Health and safety starts at the top. As a workplace leader, you must demonstrate that you and your organization take health and safety seriously. Strong leadership and a firm commitment to continuously improving health and safety performance, backed by action, are the foundations of a strong health and safety culture.

Show that you are committed to making sure workers stay safe on the job by embedding health and safety in every aspect of the workplace.

You can demonstrate health and safety leadership in many different ways, such as:

• Driving annual health and safety plans forward with your management team
• Visibly focusing on health and safety on the shop floor
• Making health and safety a topic of everyday conversation
• Regularly visiting your worksite(s) to champion the safety agenda
• Setting clear expectations and encouraging accountability
• Measuring outcomes of health and safety activities
• Promoting the investigation of near misses
• Training and investing in all areas of health and safety
• Being honest and open about health and safety issues
• Striving to continually raise the profile of health and safety
• Having an annual health and safety plan

To create a workplace culture that values health and safety, your organization should be transparent about the importance of health and safety across the workplace. Engaging your workers appropriately in all aspects of health and safety, including planning, implementation, and day-to-day activities, helps with this transparency.

As a leader, asking questions and challenging your organization on the topics above will help drive health and safety improvement.