What's Your Opinion: Have you observed generational differences in attitudes about safety at your organization?

Our plant, like most others, has employees in every age group from their late teens to their sixties and even seventies. In addition to generational differences, there are cultural differences. Our employees are from the US, Africa, and Indo-China. The latter two are largely immigrants. The Indo-China immigrants for the most part came shortly after the Vietnam conflict ended, whereas the African immigrants are more recent. It may be more related to age than generational group per se, but it seems to me that our older employees are more concerned with doing a good job, following the rules, and working with management than the younger ones. I am one of the older employees, and if I am honest with myself, I see that it is not my generation, but my age that makes me more dedicated. I suspect the rest of the 50s and 60s employees likewise were less dedicated when they were in their teens, 20s and 30s. The immigrants are also very different. Without being judgmental, I can see a dedication variance betwen the two groups, and that is reflected in how industrious they work, whether they are prompt or not for start times and breaks, and how they react to physical activity required to move materials. Individual differences compound all this, so I find there are about 300 different attitudes among the 300 employees when it comes to safety.

The last place I worked had 20 somethings up to people in their 60's. I was quite surprised to see the employees in their 20's were more interested in safety compliance than the older workers. The older workers had that old attitude about safety and it being a pain and slowed them down. The younger workers were hungry for knowledge and eager to comply. It really didn't matter what cultural heritage they had and where they came from. I spent my entire time there working to get everyone on the same page and looking at safety the same way. I made a difference but did not get the older group to buy off on it completely. They kept doing things when nobody was looking and I had no leadership support whatsoever. It was tough but it was enough to convinced me to leave. So, I have observed generational differences in attitudes about safety.

I have worked at my present location for nearly 34 years, the last being in a safety and training position. Over the years there has been a change in what is accepted and the attitude towards a lot of issues. Some of that is normal as we age, but the younger version of technicians as well as engineers believe that they "know everything" to some extent and it is reinforced by managers who believe that a college degree is "all-knowing". In my opinion, the education system is broken due to the fact that we find it increasingly difficult to hire personnel who actually want to or have the skills needed to do actual work. We have eliminated a lot of the workforce by telling them that they are not going to be successful without the degree. By doing so, many talented persons find themselves out of work and those with degrees not qualified to do most physical labor. It is very difficult to teach people anything with those attitudes most of the time. The fact of the matter most job skills at our location aren't taught in colleges anyway. Therefore safety becomes an afterthought.

Our company is relatively young. Many of our older workers are people that worked for other companies in a more structured safety environment (safety cops). The younger generational workers require more of an explanation with safety concepts. Part of the reason that more explanation is needed is that the younger generations aren't exposed to basic production type skills as part of growing up. Changing oil in a car would be an example of this. Many of the younger generation have never, nor would they know how to change their own oil. This is not meant to be an indictment because the younger generational workers bring a different skill set to the work force. Their skill set is more technologically advanced and is better suited to a more graphical method of training. From an EHS perspective the work force diversity is a great thing. It requires us to keep our minds open and to develop new ways to get the message across. It is no longer efficient training to use the same video that has been used for the past 20 years. As safety professionals we must adapt and be more creative to make our training effective. It is a great time to be in the safety field!

You tend to get those "I've done it like this for 20+ years" attitude with some people, and that can sometimes poison the culture for the rest of the employees. Though these mindsets can become a challenge in your safety program, these are the individuals that become beneficial when it comes to improving a safety culture. Much like management, if you can win them over, the rest will follow.

My company, like most other very large companies, has employees from every age group as well as many different educational and cultural backgrounds. We have some employees that come on assignment for extended periods of time from other parts of the world . We are required to follow very strict policies as part of our jobs to maintain world class quality in our products. However, the first and most important policy here is SAFETY. Unsafe acts are not tolerated. We are trained in safe practices from the first day and we have ongoing safety training throughout our careers. I honestly feel that my company does an excellent job of being proactive with all employees - from the top man to the newest hire.

With regard to generational differences everything is changing! Work ethic, skillsets, job expectations, and overall character and personalities. Overall for tactile hands on types of jobs the hiring/training process needs to be completely rethought. The challenges facing organizations today are significant and we must pay attention to the people entering the workforce in order to better understand both their expectations, and training needs in order to fulfill them. As Chris points out the demographic of our workforce is very diverse both in age and ethnicity and the biggest hurdle seems to be the quality of the work provided and safety goes hand in hand with quality.

Young employees have been trained from the start campared to the older workers. The younger works are less exsptive to discipline.

What I'm seeing among younger workers is that we simply can't assume a basic level of knowledge or skill. We are hiring people who've never picked up a wrench, or worked on machinery. We're in the agricultural sector, and located near a typical Midwest town. Historically, most employees had a farming background of some kind. Now we must train them on everything. There is no "common sense" because "common sense" comes from experience, and our young people haven't had those experiences.

TECO-Westinghouse Motor Company has a factory, warehouses and Sales force that work out of there houses. For this reporting should the sales force be include in the 20 to 249 workers?

This generation is so committed to electronic communication, that it is difficult to present a class or have a safety discussion when the audience is constantly distracted by cellphones and an addiction to social media. The "new" hazard is texting and walking! And the "new" injury is "carpal neck". If you can't engage today's young employees with both hands, you won't have their full attention. It's hard to compete with a cellphone.