The statistics tell a sobering story, about half the lost time injuries in our industry occur on drilling rigs. Industry trends indicate drilling safety performance is on a plateau and there is a growing belief that the current performance isn't good enough. Faced with this information we have two choices. The first is to do what we do already and accept the inevitable consequence that we will continue to have accidents. The second is to realise that, as an industry, we need to do something different if we are to create a culture where an accident free drilling operation is common place. This paper describes a process for revealing the underlying culture of the drilling industry and the type of behavioural and organisational changes which need to be made if we are to achieve a permanent step change in safety culture and performance. In the same context the paper describes the global drilling safety leadership campaign which has been initiated to enroll operators, drilling contractors and service companies to the common cause of improving drilling safety performance by working together on personal commitment, leadership and behaviour.