How to build a forklift safety culture

IF YOU ASK THEM, most forklift operators, fleet managers, and warehouse workers will say that safety is their number-one priority. They’ll probably also say that they continually think about safety while they’re at work. More often than not, though, such assertions are closer to aspiration than reality.

Yet it is possible to develop an environment where every employee and contractor actually does consider safety to be his or her responsibility and does think about it throughout the workday. That describes a “safety culture,” which Don Buckman, Hyster Co.’s environmental health and safety manager, defines as “a set of beliefs, attitudes, and actions consistently adopted by everyone in the organization to make the right decisions that value safety.”

The word “everyone” is key: A successful safety culture requires each individual to value and prioritize safety, regardless of his or her position on the organization chart. “We want every person who comes to work, including not just forklift drivers but also office staff, to have a ‘zero injury mindset,’” says Ed Johannesen, director of manufacturing for UniCarriers Americas (UCA).