As a Michigan-based consultancy, our team has had the pleasure of working with dozens of manufacturing clients over the years. We’ve witnessed firsthand their commitment to worker safety. Protecting workers on assembly lines and around heavy equipment has been a top priority for these organization over the last few decades. This is true for professionals in hospitals and other industries where risks for injury are high.

Worker safety, both physical and psychological, needs to be a priority for all organizations. Safety training and safety assessments are a critical part of the solution.

I recently read the article “5 Reasons to Assess Behavioral Safety Risk” by our content partner TalentClick, which reminded me that an essential characteristic of a healthy and productive organization is the commitment to an injury-free workplace.

While engineering safe procedures and purchasing and maintaining injury-preventing equipment are foundational, the core difference maker in safe workplaces is understanding and focusing on employee behaviors. Behaviors drive actions that result in safe or unsafe outcomes.

In a research study that TalentClick conducted with its security services client, the organization sought to determine the relationship between attitude, values, and personality and high-risk behaviors. They wanted to predict and reduce employee medical and first-aid incidents. After analyzing 232 responses, they found that that by hiring more employees who score high on responsibility and coachability dimensions and low on resistant, distractible, and reactive dimensions, they could improve the safety of their workforce. This would save time, money, and lives.

This HR Future article cites a jaw-dropping U.S. Bureau of Labor statistic: over 2 million employees report nonfatal injuries each year. They also report that between 80% and 90% of all workplace accidents are caused by human error. The likelihood of these injuries increases when workers are stressed or fatigued.

TalentClick’s years of research into workplace safety have uncovered six personality traits that directly correlate to employee safety:

• Resistant vs. Accommodating
• Anxious vs. Calm
• Impatient vs. Patient
• Distractible vs. Focused
• Impulsive vs. Cautious
• Thrill-Seeking vs. Apprehensive

Dion Leadership uses the Safety Quotient (SQ) assessment and accompanying training to improve employee safety self-awareness. This tool also enables managers to predict preventable incidents through personalized safety training, safety assessment, and coaching. Organizations that utilize the assessment have reduced incident rates by 25%. After researching a variety of methods to systemically improve workplace safety, we chose this program because it is rooted in behaviors.

My takeaway after looking at this research and data: For critical positions, HR, talent management, and hiring managers should consider adding a safety assessment component to their pre-hire testing to determine which candidates are most likely to behave in safe ways.

Additionally, talent development should consider making all employees aware of their natural traits and how they support (or cause risk to) a healthy workplace through management training. This self-awareness will bring daily focus to the behaviors that assure an injury-free environment.

Leaders are an important part of the workplace safety puzzle. They need to understand these six behavioral traits for themselves so they can spot them in others. Only then will they be able to coach, correct, and reward critical safety behaviors. When everyone is aware of these six behavioral traits, how they play out at work, and how you can align your behaviors to the situation, safety improves!

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