The day that Peter Brock came for dinner Managing safety, managing change

The background

• This all happened in the early 1990’s at a mine located in the Karijini area of West Australia.

• Back then mine safety was important – but it wasn’t mandatory in many cases…… and the curse of macho stupidity still existed.

• We had tried a lot of culture change efforts – but they had been largely useless. We had done some apparently “tough” leadership – but this seemed to just reduce the respect of the staff

• At the same time, it was becoming an absolute priority to achieve zero LTIFR’s* in order to retain the right to mine! * Long term injury frequency rate

Answering the WIIIFM question

• It was clear that we had not answered the WIIIFM question for the staff – and we all knew that we needed 100% volunteers – not conscripts

• Otherwise how could we seriously shoot for the 0% target - every day, every month, all year

• …………..and then we had an “ah ah” moment. Listening to discussion in the site canteen, we heard a number of the staff planning to go back to Perth to see the V8 racing cars

• Now no-one considered the drivers to be whimps for wearing extensive safety gear + roll cages etc, etc

Peter Brock comes to dinner

• On the following Tuesday, there was a call for all hands meeting at the end of the day shift – and then it all happened: – A character walked in fully dressed in race suit and helmet, gloves

boots – When he removed his helmet….there stood Peter Brock! – Staff were either dumbstruck or cheered wildly – Then Peter spent the next 30 minutes talking about safety – he

even showed off his fire-retarding tee’s sox etc. – There were masses of questions including a lot that dealt with

safety – Peter Brock’s closing call to action was for all hands to think and live

safety like a race team…………and always “do a Brockie” for safety at all times

• All the safety measures dramatically improved and stayed that way – and the “Doing a Brockie” became a core part of the onboarding program

A Brockie!