It’s the start of a new year and I thought it would be wonderful to start off on a positive note. The topic of this year’s first podcast is imagination.   What is imagination? Why do we need people to be more imaginative, more creative in the risk and safety industry? And do we really need people to be imaginative in a compliance driven industry with strict rules to follow? What about the (unintended) consequences of thinking ‘outside the box’ in a high risk environment?   These are some of the questions Dr Rob Long and I tackle in this conversation.

It is often said that safety people require a predisposition of care and empathy towards the others. Rosa Carrillo’s well-researched book ‘OHS Voices from The Resistance’ brings a paradox to surface. What if care and empathy make (safety) people vulnerable and fragile in the face of growing aggression and brutalism in the workplaces?   The book is packed with stories of people working in the safety function struggle to maintain their identity and become seen as misfits in their organisations. While some find themselves out grouped from within their own organisations, others consider abandoning the safety industry as a whole. Rosa’s conversation with Nippin is deeply personal and reflective of her own struggles and ethnicity.    For those interested, Rosa’s offers her wisdom on how to tackle and live with some of these issues: https://carrilloconsultants.com/product/voices-from-the-resistance/  

Nippin Anand and Pedro Ferreira follow-up on their conversation in Croatia A conversation about what it takes to bring cultural sensitivity into organisations. Nippin and Pedro discuss several examples of how fostering conversations that are not power dominated and personal agendas are not so much at play, can bring about a much better understanding of different perspectives. The understanding and sharing of different perspectives then brings about much enhanced decision-making.  

How do you understand culture, cultural sensitivity and risk intelligence? How can being culturally sensitive make us risk intelligent? Nippin Anand and Pedro Ferreira offer some thoughts. And guess where they are – in the cultural capital of Europe i.e. Rijeka, Croatia

This podcast is dedicated to people who put on a performance (a show) every day when they come to work. performance means many things, although in the risk and safety world we have become excessively focused on work and the narrative goes something like this that in order for the worker to perform well, she needs the right support from the company. Support in the form of the right processes, right tools, right instructions, right directions and the right rules. And once you do that, not only safety but reliability, quality and efficiency will also improve. Since it is all about performance, the focus still remains on measurements and dashboards, AI and technique.   But there is another kind of performance, the kind of performance that we notice with people who are going through so much in their lives (family issues, marital problems, trauma, identity crisis, discrimination, victimisation, bullying, harassment, sexual abuse and so on) and yet they are expected to put on a show when they turn to work. that’s performance, just like Freddie Mercury making sure the show must go on.   Do we care to understand performance from this perspective? Is it even important given that this has ‘nothing’ to do with work? Steve Shorrock and I had a heartfelt conversation on this topic and we share our thoughts in this podcast.   We hope this podcast will make you think, reflect and approach yourcolleagues and friends with a different perspective about performance.  

Our society has become so obsessed with measurement that even leisure, reading, wellbeing and healthy living have become a topic for efficiency. Many of us live and die without experiencing a life outside of efficiency and measurement. Take for instance the case of the father of scientific management Frederick Taylor. Even on his deathbed, Taylor was seen winding a stopwatch. What a paradox that we won’t let go of measurement even when there is no time left to live?   But things are not that straightforward. How do we explain the countless time sitting on the couch browsing through social media without purpose or meaning? How do we explain investments in weapons of mass destruction? Clearly these are issues that cannot always be understood through the lenses of efficiency. In this podcast, Rob Long and I discuss the meaning of Technique as an ideology (or a worldview) that has come to dominate our lives. The ideology of Technique comes from the work of the French philosopher Jacques Ellul but was also discussed in the work of Heidegger and other philosophers.   We hope this podcast will make you think, reflect and live a more fulfilling life.

Greg Smith and I recently did a podcast where I asked Greg about how far the industry has onboarded his wisdom about paper safety. The discussion ended in a very interesting place where we both felt the need to articulate a very basic question – what is safety?    It sounds like a simple question but there are so many dimensions to the idea of safety that we never come to a shared understanding and so I’m afraid we don’t have an answer but we do have some questions for you to reflect upon.

The podcast explores the concept of semiotics and how it helps us understand the symbolic meaning of the visual world. They discuss the importance of cultural sensitivity and risk intelligence. Topics include dream time, symbolism, power dynamics, and immersing oneself in different perspectives.

For decades, western societies have become increasingly committed to demonstrating in the most tangible way possible (i.e. through procedures) that risks are mitigated to all possible extent. Quantification and documentation have gradually come to dominate every aspect of risk, and disconnection with the reality of work has lead many to question the purpose of what we have created around work and safety. Greg Smith in his book “Paper Safe” has brilliantly unpacked this issue and the assumptions that sit in the back of it. Nippin met Greg while in Australia for a conversation that sheds light on how paperwork has so often become a blanket that rather than keeping us safe and warm, is blocking our view over the things that help us understand and tackle risk.

In this podcast, Rob Long and Nippin Anand discuss the uniqueness (not superiority) of Social Psychology of Risk. How SPoR methodology, methods and tools can help us become good listeners and become deliberate about our culture and culture change.