Without getting into long descriptions, good workplace safety culture is the result of attitudes and personal and corporate values aligning. If apathy in the workplace exists, little care will be given to safety. When the quality of the work is “good enough,” apathy in safety exists. If employees think it's a lousy place to work, then safety will take a back seat. Poor safety attitudes will impede becoming a top performer. That reflects in both safety and financial performance. A broken safety culture will have an impact on overall corporate performance.

Topics: safety responsibility, safety teamwork, accelerate safety, safety mindset, safety moment, safety complacency, peoplework, m4 method, safety motivation, safety engagement, safety effectiveness, safety communications, proactive safety, safety marketing, safety leadership, kevin burns

Your job isn’t to enforce the rules as much as it is to build your team’s performance within the rules.

Top down. That’s how your safety program has probably always been handled. Everything rolls down from the front-office to the front-line.

Topics: kevin burns safety videos, safety responsibility, safety teamwork, accelerate safety, safety mindset, safety moment, safety complacency, peoplework, m4 method, safety motivation, safety engagement, safety commitment, safety effectiveness, positive safety,, safety supervisor, safety communications, safety compliance, safety leadership, kevin burns

What if instead of guilt and fear and manipulation tactics, you simply cared?

When you really think about it, there are only two main ways to get people to join in your safety program and for them to buy-in to the idea of safety: you can either manipulate or inspire. Either you pull on the heartstrings to try to guilt them into following rules, or you help them flip that internal switch that kicks-in their motivation and fires up their personal leadership capacity. Before you decide, know this: manipulation does not create leaders.

Topics: kevin burns safety videos, safety responsibility, safety teamwork, accelerate safety, safety mindset, safety moment, safety complacency, peoplework, m4 method, safety motivation, safety engagement, safety commitment, safety effectiveness, positive safety,, safety values, safety marketing, safety leadership

Don’t waste your one-on-one time with your people enforcing rules.

I’ll let you in on a little secret. When employees buy-in to safety, you don’t need to police them anymore. Where you once spent a great deal of time on enforcement, you can now replace with coaching and mentoring. Trust me when I say, coaching and mentoring is infinitely more satisfying.

Topics: safety teamwork, safety mindset, safety complacency, peoplework, m4 method, safety engagement, safety effectiveness, safety communications, safety values, selling safety, safety management, safety meeting, safety leadership, safety speaker, kevin burns

Focus on the plan to improve the things you're not already doing. Not the goal.

Once upon a time, in the mid-90’s, I was working in a sales job. At the start of each month, our sales manager would assemble all the sales reps in a room and ask each of us for our specific sales goal for the month. He wasn't asking us what our plan was to make more sales. He was asking for a number.

Topics: safety teamwork, accelerate safety, safety mindset, safety moment, safety complacency, peoplework, m4 method, safety motivation, safety message, safety effectiveness, safety communications, proactive safety, safety marketing, safety consulting, workplace safety speaker, safety culture, safety leadership, kevin burns, safety speaker

What if your "one thing" was to make a difference?

There are no such things as priorities. You can have a priority; one. But you can’t have more than one priority. Besides, it’s not a priority if it competes for attention with other priorities. You can have a lot of things that are important, or urgent or critical. But there is room for only one priority. It is that one priority that you can build a company, an ideal or a movement around.

Topics: kevin burns safety videos, safety teamwork, accelerate safety, safety mindset, safety moment, safety complacency, peoplework, safety blog, m4 method, safety engagement, safety effectiveness, safety communications, safety values, safety buy-in, safety leadership

A safety system by itself doesn't make the organization any safer.

Driving instructors have a system for teaching people to drive. Sports coaches have a system for improving player performance. Almost everything in this world has a system. There’s even a system for generating your paycheck. But, the system doesn't pay out unless someone tells it to.

Topics: kevin burns safety videos, safety responsibility, safety teamwork, accelerate safety, safety mindset, safety moment, safety complacency, peoplework, safety motivation, safety engagement, safety effectiveness, positive safety,, safety communications, proactive safety, safety marketing, safety consulting, safety management, safety culture, safety leadership, kevin burns

To improve employee participation in the safety program, clear communications are key.

If you are going to communicate something in safety, what do you want to have happen? How exactly do you want your people to participate?

Informing people isn’t enough anymore. Your people are already bombarded with, on average, four thousand marketing messages each day. Everywhere they look, they are getting access to another message – competing with your safety message - even as recently as this morning. 

But let's say that you are above-average in compelling and engaging your people’s attention during a morning safety meeting, as soon as they leave the meeting, they are faced with hundreds more messages that all compete for attention. So, to combat this, you have to be clear.

Topics: kevin burns safety videos, safety responsibility, safety teamwork, accelerate safety, safety mindset, safety moment, peoplework, safety blog, safety motivation, safety engagement, safety effectiveness, safety communications, safety marketing, safety consulting, safety management, safety culture, safety meeting, safety leadership, kevin burns

Are you meeting the needs of your people in safety meetings?

How many times have you seen presenters, with 10 minutes of solid information, stretch it into a 90-minute presentation? How does that happen? Here’s how. The person organizing the safety meeting is trying to fill blocks of time instead of developing content that will make a difference to their people.

Topics: kevin burns safety videos, safety teamwork, safety mindset, safety moment, safety complacency, peoplework, safety blog, safety motivation, safety engagement, safety effectiveness, positive safety,, safety communications, the perfect safety meeting, proactive safety, safety buy-in, safety management, safety meeting, safety leadership