Unsafe Acts of Managers and Workers in the Labor Process

Lecture

In real production conditions, where a human being is involved, it has not yet been possible to ensure the ideal course of labor activity. Because of causes already identified and examined in more detail below, a person makes incorrect (inaccurate, erroneous, untimely) actions, omits necessary actions, commits reckless acts, and so on. Some of these have no noticeable effect on labor indicators, another part affects product quality, and a third — creates a dangerous situation that is one step away from an accident or an emergency. We will call this part of incorrect actions unsafe acts.

By the degree of damage caused, instances of unsafe acts can be classified as an accident, an emergency, or a catastrophe.

Accident — a sudden, unintentional injury to a person's body (preventing the normal performance of activity) resulting from exposure to a hazardous production factor or from the person's own unsafe behavior.

Emergency — an incident that damages equipment and causes economic harm to an enterprise or to society (which may or may not be associated with harm to people's health and life).

Catastrophe — an incident in which, in addition to the technical emergency, people are killed.

Analysis of the materials of accident and emergency investigations makes it possible to identify and group, by the phases of psychomotor acts, the characteristic unsafe acts of workers. Differences were established in the composition and content of unsafe acts between workers and officials (managers and specialists) at production facilities, which is explained by the difference in tasks and functions performed by these categories of employees (Table 5).

Any unsafe act may be the consequence of one cause or a group of causes. For example, an incorrect assessment of the state of the equipment being operated occurs as a result of either a lack of professional knowledge, or a worker's poor state of health, or a lack of the time needed for this operation, or simply the worker's disregard of the requirement to check the state of the equipment. A generalization of the materials from investigations of industrial accidents and emergencies makes it possible to reduce the entire variety of immediate causes of unsafe acts to four groups (classes):

• cannot do it — the worker does not possess the knowledge, corresponding skills, methods, and techniques needed for the given job;
• does not want to do it — the worker is able to perform the given work (operation) skillfully and safely, but has no desire to observe safety requirements, in other words, lacks motivation and has not developed a psychological set toward observing these requirements;

Table 5. Unsafe acts of the manager and the workers

Stages of the manager's activity	Types of unsafe acts by the manager	Stages of the worker's activity	Types of unsafe acts by the worker
1. Perception (during inspection of production facilities and workplaces)	1. Non-perception or incorrect (mistaken, delayed) perception of signs of danger	Perception of the object, the situation	1. Non-perception or incorrect (mistaken, delayed) perception of a signal, signs of danger
2. Thinking — "making sense" of the situation, the state of the object, and the information received: • analysis of the situation, the state of the object, the information; • assessment of the situation, the state of the object; • formulation of the problem; • forecast	2. Poor-quality analysis. 3. Incorrect assessment of the situation or the state of the object. 4. Incorrect formulation of the problem. 5. Poor-quality forecast, absence of a forecast	Thinking: a) analysis and assessment of the situation; b) decision-making	2. Incorrect assessment of the situation. 3. Incorrect or untimely decision. 4. Failure to make a decision
3. Development and adoption of a decision (a plan of measures, a work schedule, a procedure of actions, regulations, etc.)	6. Incorrect decision. 7. Untimely decision. 8. Failure to make a decision	Action (psychomotor act)	5. Omission (failure to perform a required action, operation). 6. Incorrect (inaccurate, erroneous) performance of an action. 7. Untimely action. 8. Use of a hazardous technique, a prohibited action. 9. Impulsive (affective, panic) actions. 10. Prostration (stupor)

End of Table 5

Stages

of the

manager's activity

Types of unsafe acts by the manager

Stages

of the

worker's activity

Types of unsafe acts by the worker

4. Implementation of decisions (a plan of measures, a work schedule, a procedure of actions, regulations, etc.)

9. Absence or untimely issuance of the corresponding orders.
10. Incorrect, erroneous orders.
11. Non-execution, poor-quality, or untimely execution of orders

5. Monitoring the implementation of the decision (a plan of measures, a work schedule, a procedure of actions, regulations, etc.)

12. Poor-quality or untimely monitoring.
13. Untimely (inaccurate, false) information about the results of monitoring.
14. Absence or untimely reaction to the results of monitoring

• cannot do it — the worker is in such a physical or psychological state that, despite the ability and willingness to work, he commits an unsafe act;
• is not provided for — the worker does not perform a prescribed action because he is not provided with the necessary conditions — tools, materials, instruments, information.

The first three groups of immediate causes are determined by the individual and personal characteristics (qualities) of the worker. The fourth group of causes is an external factor in relation to the worker — this is the production environment in which the worker's activity takes place.