It is often the case that when we work with companies we hear statements such as "Oh, but here it's different, you can't compare us to somewhere else or expect to find the same practices here, it's our culture", in order to justify some safety practice or other. The ‘somewhere else' can include: the next valley, another region, another country or another continent.
Studies carried out on a global scale, such as the ‘Global Leadership and Organizational Behaviour Effectiveness' project support this idea, grouping countries according to their cultural similarity. This criterion is identified as a determining factor in the effectiveness of organizational and behavioural leadership. One conclusion that is given can be summarized as, ‘When in Rome, do what the Romans do; if you're somewhere else, do what they do'.
ICSI has been asked to work with companies in many parts of the planet with different local cultures, and in turn can ask the question: to what extent is safety culture influenced by the country's culture?
Between 2008 and 2013, the Institute carried out a large-scale study of the factors that influence perceptions of beliefs and practices related to safety. We collected more than 21,000 questionnaires about perceptions of safety (21 entities in 4 continents in the oil, services, and gas transport and storage sectors). Three potential influential factors were tested: the sector of activity, the geographical area and the hierarchical level of respondents.
The study showed that the factor that has the most influence on perceptions in terms of safety culture is the sector of activity, which is well ahead of the geographical factor. In fact, the geographical factor takes third place after the hierarchical level. In other words, the ‘local' culture does impact safety culture but is not a major determinant in the sectors that were studied. The factor that has the most influence on perceptions of safety culture and practices is the sector of activity.
Yes, organizations that want to move to safer practices must take into account the local culture if they want to have a better understanding of the perceptions and practices of actors. However, they have other levers that can influence perceptions and practices at the entity itself, notably the organization that they put in place and the ‘culture' of the sector they are part of.