HRM: Safety Culture and HRM Functions Implementation at Bruno Smallgoods

This document defines safety culture and discusses the implementation of multiple HRM functions at Bruno Smallgoods to address safety issues. It also includes references to support the discussion.

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Student’s Name
University Name
Author’s Note

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Question 2- Define the term ‘safety culture’
The term, safety culture originated in the year 1986 during the nuclear explosion at
Chernobyl. The International Safety Advisory Group used the term poor and unhygienic
safety culture for the identification of the factors that contributes to workplace accidents. The
safety culture can be defined as the ways that the issues related to safety are addressed at the
workplace. The term furthermore illustrates the beliefs, attitudes, values and perceptions that
are shared by the employees in connection to safety factors.
International Safety Advisory Group defined the term safety culture as the assembly
of the attitudes and the characteristics of an organization that initiates in establishment of
priority and safety plants for addressing the issues that receive the attention for their
importance. According to Cox and Cox (1991), the term safety culture reflects the
perceptions, attitudes, values and the beliefs that is being shared by the employees in
connection to the safety culture. Glendon and Stanton (2000) illustrated the term as the
compromising of the behaviours, attitudes, norms, personal responsibilities and human
resources featuring the development and training. As per the insight of Richter and Koch
(2004), the shared and the meanings of the learning, interpretation of work, experiences of
the safety and work that are expressed symbolically and partially guiding the action of the
people towards the accidents, risk and prevention of the safety culture. Furthermore as per the
insight of the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (2011), safety culture can be illustrated as the
behaviours and the core values that result from a collective commitment by the individuals
and the leaders towards the emphasizing of the safety over the competing goals towards the
ensuring of the protection of the individual and the environment of the organization. The
definition of the safety culture furthermore highlights a set of prevailing beliefs, values and
the indicators that the organization owns towards its safety culture.

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Question 4 - Recommendation of implementation of multiple HRM functions by Bruno
Smallgoods within the organization
The function of the human resource tends to be significantly different from the practises of
the HR. The HRM functions comprise of transactional activities that tend to handle in the house and
can be easily outsourced. Some of the essential HRM functions that Bruno Smallgoods must
implement in the organization targeting the poor attitude towards the safety among the front
line supervisors, staff and the middle management includes performance management
feedback system, system of knowledge sharing, fair evaluation system, open house discussion
together with the process of feedback mechanism and finally the most important, safe healthy
and happy workplace.
In context to the several examples in connection to the dangerous practices in the
organization including poor practices of manual handling, dangerous use of the forklifts, un-
safety barriers on the machine for speeding up the production process, it is essential for the
chief executive officer of the company to work for the effective development of a safe culture
among the organization.
It is thus important for both the management of the company and the staff to jointly
develop and implement an effective occupational health and safety program. One of the
important recommendation is to provide workers with instructions, information, training and
necessary guidelines together with the probable accidents that can happen for neglecting
health and safety factors (Grossmeier et al, 2016). The company should furthermore provide
and maintain protective devices, equipments and the clothing materials and ensure that they
are being used. It is also essential to identify the potential hazards through regular inspections
and encourage the workers of the company to express and come up with their concerns and
suggest any sort of improvement measures through the means of meetings, safety talks and
consultation with the representatives of the worker. It is thus recommended that the

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responsibility of the CEO of the organization to appoint supervisors who can investigate
unsafe working conditions and report to them for correction actions.

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References
Cox, S & Cox, T. 1991. The structure of employee attitudes to safety: an European example.
Work and Stress, 5, 93-106.
Glendon, A.I. & Stanton, N.A. 2000. Perspectives on safety culture. Safety Science, 34, 193-
214
Grossmeier, J., Fabius, R., Flynn, J.P., Noeldner, S.P., Fabius, D., Goetzel, R.Z. and
Anderson, D.R. 2016. Linking workplace health promotion best practices and organizational
financial performance: tracking market performance of companies with highest scores on the
HERO scorecard. Journal of occupational and environmental medicine, 58(1), pp.16-23.
Nuclear Regulatory Commission. 2011. Final Safety Culture Policy Statement. (NRC2010-
0282). Federal Register, 76, 34773-34778
Richter, A. & Koch, C. 2004. Integration, differentiation, and ambiguity in safety cultures.
Safety Science, 42, 703-722