| The purpose of this research was to examine the importance of top leadership practices in relationship to organizational safety performance. The top leaders in organizations are ultimately held responsible for the safety culture and performance in organizations, yet the focus of safety programs has been on engineering, employee education, and enforcement of safety regulations and practices. In the present study, the Leadership Practices Inventory (Kouzes & Posner, 2003) was used to study the impact of top leaders' practices on safety performance. A cross-sectional survey was administered to safety and health professionals to collect data regarding their top leaders and organizational safety performance. It was hypothesized that leadership practices would influence organizational safety performance. The results showed a correlation between one leadership practice, termed "model the way," and safety performance. The data also indicated no relationship between the top leadership practices and incidence rates. |
