by Rick Baker
On May 31, 2013
Despite everything you have done to meet legislation and best practices, your people do not feel as safe at work.
Abraham Maslow and others have created pictures like this...
...to explain human needs. Physiological needs come first and Safety needs are next. Safety is the #2 most-basic human needs.
And your people do not feel safe at work.
This has nothing to do with workplace hazards and accidents.
Your people do not feel safe because:
- Future Shock - The pace of change is accelerating - we are experiencing the 'Future Shock' Alvin Toffler wrote about 40 years ago: people know relationships in business are much more fragile than they used to be; people are more uncertain about the stability of their place at work; people are inundated with information, Attention Dilemma, etc.
- Economic Recession - The 2008 economic downturn shook people's confidence and the fact economic doldrums linger on prove people are still shaken. Shaken means uncomfortable, uncomfortable means insecure & unsafe.
For these 2 reasons, your people do not feel safe at work.
If you take a step back from the heat of day-to-day work, you can observe the behaviour that confirms this fact. You can observe increased 'fight' and you can observe increased 'flight'.
Some examples of increased fight:
Some examples of increased flight:
- people failing to return phone calls
- people failing to pay bills...and stretching accounts payable
- people failing to take risks [including spending money]
- increased use of consensus decisions
To be comfortable...business people must feel more safe than they do now.
As a business leader...
What are you doing to make your people feel safer?