Health and Safety Culture as a Competitive Advantage for Knowledge‐based Organizations: An HSEC Model Perspective

Abstract

Because knowledge is increasingly considered to be a key resource for companies, organizations must create and foster knowledge-sharing culture. A clear plan and strategy for knowledge creating, sharing it, and managing it provides sustainable competitive advantages for knowledge-based organizations. Knowledge as an important source of capital for an organization can only be created and managed properly and successfully in a healthy cultural environment. The knowledge stores of organizations are in the minds of their employees, and it is through the art of management that a climate and policy for converting this tacit and valuable knowledge into explicit knowledge is created. This study employs the health, safety, environment, and culture (HSEC) model as a managerial tool to help managers create a health and safety culture for creating and managing knowledge and also gain a real competitive advantage in this highly competitive era. According to this model, knowledge-based organizations must consider the role of cultural assessment, control risk, cultural hazards, and cultural syndromes when creating a health and safety culture. A successful HSEC model enables an organization to manage its complexity and uncertainty, improve performance, create competitive advantages, and enhance its business reputation. This model will create a deep understanding of a health and safety culture that facilitates the interaction and conversion process and also determines how the knowledge process should be developed and managed by identifying cultural hazards and risks.

Dynamics of a culture of workplace safety in human service organizations: A qualitative analysis

“…Safety culture has been deemed a critical developmental component of health and safety regimes within social services (Firoozi and Hatami, 2017; Mellor and Webster, 2013). However, scant empirical inquiry has been directed at exploring how safety culture in an organization supports factors related to health and safety.…”

“…Moreover, Mellor and Webster (2013) advocate the use of consistent management practices supporting safety, such as work planning, pro-safety interactions, appropriate resourcing, and self-assessment, while DeJoy (2005) calls for the creation of data and evaluation tools for health and safety programs. Broadly, successful health and safety models are conceptualized as managing complexity and uncertainty in an organization, including gaining a deep understanding of health and safety culture to determine key hazards and risks (Firoozi and Hatami, 2017).…”

“…It is also suggested that the involvement of all stakeholders, including frontline staff, in the development of a health and safety plan leads to a stronger safety culture (Mellor and Webster, 2013). Studies on the safety climate of organizations show how safety climate is related to knowledge sharing among employees (Firoozi and Hatami, 2017), which is strongly related to safety performance behavior, psychological safety climate, and group safety climate (Christian et al, 2009). Using cross-sectional data from three surveys across 91 hospitals in the United States, Singer et al (2009) found that institutions with a better safety climate and lower levels of shame and blame had lower levels of personal safety issues.…”

Effects of Safety Health Practices on Competitiveness of Grain Milling Firms in Uasin Gishu County-Kenya

“…The study was conducted in the Korean context with a focus on sustainable performance and not competitiveness. Naser and Akram, (2017) Health and Safety Culture as a Competitive Advantage for Knowledge based Organizations: An HSEC Model Perspective. This study employed the health, safety, environment, and culture (HSEC) model as a managerial tool to help managers create a health and safety culture for creating and managing knowledge and also gain a real competitive advantage in this highly competitive era.…”

Relevance Proof of Safety Culture in Coal Mine Industry

“…It turns out that safety knowledge and safety motivation are key factors in interpreting these relationships. Firoozi et al [ 26 ] found that knowledge is an important source of capital for an organization and can only be correctly created and managed in a healthy cultural environment. The paper adopts a health, safety, environment and cultural model as a management model, which enables people to have a deep understanding of the health and safety culture that promotes the interaction and transformation process.…”