Your new employees will either embrace or reject your safety culture within their first 90 days. Senior management can set policies and launch initiatives, but they can't create safety culture at the frontline level. New team members are learning something deeper through daily interactions: whether their supervisor genuinely cares about their well-being. The relationship built in those first 90 days determines everything about how that employee approaches safety for their entire time with your company.
Your new hire will either embrace your safety culture or reject it in their first 90 days. And it's your supervisor who decides which one happens; not your safety procedures, not your orientation program, and definitely not your senior management team.
Every company has essentially the same onboarding process. Day one is paperwork and videos. Day two is more paperwork and a tour. Day three is shadowing someone who's been there a while. Then you turn them loose and hope they figure it out.
But here's what nobody talks about: while you're focused on getting new team members through orientation, your supervisor is teaching them something far more important. That supervisor is teaching them whether safety actually matters here or if it's just something we say matters.
And that lesson sticks with the employee for their entire time with your company.
Research shows it takes 18 months for a new team member to perform at the same level as a veteran. But here's the part that should terrify you: more than one-third of all workplace injuries happen in the first year on the job. In fact, OSHA reports that new employees are five times more likely to get injured than experienced team members.
Let that sink in. Five times more likely.
Your newest team members are the most vulnerable. They don't know the equipment. They don't know the risks. They don't know which shortcuts are safe and which ones will hurt them. They're completely dependent on the people around them to keep them safe.
And the person they depend on most is their supervisor.
They're learning what really matters here.
They're watching their supervisor. Does this supervisor actually care about safety or just talk about it? Does this supervisor protect the team or just protect their own career? Does this supervisor value people or just value production numbers?
New team members figure this out fast. Within the first two weeks, they know if their supervisor genuinely cares about their well-being or just sees them as another body filling a slot.
And once they figure that out, they either buy into your safety culture or they don't.
Your senior management team can create policies. They can launch initiatives. They can give inspiring speeches at company meetings. But they can't create safety culture at the frontline level.
Here's why: your new team member will never meet most of your senior management team. They won't hear those inspiring speeches. They won't read those carefully crafted safety policies. What they will experience, every single day, is their relationship with their supervisor.
The book, The CareFull Supervisor, makes this clear: "An employee's perspective about their employer is largely shaped in the relationship they have with their supervisor."
Senior management may set the direction. But supervisors create the reality. A new employee doesn't know what senior management values. They only know what their supervisor values. And they judge everything about your company through that lens.
You can have the best safety vision statement ever written. You can have senior leaders who genuinely care about safety. But if the frontline supervisor doesn't demonstrate that care in daily interactions, none of it reaches your new team member.
And here's the flip side that really matters: even when senior management fails to show support for safety, a strong supervisor can still protect their team and teach them the right way to work. A good supervisor creates a safety culture for their team regardless of what's happening above them. That's the power of the supervisor-employee relationship.
Here's what most companies miss: safety culture isn't built in orientation sessions. It's built in the relationship between the supervisor and the new team member.
When a new employee starts, they're looking for someone to trust. Someone who will show them how things really work here. Someone who will protect them while they're learning. Someone who genuinely cares about their well-being.
If their supervisor builds that relationship in the first 90 days, that new team member will embrace your safety culture. They'll speak up about hazards. They'll follow procedures. They'll look out for their teammates. They'll take safety seriously because someone they trust takes it seriously.
But if that relationship doesn't get built - if the supervisor is too busy, too focused on production, or just doesn't care - that new team member learns a different lesson. They learn that safety is just paperwork. That speaking up gets you in trouble. That the real way to succeed here is to keep your head down and don't make waves.
And they'll carry that belief for as long as they work for you.
Let's talk about what happens when supervisors don't build strong relationships with new team members in those first 90 days.
Safety incidents increase. New employees who don't trust their supervisor don't speak up about problems. They don't report near misses. They don't ask questions when they're confused. They just try to figure it out themselves. And that's when people get hurt.
Turnover increases. When new team members don't feel valued or supported in their first few months, they start looking for other jobs. Your company invests in recruiting them, hiring them, and training them - and then they leave before you ever see a return on that investment.
Your entire team suffers. When new people don't buy into the safety culture, it affects everyone. Experienced team members have to work harder to cover for them. Trust breaks down. The whole team becomes less safe.
Your new hire's entire view of your company gets formed in those first 90 days. And that view depends almost entirely on their supervisor.
Most supervisors spend the first 90 days teaching new team members how to do the work. That's important. But it's not the most important thing.
The most important thing is building a relationship where the new team member knows their supervisor genuinely cares about their well-being.
Here's what that looks like in practice:
Check in daily, not just when there's a problem. Take two minutes at the start of each shift to talk to your new team member. Ask how they're doing. Find out if they have questions. Show them you notice they exist.
Make it safe to admit they don't know something. New people are afraid to look stupid. They'll fake understanding rather than ask for help. Your job is to create an environment where it's okay to say "I don't understand" or "I need help with this."
Catch them doing things right. Most supervisors only give feedback when something goes wrong. That teaches new team members to hide mistakes and avoid their supervisor. Instead, look for chances to acknowledge when they do something well. People repeat behaviors that get recognized.
Explain the why behind procedures. Don't just tell new team members what to do. Tell them why it matters. Help them understand that safety procedures exist to protect them, not to make their job harder.
Show them they matter as people, not just employees. Learn something personal about them. Remember it. Ask about it later. This doesn't have to be complicated. You just have to care enough to pay attention.
The book, The CareFull Supervisor, puts it plainly: "Any relationship, personal or professional, needs genuine caring to succeed. The people you say you care about need to feel it from you."
After 90 days, your new team member should believe two things:
First, they should believe their supervisor genuinely cares about their safety and well-being. Not just in theory, but in practice. Not just in safety meetings, but in everyday interactions. They should know, without any doubt, that their supervisor wants to care for them and protect them.
Second, they should believe they can trust their supervisor with problems. They should know that if they see a hazard, have a concern, or make a mistake, they can go to their supervisor and that supervisor will help them fix it.
When new team members believe both of these things, they embrace your safety culture.
It's that simple.
The relationship your supervisor builds with each new team member determines whether they embrace or reject your safety culture. Not your procedures. Not your training programs. The relationship.
At PeopleWork Supervisor Academy, we teach supervisors how to build the relationships that create strong safety cultures. We show them how to connect with new team members from day one, how to create trust, and how to develop a team where everyone looks out for each other.
Your supervisor builds the relationship in those critical first 90 days.