Definition of near miss

[Tony]

Ultimately any repoerting system must be fairly straight forward, easily completed and consistant. If your workers know it is for their betterment/safety/ improvement, most things will get reported. Be realistic and understand some things will slip through the cracks, but not the major ones.

There needs to be results from reporting, from policy changes, new/better equipment, training and the like. Else it just seems an exercise in futility.

Don't get stuck on the negative, report successes and wins as well. Talk about what went well and why. Success deserves repetition. Repetition forms habits.

Sounds to me as if you are on a good track. After many trys I have found thee are no silver bullets, just opportunities to try again, better than the last time.

Tony

 

[Jem4417]

I work in the field still but am on the saftey committee and am pretty social so I stress that even if we don't document it we can just have a conversation and figure out where things began to go wrong. I really want to get detailed about climbing, cutting and rigging techniques and not so much the little brain farts even though those can lead to serious issues as well.

 

[treehumper]

It needs to be made clear what the intended outcomes are for the information reported. Until that happens it will be left to the workers to form an opinion and that will usually be negative. Be clear that the point of reporting is to develop teachable moments or identify training needs, work process modifications, etc..., not to allocate blame or responsibility.

I feel that any time something happens that was unexpected or that wasn't the intended outcome it needs to be reported to the extent that it can be evaluated and lessons can be drawn from it. Trends can be identified, processes can be assessed and if found lacking, re-engineered. Take a felling situation in an open area with no targets, human or otherwise. The feller intends it to fall in a given direction but it veers to one side unexpectedly. No harm, no foul, no report? To review that scenario may help to uncover something in the cutting technique, or planning stage. That's one of those cases where it could lead to an accident or damage when there is less room for error.

Most importantly, no blame, complete objectivity and allow the feedback be constructive.

 

[Jem4417]

It needs to be made clear what the intended outcomes are for the information reported. Until that happens it will be left to the workers to form an opinion and that will usually be negative. Be clear that the point of reporting is to develop teachable moments or identify training needs, work process modifications, etc..., not to allocate blame or responsibility.

I feel that any time something happens that was unexpected or that wasn't the intended outcome it needs to be reported to the extent that it can be evaluated and lessons can be drawn from it. Trends can be identified, processes can be assessed and if found lacking, re-engineered. Take a felling situation in an open area with no targets, human or otherwise. The feller intends it to fall in a given direction but it veers to one side unexpectedly. No harm, no foul, no report? To review that scenario may help to uncover something in the cutting technique, or planning stage. That's one of those cases where it could lead to an accident or damage when there is less room for error.

Most importantly, no blame, complete objectivity and allow the feedback be constructive.

Agree completely. When do you find repercussions should be handed out for incidents? Would that depend on severity, or carelessness or repeat offenses? I'm sure there are a many variables on how and when to issue write ups or suspensions. Or do you or anyone find this negative reinforcement to be ineffective

 

[SomethingWitty]

Grandma scared me several times in that vid! Thought for sure she was going to get bonked on her head. One of my favorites is Bob Villa ... another one who doesn't know squat about felling trees ... watch his cuts & compare them to the fall direction ...

That was so terrible... no hat. Why the hell did he angle all 3 cuts?!

That wasn't a large tree, but it wasn't small enough that inexperienced fellers should just jump on it because bob villa said it's no big deal.

 

[treehumper]

Agree completely. When do you find repercussions should be handed out for incidents? Would that depend on severity, or carelessness or repeat offenses? I'm sure there are a many variables on how and when to issue write ups or suspensions. Or do you or anyone find this negative reinforcement to be ineffective

The repercussions are training or mentoring first, second and third. Fourth, if they're making progress even haltingly. That's driven in part by the reality of the labor market. Re-evaluating their job as well. Is it the best fit for their skillset? Job modification is a useful tool and can improve overall team performance. Through this the direct manager needs to observe and discern reasons for a lack of development. The mgr needs to be able to justify their conclusions and recommendations based on those observations. If there is clear behavioral components then it needs to be addressed. This means delving into what the underlying issues may be.

Running a business means managing people at their best and worst. Sure, you shouldn't need to be their parent but you do need to be their coach. By developing your people you will build loyalty and a commitment to do their best. However, you'll also see when someone may not be willing to grow or change.

Negative consequences are mostly punitive and only serve to reinforce negative behavior or attitudes. Does a write up in and of itself really lead to change? It could if it is primarily documenting the discussion and action plans for improvement. Suspensions, IMHO, are useless. Taking a day's pay out of someone's pocket but giving them the time to go make some money on their own fails on so many levels. Might as well turn them over your knee and get the belt out. Same concept.

The point of the reporting is to uncover the real problems so those can be addressed. Was it carelessness? If so, then why? Are they fatigued due to their personal lives (babies, second job, parents, partying, sporting activities, financial load, etc...) Is it the workload or other process related issues? Weather related issues such as cold, heat, humidity?

Managers need to manage their people through coach, mentoring, training, counselling, troubleshooting, problem solving and most of all objective non-threatening communications.

 

[Jem4417]

The repercussions are training or mentoring first, second and third. Fourth, if they're making progress even haltingly. That's driven in part by the reality of the labor market. Re-evaluating their job as well. Is it the best fit for their skillset? Job modification is a useful tool and can improve overall team performance. Through this the direct manager needs to observe and discern reasons for a lack of development. The mgr needs to be able to justify their conclusions and recommendations based on those observations. If there is clear behavioral components then it needs to be addressed. This means delving into what the underlying issues may be.

Running a business means managing people at their best and worst. Sure, you shouldn't need to be their parent but you do need to be their coach. By developing your people you will build loyalty and a commitment to do their best. However, you'll also see when someone may not be willing to grow or change.

Negative consequences are mostly punitive and only serve to reinforce negative behavior or attitudes. Does a write up in and of itself really lead to change? It could if it is primarily documenting the discussion and action plans for improvement. Suspensions, IMHO, are useless. Taking a day's pay out of someone's pocket but giving them the time to go make some money on their own fails on so many levels. Might as well turn them over your knee and get the belt out. Same concept.

The point of the reporting is to uncover the real problems so those can be addressed. Was it carelessness? If so, then why? Are they fatigued due to their personal lives (babies, second job, parents, partying, sporting activities, financial load, etc...) Is it the workload or other process related issues? Weather related issues such as cold, heat, humidity?

Managers need to manage their people through coach, mentoring, training, counselling, troubleshooting, problem solving and most of all objective non-threatening communications.

Okay so I get what your saying. And I agree with your approach. You have to unpeel the employee with questions to find what the issue was underneath just the physical infraction. I'm not going to be able to dissect your detailed reply as appreciative as I am for your response. But for example what if you have a 15 year employee who is considered an ace who decides their able to drop a tree instead of climb it. Lines are set with appropriate pulling power, wedges are out, stick trick used, notch is on point and back cut is lined up. He does a job briefing is totally confident and the tree takes a turn and ruins a deck or cause some sort of significant damage. The employee understands all the ins and outs of tree felling already there's not much he can be instructed on but he made a judgement call and was wrong. I believe as an example to the rest of your employees by invoking disciplinary actions such as suspensions you display that your responsible for your decisions and their are consequences to consider. And please don't think I'm the type of person who wants to go right to the stick when someone messes up. Just interested in opinions on this topic

 

[Frax]

Building a culture where talking about events that didn't go as planned (a near miss) and where employees can even recognize a near miss for what it is will take some work.

The true doofuses of the tree world woop and holler with misplaced manly pride because they got away with some high drama and no one got hurt in spite of the screwup.
A competent tree worker can look at a situation like that and recognize it for what it was, a failure that you just happened to luck out on.
Even further, a real professional can look at an unexpected outcome that might even look good to someone not trained, and recognize it for what it was, a failure.
Unplanned outcomes are rarely the result of a single shortcut or bad call. It's usually a series of small missteps.
Build a culture where noticing these chains of events is a matter of professional pride and situational awareness, not finger pointing and squealing.

Sent from my SAMSUNG-SM-G930A using Tapatalk

 

[Jem4417]

Building a culture where talking about events that didn't go as planned (a near miss) and where employees can even recognize a near miss for what it is will take some work.

The true doofuses of the tree world woop and holler with misplaced manly pride because they got away with some high drama and no one got hurt in spite of the screwup.
A competent tree worker can look at a situation like that and recognize it for what it was, a failure that you just happened to luck out on.
Even further, a real professional can look at an unexpected outcome that might even look good to someone not trained, and recognize it for what it was, a failure.
Unplanned outcomes are rarely the result of a single shortcut or bad call. It's usually a series of small missteps.
Build a culture where noticing these chains of events is a matter of professional pride and situational awareness, not finger pointing and squealing.

Sent from my SAMSUNG-SM-G930A using Tapatalk

Hey frax little confused if you were responding to my post before this or near misses in general. But I'll agree to disagree on mistakes being a series of missteps because in my experience the first misstep is the beginning of a snow ball that keeps building mistakes that leads to an incident. So what I'm saying is even though you could say you went wrong in a couple ways there is a root cause that started it all

 

[SomethingWitty]

Building a culture where talking about events that didn't go as planned (a near miss) and where employees can even recognize a near miss for what it is will take some work.

The true doofuses of the tree world woop and holler with misplaced manly pride because they got away with some high drama and no one got hurt in spite of the screwup.
A competent tree worker can look at a situation like that and recognize it for what it was, a failure that you just happened to luck out on.
Even further, a real professional can look at an unexpected outcome that might even look good to someone not trained, and recognize it for what it was, a failure.
Unplanned outcomes are rarely the result of a single shortcut or bad call. It's usually a series of small missteps.
Build a culture where noticing these chains of events is a matter of professional pride and situational awareness, not finger pointing and squealing.

Sent from my SAMSUNG-SM-G930A using Tapatalk

That was very well said. I have both been the one excited about and seen the celebration of luck-saved jobs.
I do have to say that it seems to downplay one of the greatest differences between a greener tree worker and a more seasoned one: the ability to actually guess what will happen if something doesn't go as planned as well as the likelihood that the step in question will do what you want with what amount of effort. Knowing the difference between "It will probably work, and if it doesn't it will cost us a few minutes" and "This will probably work, but if it doesn't it will rip the power lines down" is very important.
I tell my guys our plan b as I set up for a cut pretty often. If plan b isn't an option, we set up so that there is no doubt even if it probably would have been fine.

 

[treehumper]

The employee understands all the ins and outs of tree felling already there's not much he can be instructed on but he made a judgement call and was wrong. I believe as an example to the rest of your employees by invoking disciplinary actions such as suspensions you display that your responsible for your decisions and their are consequences to consider

We live a job of informed, educated, seasoned, guessing. So, in this scenario, as my instructor, Mangoes, would say, you have a teachable moment. What he, or she, can be instructed on is reviewing a failed operation to identify the variables that may have been missed or missread.

Turning this into a situation to be made an example of serves what purpose? What is the lesson then? Being responsible for your decisions? What of all the decisions that went before this that led to them being described as an "ace"? How many times did those save the company money and increase profitability on the job? Were they held responsible for that and appropriate consequences considered or was that treated as just another day? Suspension in my estimation and experience leads to resentment not some sort of epiphany that they just have to be better employees.

As the manager, it becomes imperative that these situations be reviewed, debriefed and process improvements identified for the individual to gain from the experience. They will do much more to improve their performance than simply being "disciplined". However, this is not to say to forget that it happened. Another aspect of managing is observing your crew and being alert to behavioral changes or trends that can suggest something is impeding their work ability. Say from this example, that they continue to make poor decisions or leave things to chance or haven't seemed to modified their work approach to adapt the learning from the previous incident. Then there is grounds for intervention on your part. Conduct a meeting with them to discuss your concerns and learn from them what they feel is at issue.

This can lead to open candidate communications that will help in dealing with performance related problems without having to use disciplinary actions. I believe, without looking back, I laid out a 4 step process if the problems persist. In the end, it leads to a mutually accepted outcome.

We are all falling forward, we sometimes just need someone to help us up to keep going and improving.

 

[Jem4417]

Very well put. So you believe there is never a need for suspending an employee for a performance incident? So if an employee who is an asset but continues to show poor performance even after you communicate with them what is your next step? This industry isn't filled with angels and management has to put up with certain personalities that are natural for the conditions of our work. So if I have an employee who displays great skill but takes a chance with an overconfident attitude why wouldn't disciplinary action be useful. There's only so much that talking can do at a certain point. The integrity of the company is at stake and the liability of men with a cowboy attitude needs to be dealt with so they know that that mindset will not be tolerated. The cowboys can make tons of production but isn't it their decision how to do the work? Management doesn't send employees out saying your not allowed to fell big trees. Or rig this way or rope that way. They pay skilled employees to, who can pick twenty different ways to do a tree each being safer but long or shorter but riskier. So if they decide to go the riskier route and fail it essentially is on them...please realize I'm not even in management but I have hopes to be and the company I am at now shows zero negative reinforcement contrary to my former employer who had no problem with suspending people for performance. The latter being one of the larger tree services in the world. And I know that I made lots of decisions to be over cautious for the larger tree service because I knew even after the conversation to find root causes there would be consequences.

 

[SomethingWitty]

Very well put. So you believe there is never a need for suspending an employee for a performance incident? So if an employee who is an asset but continues to show poor performance even after you communicate with them what is your next step? This industry isn't filled with angels and management has to put up with certain personalities that are natural for the conditions of our work. So if I have an employee who displays great skill but takes a chance with an overconfident attitude why wouldn't disciplinary action be useful. There's only so much that talking can do at a certain point. The integrity of the company is at stake and the liability of men with a cowboy attitude needs to be dealt with so they know that that mindset will not be tolerated. The cowboys can make tons of production but isn't it their decision how to do the work? Management doesn't send employees out saying your not allowed to fell big trees. Or rig this way or rope that way. They pay skilled employees to, who can pick twenty different ways to do a tree each being safer but long or shorter but riskier. So if they decide to go the riskier route and fail it essentially is on them...please realize I'm not even in management but I have hopes to be and the company I am at now shows zero negative reinforcement contrary to my former employer who had no problem with suspending people for performance. The latter being one of the larger tree services in the world. And I know that I made lots of decisions to be over cautious for the larger tree service because I knew even after the conversation to find root causes there would be consequences.

A bad call and negative results can be very humbling.
That leaves a window where the ego is not in the way as much as it usually is.

I've been approached in a serious, but understanding, way after making mistakes like that. It works.
There is a certain amount of willingness to accept that they are not perfect on the worker's part that is absolutely required, but it's not hard for most of us.
If you can't talk to them and figure out exactly what they did and what they should have done and get them to say they'll do better next time (and mean it) then you don't need them on your job site.

 

[treehumper]

In the case of a lack of development and continued risky choices then take whatever steps you need in order to escalate toward termination. It depends on whether you're unionized, "at will" state, or whatever the company policy is. Typically, a first step is a verbal warning, That could be the first time you speak with them regarding an incident. Note it on their file. Next may be written training plan to modify work processes with specific objectives and timelines to be met. Next time, final written warning with further monitoring, training and timelines to meet with a review at that point to determine if they have improved and should continue with the company. If they do repeat on the fourth occasion it's termination.

It's not punitive but a severing of the work relationship to the mutual benefit of both. They can move on to a more appropriate employer and you can hire someone who will fit the organization better.

 

[hatchetation]

A bad call and negative results can be very humbling.
That leaves a window where the ego is not in the way as much as it usually is.

Yes! And, orgs that push employees towards defensiveness and Cover Your Ass maneuvers can get in the way of this happening.

My day job is in tech where a lot of companies believe in a concept called blameless postmortems. It's all too easy to pin blame on human error and stop there when the org and everyone in it could learn so much more from the incident. There's no wisdom in the second kick of a mule.

"A funny thing happens when engineers make mistakes and feel safe when giving details about it: they are not only willing to be held accountable, they are also enthusiastic in helping the rest of the company avoid the same error in the future. They are, after all, the most expert in their own error. They ought to be heavily involved in coming up with remediation items."

https://codeascraft.com/2012/05/22/blameless-postmortems/
https://www.cms.gov/Medicare/Provider-Enrollment-and-Certification/QAPI/downloads/FiveWhys.pdf

There's something very cathartic about having a well-known constructive path forward when you know you've screwed the pooch. It's not about avoiding blame, it's about owning up to it and feeling comfortable doing so because the company has a genuine curiosity about WHY it happened.