| Worksite safety programs in general and safety training in particular are predicated on the assumption that safety depends on effectively recognizing and responding to health and safety problems. While the corresponding physical hazards may be defined objectively, formulations of problems are embedded with subjective expectations and assessments of risk. Furthermore, other agendas besides safety promotion may shape the definition of problems and responses to them. This study investigates how hazardous waste workers come to define certain issues as problematic, especially how job characteristics, organizational dynamics and occupational identity An interpretive, qualitative research approach was used to investigate these issues. Twenty-nine workers involved in handling hazardous materials at eleven worksites were interviewed in person using open-ended questions about their work, their work relations and health and safety problems. Particular emphasis was given to eliciting workers' accounts of accidents and “near-misses.” Transcripts of the tape-recorded interviews were analyzed to identify typologies of problems and related themes, and then examine their associations with different characteristics of jobs and organizations.; Open communication, support from management and teamwork were found to be associated with a more proactive, systemic approach to identifying and responding to problems. Although occupational identity had not been part of the original analytical focus, it emerged as an important theme in determining which issues respondents considered problematic and their views of their own roles vis-a-vis these problems. Compared to workers basing their identities in professionalism or affiliation with their company or union, workers whose occupational identities related exclusively to the tasks they performed tended to define problems more narrowly as isolated events and blame the individuals involved in accidents. This broad, proactive approach to problems was particularly evident among workers who demonstrated multi-faceted “liminal” identities. The discussion of the findings concludes with a list of recommendations that organizations might adopt to facilitate more effective responses to health and safety problems, along with recommendations on improving and enabling more effective learning from accidents and near-misses. |
