Barriers to Developing a Safety Culture in the Opinion of Occupational Health and Safety Professionals

Objectives Identification of barriers to the development of a safety culture, determining their importance and detecting associations between them. Material and methods First, a critical and comparative literature analysis was used, followed by a quantitative empirical study. The quantitative analysis examined the frequency of occurrence as well as associations and connections between attributes. A survey was conducted on a sample of 105 people. Results It was found that the most common barriers to the implementation of safety culture in the literature are: (1) lack of leadership and commitment of management, (2) lack of commitment and disregard by employees and (3) lack of understanding by employees. On the other hand, practitioners indicated (1) lack of leadership and commitment of management, (2) problems with communication and (3) lack of commitment and disregard by employees as the most important barriers. Therefore, two of the three most important barriers are the same in both cases and concern people: management on the one hand, and employees on the other. Conclusions A characteristic triad of barriers to developing a safety culture has been identified. In this way, a model approach to the problem was proposed. Understanding them and striving to eliminate them will allow for a more effective shaping of this area of organizational culture.