New Research Shows Health Workers Need to Improve Safety Behaviours

A new study shows that workers in health and community services have only a moderate safety consciousness despite having the highest number of workplace injury claims of all industries.

The study, Dangerous Personalities Making Work Unsafe, by organisational psychology firm SACS Consulting, found that compared with other sectors, health and community workers were only moderately motivated to ensure workplace safety, to comply with OHS rules and to participate in improving safety at work.
“This finding is a real worry,” says Andrew Marty, Managing Director of SACS and Principal Researcher in the study. “The latest data from Safe Work Australia shows employees in health and community services had by far the highest number of serious workers compensation claims in 2011-12, at 19,060 claims,” says Marty.
“The evidence is clear - the health and community services sector needs to improve the overall safety behaviours of its employees,” says Marty.
The SACS study, Dangerous Personalities Making Work Unsafe, shows that:

• The safest employees work in the local government, utilities and FMCG industries


• There is a distinct difference in workers’ approach to safety, at the fundamental level of personality, some employees truly value safety and others do not


• Men tend to take safety more seriously at work than women.

The SACS study found that it is possible to identify which people are likely to flout or support OHS and safety rules in the workplace.
“For employers concerned about OHS who are keen to reduce workers compensation costs and time lost to injury, screening their staff is a more sophisticated way to reduce unnecessary safety risks in the workplace,” says Marty.
About the SACS study:
The SACS study surveyed more than 1400 employees in a range of organisations and employment sectors. In an anonymous questionnaire respondents were asked about their attitude and behaviour when it comes to OHS and safety in the workplace. These responses were correlated with the outcomes of respondents’ personality and values tests.
The study found that by using a combination of a personality and values assessments, potentially unsafe employees could be predicted with 37% accuracy before they are hired. Compared with the average accuracy of job interviews at 10-20%, this new approach can help employers to manage safety risks in the workplace.