S12Ep12: The Role of a Trainer IS More Than You Think

When the training is done, the role of the trainer has just begun. Danny explains in this episode that every SafeStart Champion must hear.

Host: Danny Smith   

https://safetalk.buzzsprout.com/1032442/4151828-s1ep9-steering-committees-with-dennis-carnrike?t=0

Transcript

Welcome back to SafeTalk with SafeStart. I'm Danny Smith and today I want to speak directly to those of you who are certified trainers, those of you who are actually doing the training there at your site. And, more specifically, I don't want to talk to you just about doing the training itself, but more precisely about your role after you've completed the bulk of your training in the core units. 

The fact is that your fellow workers are going to look at you as a SafeStart champion, and rightly so. After all, you probably know more about the SafeStart process than anyone else in your organization. So your role as a SafeStart champion is really just getting started with the actual training. Think of it this way the training is akin to a coach installing a game plan, but that plan still needs to be executed, and you play a huge role in that. So what else should you be doing other than just actually conducting the training in the classroom? Well, in no particular order of importance, let's start with just improving storytelling skills. 

Now notice there I didn't say improving your storytelling skills. More on that in a second. You know, I know there are some folks who are just born with the natural gift in regard to being able to tell stories and share stories. But the bottom line is we can all get better. And what does that take? Well, it's kind of like the old joke about asking the cab driver in New York City how you get to Carnegie Hall Practice, practice, practice. But it's not just about getting better with your stories and better at telling your stories by practicing them. It's also about prompting everyone, especially leaders and supervisors, to share stories themselves on a regular basis in team meetings. So continuing to coach everyone on how to share good, SafeStart stories that contain all four of the elements of a good, SafeStart story, that's another vital role as a trainer, and in that regard, I've often found it's helpful just to ask a specific person to prepare a story for a particular meeting. That way you avoid that awkwardness that we've all probably experienced when the crickets invade the room and we hear them singing instead of people actually sharing something, when we say does anybody have a SafeStart story that they'd like to share? And then come the crickets right. You've probably experienced that. I was with one group recently who rotated the storytelling between departments in their morning meetings with their managers. So when they came in they knew Wednesday it was operations day Thursday, it was accounting and so forth, so everybody knew what their role was and when they were going to be counted on to share a SafeStart story and came in prepared. 

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02:52

Now I mentioned the four elements a moment ago. It may take a bit of prompting to get people thinking about it, but always be sure to remind them to pause and to consider how things could have been worse. That's a really, really powerful tool that sometimes we forget about. It really causes us to just take a step back and realize how fortunate we are, how lucky we are whatever terminology you want to use and it also is a good reminder that we all need to continue to build those critical safety skills. And, as we often say, sometimes it's just a matter of a few seconds or maybe a few inches, one direction or another. That could be the difference between a near miss or potentially a serious injury or fatality. Yet we don't always think about that or think in those terms when we're discussing things or telling our stories. 

Now, I get it. That may sound like a doom and gloom mentality, and well, we know that not every accident has potentially fatal hazardous energy. But if you pause, read some accident reports, things on and off the job. It's amazing how many times something really, really bad happens in a situation that, well, we probably didn't even consider as being high hazard in the first place. We probably didn't even consider as being high hazard in the first place. So, channeling this idea of thinking about how things could be worse into the conversation, into the storytelling, getting others to do that as well when sharing their stories, well, it really just helps us to drive us towards the use of the Critical Error Reduction Techniques. 

Another thing to keep in mind when it comes to storytelling is the types of stories, and by types of stories I mean not everything has to be a safety story. Remember, SafeStart is about managing human factors and getting better with human factors overall, which there's a lot of things that happen as a result of this state to error pattern. I'll give you an example. 

04:46

I have a prescription shot that I take every Friday morning, and last Friday I got up in a hurry, got dressed, took a shower. I actually took the shower first, but I guess you kind of assume that. Anyway, I got to my desk, I had my coffee and I sat down. It was about 10 minutes till 8. I had an 8 am conference call with a really important client and I sat down and I realized suddenly that I had forgotten to take that shot that morning. It's again not a daily thing that I do, so it was one of those. 

05:12

I've got a little pop-up on my computer, it sure is, you can imagine. As soon as I popped my computer on it said, hey, go take your shot, and I realized I'd forgotten it. So I jumped up from my desk to run go grab the prescription from the refrigerator where I keep it, and I knocked my coffee over on my desk. Now, fortunately the lid was on so it didn't spill badly, didn't hit my computer. I also had a rebate check on the corner of my desk for $100 from something we had bought recently that I hadn't taken to the bank yet. So I barely missed my computer, barely missed the rebate check, I guess. All in all I was pretty fortunate that I didn't lose money either by ruining the check or the computer. 

05:50

Just a little bit of a small mess to clean up, and it could have been really, really bad obviously if I'd gotten it on either of the others. What I'm saying is this that's not a safety-related story, but yet it's something that would have had a big impact on me financially and potentially. You know, if I had to scramble to try to get another computer in here real quickly, get my wife's computer in here and get it set up to get on the call with that important client, you can imagine that would have been a hassle as well and probably could have made some other serious mistakes while I was trying to do that. So you know, use a good mixture of safety related stories and those mistakes that cost us time and money or like mine very easily could have. We refer to those often as performance errors. 

Also, remember this state to error pattern follows us 24-7. I guess perhaps my story is a good example of that as well. 

06:41

Be sure to leverage off-the-job stories because in my experience you use SafeStart probably more off the job than you do on the job. So remember that with those that you're leading and help them to find the value in the process by recognizing that as well. You in the process, by recognizing that as well. The more stories from away from work, the more you establish that value there. It's probably going to increase the likelihood that others are going to follow along and start sharing those as well. Be sure to talk about your experiences about taking SafeStart home as well. I think that's a really important role. For example, I'm teaching my grandkids about the SafeStart concept, just like I taught my girls when they were younger. 

07:21

Be sure to cast a wide net when you're doing this. I mean, I'm thinking about children, grandchildren, nieces, nephews. Maybe you work with a youth group or something like that Little League or you name it. Just find a way to share this. You know, despite all our efforts in the safety community and in the public at large I mean, the CDC tells us there's still about 20 unintentional injury deaths for children and teens age 0 to 19 every day in the US. Now that rate's down a little bit. It's actually declined about 11% over the past decade or so. But you know, but one child, one child dying accidentally is just too many tragedies for us to have.

08:04

So talk about motivation. It always amazes me when you start talking about kids, grandkids, nieces, nephews. It always amazes me how the hardest, toughest, grumpiest old goat in the room and some of you probably just pictured somebody in your training class, just as I was saying that you knew exactly who in your organization I was talking about you start talking about the kids or grandkids and, man, they just melt. They want to keep their kids and grandkids safe. So even if they don't find the value initially in SafeStart themselves, you can help them find that value by helping them see the value of it with their kids. Don't be shy about tapping into that strong motivation. I think it's something we really miss at times and we probably can capitalize on that more than we realize. 

08:55

So again, your role as a storyteller but also prompting others to share stories really just helps serve a crucial role with SafeStart In the beginning. We're using those stories to look back and validate the concepts for ourselves. We're seeing how the search would have helped if we'd only used one of the skills in the past. But eventually you'll see your story start to be based more on how you use those skills and prevented something for happen. I self-triggered when I was in a rush or I was working on this habit and it helped me prevent this accident or incident. Keep in mind as well you'll find leaders who pick up on the concepts readily and others well, not so much. 

09:37

Remember another part of your role as a SafeStart trainer is really to be a coach. You know, not just in coaching stories but coaching in other ways as well, and such you can encourage those who get it and really help to coach those folks who may be lagging behind a bit. I mean, nobody likes problems piling up on their desk, so it's speak their language. The more problems that you can solve for them, the better. Focus on improving safety, productivity, quality, improvements in scrap rate, you name it. Relate it back to these human factors and sometimes, especially for leaders and supervisors, you have to relate those things back to the areas that they are measuring key KPIs, key performance indicators on and by relating it to that you can sometimes keep their attention and focus on the process more. You really help them to see how improvements in managing human factors can help move the needle for them beyond just safety. It's also a great idea to stay in communication with your steering committee. If you're not already a part of it, think about them as your internal SafeStart marketing group. The steering committee is asked to pilot and promote the SafeStart initiative, but there's so many other things that they can do to help in that function and that you can do to help them in that function. That function. I'll put a link in the show notes to a previous episode with my co-host, Tim Page Bottorff, with Dennis Carnrike, director of Continuity Initiatives, and that'll help you understand the role of the steering committee and how that can help and how you as a trainer can really help to support them. Also, continue to gather a team of SafeStart champions. Look for people to potentially join the steering committee in the future, or maybe even folks who may be potential trainers in the future. 

11:28

SafeStart's bigger than any one of us, so don't be afraid to have a succession plan in place for yourself to replace yourself. Some of the greatest advice I ever received in my career very early on was simply this If you want to get promoted, if you want to advance, start training your replacement and that certainly applies as a SafeStart trainer as well start thinking about people who can continue their own professional growth by becoming trainers. Now, some of you may not have positional authority. Your title within the organization may not be supervisor or manager, but as a SafeStart trainer, always remember you've got a lot of influence and you want to use that strategically. By reaching out and leading others, you really have an opportunity to make a positive impact on your organization beyond the classroom. You've got an incredible opportunity to one day leave your organization better than you found it, and that's all a part of the role of a SafeStart trainer. 

12:29

Well, that's it for today. Kind of a pick-me-up and encouragement type episode, I guess you could say Be sure to share this with others. Be sure to share it with your other trainers and leaders, your steering committee members as well, and thanks for your time today. I'm Danny Smith for SafeTalk with SafeStart. Have a great day.