Building a strong process safety culture is about more than just rules and regulations; it is about nurturing a shared commitment to responsibility and accountability within every team member.
This paper explores what process safety culture means for new professionals seeking to understand its core principles and how they can personally contribute. It will break down the essentials, or “ABCs,” of process safety culture, covering topics about process safety culture, benefits of a strong process safety culture, and characteristics of a strong versus weak culture.
Establishing an effective process safety culture is critical to your organization's success. With it, you can prevent catastrophic incidents, fatalities, major property damage, and loss of public trust. Without it, you could face injuries or fatalities, years of litigation, a total shutdown of operations, and millions of dollars in losses.
Achieving an effective process safety culture requires management commitment, regular employee participation, routine safety dialogues, and access to training and information.
Process safety culture has many definitions, and they continue to evolve. In 2007, The Center for Chemical Process Safety (CCPS, 2007) defined it as “the combination of group values and behaviors that determines the manner in which process safety is managed. A sound process safety culture refers to attitudes and behaviors that support the goal of safer process operations.” Then in 2018, an Essential Practices book on process safety culture was written by CCPS with a new, expanded definition. The book's team determined that the first definition did not make it clear that the goal of a strong process safety culture was to prevent incidents. The new definition states, “The pattern of shared written and unwritten attitudes and behavioral norms that positively influence how a facility or company collectively supports the successful execution and improvement of its Process Safety Management System, resulting in preventing safety incidents.”
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