Improving Safety in UK Construction

Part one: Rationale and aim of the research

The construction industry has been identified as one of the most hazardous industries across the globe (Finneran et al. 2012). Despite the hazardous nature of the construction industry, millions of people are employed by the construction industry; for example, over 2 million people with in the UK construction industry (Carmichael et al. 2016) making it among the UK’s largest industries. Over the recent past, the number of construction projects have significantly increased, which has attracted more labour into this industry (Mendeloff and Staetsky 2014). With this increase in the number of people working in the UK construction industry, fatalities and injuries among the workforce is increasing making the construction industry a considerable contributor to work-related fatalities (Smallwood and Emuze 2016). Injury and fatality figures proof that the UK construction industry is among the hazardous industries to work in. According to London Assembly (2015), among employees who have worked for more than 20 years in the UK construction industry, 6 out of 10 will suffer and major injury at work. In the year 2009/10, the construction industry accounted for 4% for all employees in the UK and 7% of the reported injuries to employees (Cooney 2016). Of the 7% employees that reported injuries, 27% were fatalities, 10% were major injuries, and 6% were over-three-days injuries (Cooney 2016).

Regarding occupational health, 4,100 out of every 100,000 employee in the UK construction industry will suffer work-related health problems (London Assembly 2015). These health hazards include noise, whereby 29% of all vibration white fingers occur in this industry and skin disease because about 10% of construction workers have been established to be allergic to cement (Sousa, Almeida and Dias 2014). Further, Boschman et al. (2012) write that the UK construction industry has the highest rate of musculoskeletal disorders that account for about 8% of major injuries, 26% of RIDDOR reported accidents, and 34% of three-day injuries. Despite the consistency at which the UK construction industry has reported high rates of fatalities and injuries, the achievements in health and safety at the Olympic Park were outstanding. The construction of the Olympic Park is the latest available non-fatal injury in the UK construction industry (Tramantano et al. 2015). The accident frequency rate at the Olympic park was 0.165, which is more than 4.5 times better the average of the UK construction industry (Finneran et al. 2012). The sheer scale of the achievement in terms of health and safety at the Olympic Park remains an example to be emulated for all construction projects in the UK. In light of the high accident frequency rate in the UK construction industry, we can conclude that health and safety remains an issue of major concern. However, the construction of the Olympic Park 2012 realised the lowest accident frequency rate, which implies the construction industry has valuable lessons to learn from the Olympic Park project. The ultimate aim of this study is to identify the measures that companies have put in place in order to prevent fatalities since the non-fatal injury achievement of the Olympic Park in 2012.

Part two: Literature review

The Olympic Park construction project employed about 40,000 people and not one fatality was recorded during the construction phase (Olympic Delivery Authority 2012). The accident frequency rate of this project has drawn the attention of many researchers to investigate the strategies that can be adopted by the companies in the UK construction industry in order to prevent injuries and fatalities. A significant number of these studies focus on the impact of effective safety communication during construction on workers’ attitudes, awareness and behaviour. From such studies, five themes are developed under which previous literature will be reviewed in this study.

Lead from the top

During the Olympic Park construction project, the leadership set standards and engaged the employees, which was aimed at motivating, directing and changing the behaviour to achieve long-term goals (Olympic Delivery Authority 2012). Tabassi et al. (2016) studied the nature of leadership in the construction industry. The results from the study indicated there is strong need for firms in the construction industry to invest more in leadership development programmes with an ultimate aim of building the professionalism of people in this industry. The results indicate that such leadership development programmes should incorporate general management and communication skills training. The leaders should also be taught to mentor their subordinates to ensure a shared vision. Another study conducted by Tabassi et al. (2016), state that leaders in the construction industry have a broad knowledge in technical skills and fewer non-technical skills especially in leadership. The study recommends leadership and communication skills training in the construction industry. In the same vein, Ozorhon, Abbott and Aouad (2013) state that effective leadership is one of the primary answers to the accident frequency rate problem of the construction industry. Opoku, Ahmed and Cruickshank (2015) state that the understanding of the construction leadership is somewhat primitive compared to leadership in other industries. The above studies stress the essence for construction companies in UK to adopt effective leadership from the top management. This study examines the extent to which leadership training and development has been embraced in the UK industry since the success of the Olympic Construction project.

Develop competent supervisors

The Olympic construction project emphasised the need for supervisors with interpersonal, technical, and communication skills in order to promote health and safety in the construction industry. According to Ogwueleka (2013), construction projects are labour intensive, which underscores the need for competent supervision. Awwad, Souki and Jabbour (2016) write that poor supervision of construction projects is among the leading factors associated with injuries and fatalities. Still, Jimoh et al. (2017) write that inadequate supervision can influence poor management of equipment, tools, and labour which affect the health and safety of employees. In exploring the importance of supervision in construction firms, Hale et al. (2012) established that supervision enhances staff development and equips employees with professional skills and knowledge to effectively do their work, which potentially lowers injuries and fatalities. Supervision also gives employees the opportunity to communicate, cooperate and coordinate with one another as a team which is associated with a reduction in injuries and fatalities. Hardison et al. (2014) state that supervisory works particularly in the construction industry have become very demanding and complex thus requires interpersonal and professional skills. In light of the above information, competent supervision in the construction industry is fundamental to health and safety. This study will investigate the extent to which firms in the UK construction industry have embraced competent supervision.

Foster an open and positive safety culture

According to the Olympic Delivery Authority (2012), workers must be able to communicate their problems without fear of reprisal. Employees that are assured of protection and care from the management are more likely to be engaged in the health and safety process. Biggs et al. (2013) write that to prevent fatalities in the construction industry, reactive and bad human attitude should be changed to proactive and positive culture, which can only be attained through involving workers in this industry. Li et al. (2015) identify the approaches to cultivating a safety culture and states that the behaviour-based approach, which identifies and modifies critical employee safety behaviour, is the most essential but its success depends of the ability of the organisation to involve employees. In order to realise a culture of safety, Zhang and Fang (2013) write that construction companies must help their employees understand the need of such culture, which goes along with respecting the voice of the workers even if it goes contrary to the will of the management. From this information, literature underscores the need for a positive and proactive safety culture in order prevents injuries and fatalities in the construction industry. However, it remains unclear the measures that these companies have taken in order to foster an open and positive safety culture. This study seeks to fill this gap.

Reward good behaviour

The Olympic Delivery Authority (2012), states that rewards and incentives play a pivotal role in encouraging safety-conscious behaviours such as reporting near misses. During the construction of the Olympic Park in 2012, positive feedback was the real reward, which boosted the morale of the workers to upholding good behaviour (Olympic Delivery Authority 2012). Marks, Awolusi and McKay (2016) write that near-misses among other high-risk situations potentially result to serious or fatal injuries if they are allowed to continue existing. In the same vein, Hinze, Thurman and Wehle (2013) write that collecting and analysing near-miss information is integral to prevention of injuries and fatalities in the construction industry. In most instances, workers are reluctant to report near-misses, which hinder the company’s ability to mitigate these risks (Hallowell et al. 2013). Therefore, rewarding those who report near-misses could go a long way in motivating workers to embrace this behaviour, which ultimately helps prevent injuries and fatalities. With such a worthwhile insight, this study explores the reward systems constructions firms in the UK have developed to motivate workers to report near-misses.

Review and learn

Based on the zero-fatality rate of the Olympic Park construction project, the Olympic Delivery Authority recommended that firms in the construction industry should continuously review any problems and communicate them across the organisation (Olympic Delivery Authority 2012). After the review, the lessons learnt should be used to promote safety and health of the workers in the organisation. A study on the importance of performing reviews in the construction industry states that at the end of every phase, a review should be held and the experiences of the project recorded with special attention to shortcomings and how they can be avoided in the following phases (Paranagamage et al. 2012). Similarly, a study conducted by Carrillo, Ruikar and Fuller (2013) emphasises the need for maintaining a review of every project a company completes and lessons identified in order to aid the process for continual improvement. McCabe (2014) recommends the use of reflective practice when conducting the reviews so that future projects are informed by past achievements and mistakes: this way, the organisation will be able to avoid the mistakes and maximise on the achievements. This reflective practice should be conducted by all staff in the organisation regardless their position. The reflective practice should also be conducted at the organisational/departmental level to promote progress at all levels of the organisation (Drupsteen, Groeneweg and Zwetsloot 2013). The need for reviewing and learning is adeptly covered in the literature but its applicability remains scantly covered. In view of this gap, this study seeks to establish the extent to which reviews are conducted in construction companies in UK.

Part three: Dissertation objectives and suggested approach

Objectives

The ultimate aim of this study is to explore the measures that companies in the UK construction industry have put in place in order to prevent fatalities since the non-fatal injury achievement of the Olympic Park in 2012. To attain this aim, the following objectives guide the study:

i. To identify the leadership training and development programmes adopted by firms towards effective leadership

ii. To identify the measures that companies have put in place to promote supervisor competency

iii. To map the actions of firms towards fostering an open and positive safety culture

iv. To explore the reward systems used by construction firms in motivating workers to report near-misses

v. To investigate the use of reflective practice and reviews by construction firms

Research methodology

This study will adopt the inductive research paradigm. The inductive research paradigm involves moving from specific observations to broader theories and generalisations (Woiceshyn and Daellenbach 2013). Plethora of literature has detailed that the lessons learnt from the Olympic Park construction project have influenced the strategies that organisations in the construction industry have adopted to prevent injuries and fatalities. However, it is not clear the measures that construction companies have adopted following the achievement of zero-fatality with the Olympic project 2012. In order to establish the exact measures that construction firms have put in place, this study will gather data from construction industries and develop a theory after analysis. According to Saunders et al. (2009), the inductive research paradigm has a greater ability to expand a researcher’s understanding of the problem under investigation: this informs the choice for the deductive research paradigm. The survey research strategy will be adopted for this study. The survey strategy is widely used by social scientist researchers in that it allows collection of large data sets over a short period of time (Bulmer 2017). The survey strategy also uses standardised data collection materials, which makes it easy to analyse the collected data (Fowler 2013). This simple analysis helps the researcher to identify the relationship between different variables under investigation. Further, the survey strategy allows the researcher to gain control over the study, which saves time and cost (Bryman 2017). For these benefits, the survey research strategy is prioritised in this study.

Purposive sampling will be used to select the study participants. According to Acharya et al. (2013), purposive sampling best works in cases where the study population is small and the researcher desires to select the most appropriate sources. Though the construction industry is among the largest industries in the UK, the objectives of this study require data to be collected from people at the management level. Therefore, purposive sampling was the most effective approach to sampling. A sample of 6 respondents will be used for this study. The researcher will identify and seek approval to conduct the study in three construction firms in the UK. In each company, two senior managers will be identified and their consent to be part of the study sought before data collection. With their consent and involvement, interview dates will be scheduled. Semi-structured interviews will be used as the data collection instrument. In this approach, the researcher will develop a list of questions to be asked but these should revolve around the study objectives (Mojtahed et al. 2014). The order in which the questions will be asked will vary across the study participants based on the flow of the conversation. The research will seek to acquire detailed information that comprehensively answers the research questions. Every interview session will take between 30 to 40 minutes unless the respondent has a very tight schedule. The interviews will be conducted on one-on-one basis and notes taken. Where this is not possible, the interview will be conducted over the phone and an audio recorded.

From the notes and the recorded audios, the researcher will identify recurrent themes and the information analysed under these themes. Therefore, data will be presented in the form of a themed discussion.

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