Safety citizenship behaviour: a proactive approach to risk management

Shama Didla, Kathryn Mearns and Rhona Flin

Journal of Risk Research, 2009, vol. 12, issue 3-4, 475-483

Abstract: Risk management is an integral part of industrial business due to its high environmental, human, legal and financial implications, especially in the oil and gas industry. There are two dimensions to risk management: technical mechanisms and human behaviours. The technical risk management systems have been developed highly. Organizations are now focusing on building a human risk management system, which means limiting risky behaviours and enhancing safety behaviours. It has been found that compliance with safety rules and regulations is influential in lowering the risk of accidents. However, safety researchers have realized that in order to achieve high safety levels, mere compliance is not sufficient. Organizations need individuals who are also proactive in participating and initiating improvements in safety. These types of proactive behaviours are termed as safety citizenship behaviours (SCBs). This study investigates the concept of SCB, and aims to understand the motivators and consequences for employees engaging in these types of behaviours. The study is based on 24 semi-structured interviews with supervisory-level employees in an oil and gas organization. The findings indicate that a positive safety culture was an influential factor in encouraging people to participate in SCBs, in addition to the innate human need for self-preservation. Previous research indicated that compliance behaviour bears consequences like employee role overload, stress and work--family conflict, but interestingly, SCBs did not show any of these negative effects. However, results suggested other causes for role overload and stress. These issues are discussed with relevance to the work context of the employees.

Date: 2009
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (12)

Downloads: (external link)
http://hdl.handle.net/10.1080/13669870903041433 (text/html)
Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:taf:jriskr:v:12:y:2009:i:3-4:p:475-483

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
http://www.tandfonline.com/pricing/journal/RJRR20

DOI: 10.1080/13669870903041433

Access Statistics for this article

Journal of Risk Research is currently edited by Bryan MacGregor

More articles in Journal of Risk Research from Taylor & Francis Journals
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Chris Longhurst ().