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Coronavirus & Building a Safety Culture

If you want to build a safety culture, you need to focus on norms.  Forget your rules.  Establish a zero-tolerance norm for unsafe behaviors.  Make unsafe behaviors so socially unacceptable that no one would ever consider taking too much risk. 

Safety is Freedom From Risk

Why Safety is Freedom From Risk? If you’ve ever attended one of the thousands of talks I’ve given on safety and risk you know that I’m a fanatic for the definitions of certain words. I spend a lot of time discussing the definitions of key words such as safety, risk, exposure and accidents. Until we all agree on […]

Where Does Safety Start?

So where does safety start?  Any company in operation today assumes a certain amount of risk, and that is the first question any safety manager asks. Whether it’s a trucking or office supply company, there is always some amount of danger involved. Now clearly, driving a truck has a lot more inherent risk than selling […]

What is Self-Directed Learning?

Can One Teach Oneself? Perhaps not, but people can learn by themselves, given the right tool. Avatar creates tools that teach people how to teach themselves. Many ways to learn: Sit in a classroom and learn from an instructor. Read a book and picture it in your mind. Watch a video demonstration and try it yourself. […]

Unsafe Behaviors ARE Your Choice

I bet there are hundreds, or even thousands of people celebrating their wedding anniversary today. I’m celebrating an anniversary of sorts as well. Twenty-seven years ago today I was forced, by a hit-and-run driver, head-on into the path of a 26,000 pound Peterbuilt tri-axle dump truck. Obviously I survived, but trust me when I say […]

Avatar Question and Answer Guide

What does Avatar do? Avatar produces custom outcome-based HR processes that you can use to improve the performance of your people.  Our deliverables help you: Find and hire best-fit employees Align, train, educate and develop their knowledge and skills Inspire, lead and support their performance Are you consultants? Yes and no.  We usually begin engagements with […]

Why Change Is So Difficult

4 feet, 8.5 inches – Why Not Change? The standard gauge of North American railroad beds is 4 feet, 8.5 inches. That’s an exceedingly unusual dimension. Why in the world would our entire railroad system have such an unusual specification?  Why not four feet, or a nice even five feet? Essentially, why not change?  The truth […]