Breaking Down Barriers: How Prioritizing Mental Health Creates a Healthier Workplace

Hilary Framke:

Hello listeners, we’re back for another episode of Elevate EHS. I’m your podcast host Hilary Framke and I’m joined here today by Steve Tucker. Hi Steve. 

Steve Tucker: Hey Hilary, great to be with you. 

Hilary Framke:

Thank you so much for taking the time out of your busy schedule to join me for this. I am so excited. So why don’t we start by giving our listeners an idea of your EHS career to date? Tell us what key trends you’ve observed over the course of your career and specifically how things are going now. 

Steve Tucker:

Yeah, thanks again for having me. I’m excited to talk about this important subject. So I work as the Global Director for Security, Health and Safety for what is now Suntory Global Spirits. Just a few months ago we were called Beam Suntory, so a little bit of a shift there. But Suntory is our parent company out of Japan. But I’m based in Louisville, Kentucky. A little bit about my history in EHS. I lucked into it. I didn’t know I wanted to be an EHS professional. I had been working as a shift supervisor for a production company that made plastic soup bowls and was in that role for about 16 months. And some wonderful leaders came to me one day and said, Hey, we’ve got an opening as an EHS manager. We think you’d be great at it. And naturally I turned it down, right? I said, nope, I don’t want to do that. That’s not for me. And I left it there. The next day the VP of the company approached me and said, Hey, I heard you weren’t interested in this role. I just wanted to make sure you knew it’s not likely that there’s going to be other opportunities. We think you’re ready for a step up role and we think you’ll be great at this role. And after some persuading I said, no, once again. This is where the luck comes in because I don’t think this happens very much but about a week later, that VP was back in town and my future boss who was in charge of the plant, they brought me in and said, I respect that you don’t want to do this, are you lacking confidence? Do you want to go in a different direction? And I said, can I be honest? I was 28 years old, fairly naive and young in my life. They said, we just want to understand where you’re coming from. And I said, I have been here for 16 months, and there have been 5 EHS managers. All 5 of them had been let go for various reasons. I honestly thought they were firing me by offering this promotion. Again, looking at naivety and not quite as aware as I am today of how things work. They assured me that, that wasn’t the case and that they thought I’d be great at this. After some persuasion and laughter, I eventually agreed to take that role. I didn’t even know that career existed 3 years before this. So it was very new to me . But I figured it out. So that was my introduction to EHS. I did that role for about 2 years. Then I was offered an opportunity to lead EHS at a multi site plant. We made pizza boxes and other things like that. And then went to another company that made cereal, worked for them as a regional role. And now here I am in this role, been here for about 8 years. It’s been a good journey. In fact, I think it’s 8 years today as a matter of fact. Yeah, how about that. It’s been a good 8 years. Beam Suntory, we make spirits around the world. We’ve got about 19 distilleries around the world that I have responsibility for and lots of manufacturing sites, warehousing.

Back to your first question about trends that I see in EHS, at least in the last 4 or 5 years. The first one that really comes to mind is emergency preparedness. I know this has been a thing forever but it feels like it’s bigger than it used to be, because we’re dealing with things like excessive storms. We’re dealing with more of a global world. So supply chain issues that used to occur in India maybe didn’t impact us the way they do today, even 10 years ago. So anything in that sort that might occur because of a hurricane in Saint Croix or a tornado here in Kentucky. They have pretty significant impacts on our business. We have lots of people working across our campuses. We have visitors who are coming to spend their day with us. We’re in charge of their well being. So if we get early alert notification for severe weather approaching that really helps us be better prepared to take care of our people. I think that’s a really emerging trend within our industry is how we prepare for emergencies, respond to those, and then have backup plans. I think artificial intelligence has been really a game changer. We’re not using it quite yet. We’re more in the learning phase, so we’ve got a lot of pilots. I’ll give you an example of the way that we hope to use it is, we can tie into our security cameras and we can watch the way that people move, bend, twist, turn, take risks, don’t take risks, cross roads. All kinds of ways that people interact on the day to day basis that we don’t have eyes on, unless there’s somebody sitting there, seeing it in that moment. So AI can actually observe those things and predict outcomes that would likely happen or help us see all of those near misses that never get reported. The challenge with AI is people are being watched, right? At least they feel like it. That’s where we’re more in a pilot phase. We’re working through those types of things so that we can get to a point where it doesn’t feel that blame. It doesn’t feel like it’s somebody.

Hilary Framke:

Like big brother. 

Steve Tucker:

Exactly. And of course, there’s 100 other applications you could use. But I think really, 10 years from now, that’s going to be a common place and that’s going to be helping us to really make decisions and predict behavioral patterns that we’re not able to do today. 

Hilary Framke:

You know what I dream about with AI? I dream of a time when you get on your platform and a little bubble pops up and says, have you noticed that ergonomic strains are up 20 percent in assembly on second shift? I also noticed that their training compliance is at 40 percent for that same group and they’re not conducting all the inspections that they’re required to do. Their inspection conformance is also low. Maybe is this something that you want to investigate further? And then you can hit yes. 

Steve Tucker:

Yeah.

Hilary Framke:

And then go dig into the data. Honestly, I don’t need it to predict what’s going to happen. I think we’re a long ways away from that. Certainly in accuracy, but I just want it to tell me what I should focus on, see things that are already present in the data that I don’t have the time to go extrapolate and get insightful information about. So I hope we’re not far away from AI being able to do something like that.

Steve Tucker:

Yeah, that’s entirely what we’re trying to do. Now, if you really want to scare people, there’s smart speakers that can tie into the AI. So if I saw you doing something, maybe you climbed a ladder and you missed a rung or you didn’t have 3 points of contact. I can set it up so that the speaker will actually tell you missed rung or 2 points of contact. So it can correct behavior within seconds but it’s scary, right? People don’t want that level of knowing that they’re being watched and their behaviors are being modified. That’s really what we’re trying to get to. So for me, it’s a comfort level and trying to really build that culture that people know the reason we’d like to use this is to protect you more than we’re able to today. And then to modify behaviors into those behaviors that we’d like to see more often than not so that the tools are there but the culture piece is still being built. And I think we’re probably a few years away from that, but it’s exciting. And just to have the data to your point would be a game changer, just to know all those near misses, all those things that we didn’t capture because it takes time to report and I could pull that up right away of how many people are crossing a crosswalk without looking one way, right? They’re just moving across or maybe a fork truck’s not stopping. So many applications we could use AI for. That’s pretty exciting. The next one I think is really important is psychological safety. Now we at Suntory Global Spirits chosen to lead this within our health and safety team. Many people might think of mental health first when we say that word psychological safety, but it’s a bit more than that. And the reason we’ve chosen to lead that within our group is to avoid that blame that HR kind of linked to it. But we’ve led a class called mental health first aid. And it’s really trying to empower our people with a skill set that will allow them to see a person in distress. And that could be a moment in time, or could be weeks and months in time or it could be even a diagnosis that’s yet to happen. And then it empowers those people with tools to either provide an ear, recommend self care ways to cope or help them get to professional care like a psychologist, a therapist, a counselor, a doctor, whatever it might be. And so far here at our company, we’ve gone through almost 260 people through that class. 

The feedback that I get instructing that class is incredibly positive. It really highlights to me how many people are craving the ability to talk about depression. They’re having a tough day. They lost a dog. Their parents are sick, whatever it might be and talk about that in a way that allows them to be more present in the workplace. If they’re comfortable talking about things outside of their life, then they can really focus on the risk that’s right in front of them while they’re at work. Instead of being distracted by all the stuff going on at home. Studies show that just the opportunity for me to say, Hilary, I’m struggling today. You got a minute? It helps me to say I can now focus on the moving equipment that’s right in front of me 2 feet away that could rip my arm off, right? So I think there’s a real opportunity to continue that mental health journey. To help people feel safe at work, that they’re not judged for any challenge they might have hidden or visible. But yeah really positive feedback and glad that we took that step to include that in our strategic plan for our company. I love that.

Hilary Framke:

So, this is so cool that your company has done something formal on this front because we have known for decades that human factors is a contributing factor in incidents. Distraction, frustration, tiredness, fatigue, right? This is what kind of created blame culture which for years that I think finally we’re realizing we’ve got to move away from. But I love that you are actually doing something formal as a response to human factors and to do some mental health first aid. An organization I work for actually formed them as a team, like mental health first aiders put their pictures up just like you did for an injury first response team these are people you can go to who are trained and you know how to have conversations, communicate, they know about services and resources. All the things that you said but just further into a team structure that they’re getting regular recurring meetings, even going as far a business that I work for brought a system on board called Headspace. I don’t know if you’ve ever heard of that. 

Steve Tucker:

Yeah.

Hilary Framke:

I love Headspace so much. So impactful and gave a license to each employee and then 2 additional licenses that they could give to whoever, the family member, friend, et cetera and you get free access to the system. It’s mindfulness. It’s conflict resolution. It’s meditation. Sleep health, help with your kids and dealing with emotions. As a business saying, we recognize that your mental health is important, and impacts your work. And we want you to be as healthy as you can, mind, body, and spirit. 

Steve Tucker:

Yeah, totally. A 100% aligned there. I am a pretty vulnerable leader. I share my own challenges. I knew I had something quote wrong with me as a young man. I knew I was all over the map. I didn’t have much consistency in my life and I had these temptations, these urges to be better. I knew something was challenging me that wasn’t a fight that other people had, but I didn’t know what that was, turned out to be bipolar disorder. And then at 45, the interesting flip to that is I had no idea I had anxiety. I just thought I was extremely motivated. I thought I was quick. I never was satisfied. I always wanted something more. Frankly, a lot of those things benefited me in my career. But I tell a lot of stories in the way that those 2 disorders have impacted my life, both in healthy ways and not so healthy ways. I talk about real struggles that I faced because I struggle with those things. One thing I have learned that I never expected to learn is people love to hear other people who are struggling because it normalizes that. I’ve probably taught 30 mental health first aid classes and I tell these stories throughout that class and there has not been one class where someone hasn’t come to me in tears either relating to me for sharing their story and saying, I totally get where you’re coming from or they share their own personal story about the loss of someone who died by suicide, or someone who struggled with PTSD, or someone who has a child with autism. And what I’ve learned, Hilary, is it’s far more common to have a disorder, a disease, a diagnosis than it is to just have a perfect looking life. But the scary thing about that is there is a survey from Harvard Business Review right at the middle of the pandemic and the survey asks, have you experienced a mental health challenge in your lifetime? And this was a survey of people older than 18. Now think about that question. Have you experienced a mental health challenge in your lifetime? Now a challenge might be loss of a dog, friend, loved one, marital problems, financial problems, you name it. It’s not a diagnosis. It’s not a disorder. 

Hilary Framke:

Yeah.

Steve Tucker:

Only 40% of people admitted anonymously that they’ve had a mental challenge. So it’s an awkward question. It makes you feel uncomfortable. And your natural reaction is there’s nothing wrong with me. I overcame all my challenges. As a person with bipolar disorder, I’ve overcome most of it. It really doesn’t impact my life that much anymore. It did when I was younger. Anxiety is far bigger of challenge to me than that was. But people hear bipolar disorder and they go, oh, that’s awful. I don’t know how you deal with that. So the more we talk about it, the less people have that reaction. And frankly, most people who have that reaction are of the people who are older than 55. Because they were taught to suppress that. We don’t talk about that much like we don’t talk about religion and finances and all those wonderful things. We’re trying to create an environment here where we talk about it and we embrace those differences and we start to see it’s way more common that you have something “wrong with you” then it is that you’re Mr and Mrs perfect all the time. That just doesn’t exist. We’ve been working pretty steadily at this for almost a year. I went through a certification process to be able to teach that class and that took about a year. And it’s been the most meaningful work I’ve done by far in the last year and a half. And to see the way people embrace it, talk about it, share it with me. There’s nothing more important than people sharing a personal moment with you. That’s the kind of culture we’re trying to build here. The way that we’re trying to empower our people to accept all of them and come to work in their whole self and not just 80% of themselves and leave that other 20% behind the doors at home.

Hilary Framke:

Yeah, Steve I commend you for your vulnerability, for your transparency. It takes a lot of courage to share these things about yourself. Thank you for your leadership. The role modeling. I too feel the same way. And this is the type of leader that I’ve been in my EHS career. I want it always to be about the truth, about what’s really going on not this flowery picture of we’re all doing so well in EHS today. No, it’s like there still are a ton of things that aren’t where they need to be and we need to continue to improve and to look at resources and look at ourselves and be willing to make changes. 

I just had a great episode where we were talking about change management and self improvement and how important that is. In order to even take a step in that pathway you have to be self aware and showing that to your teams and being willing to admit blind spots, being willing to admit, this is not something that I excel in. So if you also need help with this, I’m probably not the right one to go to. I’m still on my improvement journey, but I know someone who is good at it. And I want to connect you with them.

You have had so much success sharing the real experiences and whether that’s mentally or even in program implementation, to transition a little bit. Being willing to admit that this idea that we had failed. We learned a lot of things from this and now we know what approach we should take next. I want to proliferate fail fast and go and make progress culture. That’s another thing I hope to continue to see change because far too many EHS leaders are so afraid to make change.

Steve Tucker:

Yeah.

Hilary Framke:

I’m afraid to break a program that I know just isn’t working but that’s our management system or assessment process. It’s been that way for, 25 years. What do you mean? We need to start from scratch. Yeah, we need to start from scratch. No part of it is working. 

Steve Tucker:

There’s a layer of discomfort. I love seeing people uncomfortable, even in a moment because you get the real true genuine reaction and you start to see maybe a little bit of the depth of the culture. What’s underneath of it. I tell people all the time if you ever go with me, you’ll hear me tell employees I care about them. Some of them are ready to give me hugs and others are like, whoa that’s too much. I love that bit of being uncomfortable it reminds me when I first started this role I spent the better part of my first nine months walking our aging warehouses where we store the barrels inside and they were in bad shape, it scared me to death. I thought somebody’s going to die in one of these warehouses, or at very least, we’re going to have a serious injury. There was a gentleman that was part of our union who worked in those warehouses, and I asked what we thought would be 2 weeks turned into 6 months and he was with me almost every day and at the first couple of days, he and I were together a 6 to 8 hours a day walking through warehouses and he worked in those warehouses. So what does he care? You don’t want to be with me, and I started talking to him one day and he was short with me. He didn’t want to dive in. He wasn’t rude, but he was borderline and I called him out on it after the end of day 2. I said, Hey, have I done something to offend you? I got that immediate reaction of, Oh, I didn’t mean to do that. I’m so sorry. I’m not meaning to treat you that way. I’ve done this with you, meaning someone in my role 3 other times. And he goes, I feel like I’m wasting my time. And I said, as God is my witness. As long as I’m in this role, I’ll give you my word. I will not quit until we make these conditions better in these warehouses. He said, Steve, that’s exactly what they said. I thought here’s the battle I’m fighting is people don’t initially trust. They’ve been harmed in previous roles or people. Over time, I spent another few months with him and he started to see the authenticity that I actually cared to the point where he eventually became an evangelist, a full time EHS professional within our business, where he was leading a team of hourly employees in safety and he became the guy for warehouse safety. 

Hilary Framke:

You made an EHS Partner, Steve. You did it. 

Steve Tucker:

Exactly! He went from being a bit disbelieving, untrusting, in a good way. Nobody listened to him before. 

Hilary Framke:

He was a critic. Yeah. 

Steve Tucker:

He’s a critic and then he became an evangelist. That’s how we’re trying to build our people is show them we care, prove that we care, give them opportunities to be involved and then leverage that ownership that’s created from their expertise that’s built up over decades. It’s been a lot of fun to focus on that level of making people uncomfortable, cause I live in that space. I love being uncomfortable. I think that’s where the magic happens. Sometimes mental health is part of that discussion. It’s uncomfortable now, but I have this vision that it will be totally comfortable 3 years from now. But the more we talk about it, the more people are willing to dive in with us. 

Hilary Framke:

What I think is so transformative about that story you shared is the courage that you showed, because everybody experiences that. Many examples in my career of interactions with colleagues, frontline employees, senior executives that were negative that I felt they weren’t listening or they weren’t paying attention. I didn’t take the time to actually say, here’s how I think you were today. What’s up with that? Let’s have a conversation about that. Can you explain why this is how I feel like you’re responding to me? And that’s what’s so transformative about the story that you told. Is that you felt comfortable and had the courage to step up which is extremely impactful. Because I think people will take that then they’ll talk to some people about it. They’ll get some different points of view. Then they’ll come around like a couple of weeks later, or maybe never and they’ll hold a grudge for the rest of their career about this person that they feel like is not an EHS supporter and they just make a judgment about them and they never try again. But that’s such a missed opportunity, isn’t it?

Steve Tucker:

Would never have picked up on that. So I appreciate you even saying that. Let me go back to mental health because I spent the better part of my 15 to 23 years of age trying to be someone I wasn’t and trying to be who people wanted me to be. It was hard. You can imagine, it’s not like I was this bad person. I was a great person, but I wasn’t my authentic self. And the way I learned to deal with my bipolar disorder is to be brutally honest. That’s the only way that I’ve learned to have success with that. So for me, I don’t hear courage. I don’t hear bravery. It’s just me being me. And in a lot of ways thinking about disorders, disabilities or diseases, there are sometimes benefits when you find the right career. And I lucked into it, as I said earlier, but it’s a benefit. I love our people. I don’t have a problem telling them that but I feel like every injury we have is my fault. That’s like a clear cut symptom of anxiety. I take ownership of things that are not mine but no matter who it is, how it happened, I feel like I let them down. So that’s a lot to take on in day to day life. Now extend that out to other things. It can be a challenge, but in this career, it’s a real benefit because I feel such compassion and love for these people. I want them to have the best experience while they’re here. So in a lot of ways, those types of reactions of Steve took a lot of courage. I don’t see it at all. It’s just me being authentic, which is one of the traits I need to expel in order to deal with my disorder. So even I lucked into it, I have to wonder if there’s some higher power that kind of watched over me and said, Steve, this is where you’re going to have some success in life. And so the fit has been a good fit. I think the traits that people admire in my leadership it’s just who I am. I can’t change it or I’m going to struggle the way that I used to struggle.

Hilary Framke:

Thank you for sharing all of that. You can be a successful EHS leader and just be data driven. I’ve had leaders like that who just blow me away technically with what they know and how they can respond, how they can build strategy, the number side of things, all those kind of technical hard skills. And sure, you can have a certain level of success. But I feel the EHS leaders that have both the technical skill sets, as well as the empathetic skill sets of the soft skills, the deep care for employees and their businesses, those leaders blow you away. Any EHS leader who’s listening in, who wants and aspires to be that type of transformative leader, it’s probably the soft skills. 

Steve Tucker:

I agree. Those are the harder ones to teach. You can go to school and learn all the technical skills. The first thing I want in a leader is someone who relates to people, who has true empathy, compassion, altruism. I can teach the other stuff. And most cases, they’ve already got some of that in their book anyway. But the last thing I want is somebody to come in, have the best technical skills in the world, and not be able to show care for someone who’s just been injured. Start putting the blame on people that does more harm than it does good, even though they might be the world’s best auditor. So it’s a good balance to have. And I’m grateful, you know, we’re talking about trends just a few minutes ago, but I do think there’s a trend towards less technical while still having those technical skills, but then branching into those human factor pieces. I’d love to see that trend because a lot of times people look to safety as the culture builders. We’re building the culture. Notice I didn’t say safety culture, but culture for the whole company and so you have to have that soft skill. And if people don’t think you care about them, you’re never going to drive the needle in the right direction. 

Hilary Framke:

No, I totally agree. One of my favorite phrases that I used in my career. I’m looking for empathetic project managers.

Steve Tucker:

Love it.

Hilary Framke:

Because you have to have both. I’ve had EHS professionals who are amazing on the soft skill side, very empathetic, very caring. They walk the floor, but not action oriented. So they struggle to actually push things over the finish line and to create a strategy. That also can be a huge inhibitor in being successful. The story you told with the warehouse leader. I’ve been told this how many times, that they’re gonna come in and they’re gonna fix this and it never happens. So you do need to have the balance. I agree with you. I can overlook some gaps in technical proficiency as long as you’re willing to learn. But it’s very hard to teach the soft skills to someone who’s very far from where we need them to be leadership wise.

Steve Tucker:

Most leaders my age and older started out the way I did. We didn’t have any technical skills really. I learned it all on the job. I didn’t have a degree program when I started, but now most of our people that we’re hiring have full fledged 4 year degrees, if not master’s degrees in the field, Occ Safety, Environmental Management. So the technical skills to me is far less worrisome. I expect them to have that and if they don’t, we’ll fill the gaps in. Working in our industry, there’s going to be some gaps because you can’t find some of these hazards the way we do. It’s unique to us and same thing exists in automotive and chemical. We can teach those gaps. 

Having that altruism and that compassion for people is really becoming more common than it used to be. I used to think it was very lacking and I used to feel very unique. Look at me, I’m good at this. I’m not as good at that technical piece, but I’m good at this. Now it seems like we’re creating these all stars who get both sides of it, which is great to see. So I think we’ll continue to see that be more of a trend within our career. 

Hilary Framke:

Awesome. I’ve got a question for you. So in a situation where you are working for a business that has a real blame culture as it relates to injuries and environmental issues. It’s the employee did this. This comes back to the employee didn’t know or the employee made a bad decision. How do you navigate that situation and changing that mindset into more of a process gap.

Steve Tucker:

Yeah, good question. I think first and foremost, it’s a human nature. It’s in our DNA to find a problem and a solution, right? Here’s how I fixed it. So our natural reaction, this is the gospel of Steve, someone gets injury our first reaction is, who’s at fault? Why did it happen? And the interesting part of that is we’re usually looking for a singular excuse or a singular cause, not the layers of cause that contributed to that. When I hear that question, I think about an injury. I’ll give you some details of it because I think it’s a great example. And this happened earlier this year. Actually early spring day, it was like 60 degrees outside, which is hot here. Plus you add the ambient heat that comes from equipment. Let’s call it 80 degrees inside that facility and when you’re used to 50, 80 feels like 95. Employee was hot. So they have an overhead fan that you have to pull the string in order to turn it on. So this wonderful employee who’d been with us for 20 plus years in the same so very trained very up to date on how to work in this area. They walked about 50 feet out of the way to get a 5 gallon bucket and they stood on that bucket to pull down the cord that they couldn’t reach from the ground level and in the process the bucket gave way, they fell backwards, they hit their hand on some equipment, had a relatively minor cut. Now who’s to blame? Employee, right? That’s our first reaction. The employee did what they’re not supposed to do. Employee took bucket. Employee fell off bucket. Absolutely. A clear cut. Employee did the wrong thing. I’m not even going to argue that. I totally agree with you. The employee should not have done that. Given the fact, this is a true story. We’ve got all this on video. There was a 3 step ladder that’s approved. Literally within 5 feet of where she was. She walked farther out of the way to get the bucket than she did the ladder that was right there. On the other side of her was a 3 step portable like a push ladder that you can move. So within, let’s call it 8 feet, I’m being generous, on each side of her were 2 options that were better than the one option that she chose. Now, let’s go back even further. Why didn’t we have that pull cord powered at ground level? 

Hilary Framke:

Yeah, or extended.

Steve Tucker:

And why another layer to this, another employee, this is the thing that bothered me most about this whole incident. Another long term employee was standing right next to her watching her do it which bothered me more than anything, because I would hope if the employee well intentioned as they are said I’m going to use this, the other one would say, hold up. Yeah, so a myriad of failures here, right? Certainly not one employee did the wrong thing that I wouldn’t even argue that. So the next step to that is how would we treat that employee? We could stop the investigation right there or we could dive into the layers and figure out why did the employee not use the tools that were provided for them? Why wasn’t it wired permanently at ground level? Why wasn’t the fan better positioned in the first place? Why is the temperature high even to begin with? Why did one employee feel like it was safe to watch the other one do something wrong? There’s so many layers to this, but ultimately we could have stopped that employee did the wrong thing, right? Assuming all that the employee admitted, I shouldn’t have done that. Again, I could stop right there or I could even punish her further. She’s already been injured. 

We could discipline. We could depending on where that was in the disciplines, it could even be termination but there’s no care in that. And it’s not egregious. It’s not like this is the worst thing anybody’s ever done but there’s something inherently wrong with our system and our culture where that was an accepted behavior. And so we worked pretty hard to get through the layers and understand all of the pieces that might contribute to a decision like that. Because ultimately, I see it as a decision. The decision not to take extra $1,000 at max to wire that at ground level. Maybe we didn’t even see it. That’s okay. Why didn’t we identify that hazard in the first place? Why didn’t they report that at a different time? Why didn’t our near miss program work? 

Hilary Framke:

Why aren’t we monitoring heat in the area to make sure it’s not uncomfortable for our employees? Or should be automated that the fans come on after a certain amount of heat exposure?

Steve Tucker:

Yep. Yep. So many layers to this that I could stop with blame at the employee and discipline and call it a day, but that’s not the culture we’re trying to build. And so what we choose to do is involve that employee in the process of that investigation. We hope that they will be willing to talk about it right to their peers, maybe a shift kickoff meeting. Here’s what we did to improve it. Even if all we’re doing is focusing on the improvement. But if we fixate on one employee’s actions and their role, it really ignores the larger systemic problems. And it’s okay to have problems. 

You will find them. Hilary, you come here today to our plant and do an audit. You’re going to find something that we have not seen. Good on you. I’m proud of you for doing it and we’ll get better because of it, but I can’t sit here and pretend that the employee is the problem. In most cases, as much as I hate this, they’re trying to do the right thing. Almost always employees trying to do the right thing, whether that results in no injury or the most severe injuries, they’re usually trying to do the right thing in the wrong way sometimes. But 99.9 percent of the time they do it the right way, at the right pace, with the right amount of care, with the right focus, and we rarely reward them for that. So we try to balance that out, recognize opportunities to reinforce positive behaviors that we want to see, and then trying to dive into the layers so the employee feels a part of the process and not the problem. 

Hilary Framke:

Yeah, totally agree. And I think something that so often gets overlooked with this blame culture with incidents is this can be a poison, such a toxicity for our culture and our business. Because for sure, someone else has climbed up on a 5 gallon bucket to do something else at some other time in place. And just because they didn’t fall off, nothing happened to them. Because someone didn’t report it, nothing happened to them. But for sure, it has happened before. And now if we blame this employee because it was reported because they got hurt. And they got into the EHS system and we discipline them for this. What does that say about us? What does that say about our business? That when you get hurt, now you’ll doubly be hurt by having discipline. You’re already embarrassed. There were so many things she’s already going through in her head and she’s hurt. So she hurt her body, minor or not. It’s still traumatic in its own way for what occurred. So now we’ve just piled on. And if you let that employee go, you lose everything in that tenure. The culture, the process knowledge, the quality knowledge and you’ve got to start from scratch with someone that you don’t even know is going to be good fit for the culture, for the process. This is a mistake unless it’s egregious and this employee has gone out of their way to break a rule. It’s repetitive. They’ve been a problem multiple times. We’ve got history and documentation of that. Going and naming the employee and disciplining the employee is not going to help your business long term.

Steve Tucker:

Yeah. In my experience, everywhere I’ve ever worked at that person who’s egregious is extremely rare. I think back to risk and identifying risk. We get about 8,000 hazards reported a year from our frontline employees. 8,000 that’s a lot. That’s 8,000 potential injuries. And in fairness, let’s call 7,500 of them relatively minor. But we get 600 or so extremely solid reports every year that we probably wouldn’t have found on our own unless we had the time to dig into it and really be proactive. We get that many if we have that culture of discipline when you do something wrong. 

Hilary Framke:

It has been an honor to have you on my podcast. Thank you so much for being a guest and for your vulnerability, the things that you shared, your insights. I think it’s things we don’t talk about enough. So thank you for coming on my platform and being willing to share. 

Steve Tucker:

No, I’m really happy to be here and I appreciate the invite. I’m happy to come back anytime. Appreciate the time, Hilary. Great to be with you.

Hilary Framke:

Absolutely. To you as well. Bye listeners.