HSE 4.0: Recognising the Value of Human Capital

By Dr Karen McDonnell, RoSPA’s occupational health and safety policy adviser

Being part of the global occupational health and safety community is a constant source of inspiration and encouragement. Speaking at the recent European HSE Management Forum 4.0 reinforced the importance of connections between people and organisations in tackling the scourge of work-related accidents and ill health. At RoSPA we promote a whole-person whole-life approach to prevention, believing that accidents and cases of occupational ill health don’t have to happen, that safe and healthy work underpins success and that freedom from harm is an important goal for society. Accidents are a leading preventable cause of death, serious injury and long-term disability which devastate individuals, families and communities, and place a huge burden on health and social care systems and society as a whole.

Much of the conversation at HSE 4.0 was about the importance of recognising the value of human capital - the competencies, knowledge, social and personal attributes that each of us bring to work every day and how we use them.

We also spoke about the importance of reflective practice from a personal and organisational perspective. Why are people still having accidents or developing work-related ill health conditions that we know how to prevent? We need to create the opportunity for people and organisations to thrive.

We were keen to learn from each other - for example, did people collect data on absence from work that results from accidents that happen away from work, either to workers or those for whom they have caring responsibilities?

We champion this at RoSPA through our “policy driving excellence model”, which is an approach that links the 30+ countries across the world involved in the RoSPA Health and Safety Awards programme to share “what works”, or in some cases “what’s gone wrong”, as a tool to help others. We also offer personal and organisational mentoring through the RoSPA Awards Ambassador network, which is represented in India by Stephen Phillip Storey of Larsen & Toubro.

The whole-person whole-life approach towards sharing safety culture and awareness beyond the workplace gained significant traction over the two days of HSE 4.0. The L’Oréal [email protected] [email protected] programme captured the imagination of delegates and encouraged them to consider how they could engage through the RoSPA Awards and lead the way on developing the evidence base for “carry over” safety programmes from the workplace into other parts of life, particularly on falls prevention. As a side note, we have been delighted more generally with the reaction to the [email protected]@Home approach, including our new award of the same name, which is sponsored by L’Oréal, and was won by Hindustan Coca Cola Beverage Pvt Ltd’s (HCCBPL) DASNA Plant in India earlier in 2019. Back at the conference, we learned about the value that people add to organisations, that understanding your data and designing interventions to tackle the problem at an early stage works, that lessons learnt can be tailored to reflect local context, culture and industry wherever you are in the world and that we share a common language.

And we learnt about hummingbirds – the smallest a bee hummingbird, weighing 2.6g and being 6.1cm long, that can visit up to 1,500 flowers a day, transferring pollen as it goes. Their heart rate can reach 1,260 beats per minute. Also, the Rufous hummingbird which migrates from Alaska to Mexico, a distance equal to 78,470,000 body lengths. With such tenacity and focus on playing their part, how appropriate that Malcolm Staves, L’Oréal’s corporate health and safety director, encourages its global business to be like the hummingbird!

We reconfirmed that there are no limitations when it comes to sharing success and that the door of occupational health and safety professionals and practitioners is always open.