Influence of knowledge-based safety culture in the construction industry: a stakeholder's perspective

Abstract

PurposeSafety in construction projects is essential and requires more attention towards minimizing the accident rate. Problems concerning awareness of safety risks, procedures and practices still exist in the industry, which indicate a shortfall in diffusion of safety-related knowledge in construction industry. Also, there is dearth of studies on knowledge management strategies to prevent reoccurrence of accidents and thereby improve safety culture in construction industry. This study attempts to unveil aspects of knowledge management that are ignored in considering safety culture and discern the differences in the perception of key stakeholders of construction industry. Therefore, the objective of this study is to identify and measure knowledge-based safety culture elements.Design/methodology/approachIn this paper, the focus is on the application of a reliable, valid and sensitive knowledge-based safety culture assessment tool on key stakeholders operational in construction industry. Research method adopted is a questionnaire-based survey to seek responses from industry professionals. A total of 199 responses were obtained from 106 different companies operational in Indian construction industry. Statistical analyses including ranking analysis, t-test, correlation analysis, and ANOVA test are utilized for comparing and identifying the differences in view of stakeholder's perceptions concerning workplace safety.FindingsThis study helps to identify and rank critical knowledge-based safety culture elements from the perspective of key stakeholders of construction industry. This contributes in identifying the most critical and neglected variables among the key stakeholders regarding aspects of safety culture. Also, the study shows the importance of knowledge dimension in developing overall safety culture in construction industry.Originality/valueResults of this study offer valuable insight in enabling key stakeholders of construction industry to examine and enhance their safety performance. The implications of this study contribute new knowledge in assessing conditions that will improve worker safety in the construction industry. The paper should be of interest to researchers and practitioners in the area of occupational health and safety management.

The Model of Worker’s Quality of Life During Covid-19 Pandemic: The Role of Perceived Organizational Support (POS), Digital Literacy, Covid-19-Related Workplace Policy, Quality Culture, and Safety Culture

“…A good quality organizational culture will make the company focus on customer needs, including internal customers—workers (Rahnuma, 2020; Wu, 2015; Wu et al, 2011). Safety culture will make companies focus on the threat of disease that can interfere with workers and their work (Deepak & Mahesh, 2021; Naji et al, 2021; Williams et al, 2020). Therefore, quality culture and safety cultures will encourage companies to be more responsive to the needs of workers during the Covid-19 pandemic.…”

How and when creativity thrives in construction projects: a study of leader's humor

“…The industry requires project teams to develop novel methods and techniques (Othman and Ayman, 2013) to solve the complex challenges associated with the rapid urbanization of the emerging economy and the need to construct new buildings (Liang and Wang, 2020). However, spurring creativity in the construction context is a challenging endeavor because employees and workers experience difficult working conditions, tight schedules, job stress, high risk of accidents and poor work-life balance (Carmichael et al ., 2016; Deepak and Mahesh, 2021). Therefore, the construction project managers must maintain a positive working ethos to meet the industry's demands for creativity (Cooper and Sosik, 2012; Ogunlana et al ., 2006; Wijewardena et al.…”

“…Leader humor is defined as the “behavior enacted by a leader and directed toward a subordinate that is intended to be amusing to the subordinate and that the subordinate perceives as an intentional act” (Cooper et al ., 2018, p. 772). Such an approach to leadership is arguably valuable in the construction industry, where workers face numerous workplace challenges (Ahmad et al ., 2019; Deepak and Mahesh, 2021). A growing body of research highlights the importance of investigating the leader's humor in dealing with workplace issues in the services and manufacturing industries (Lee, 2015; Peng et al ., 2020; Pundt and Herrmann, 2015).…”

“…Second, by considering humor as an interpersonal communication resource for construction project managers, our research sheds new light on how it may spur creativity in an innovation-driven industry. Crawford (1994, p. 54) argues, “of all the communicative strategies that leaders utilize, the use of humor is most promising, but least understood.” A leader's sense of humor may alleviate the stress typically associated with construction jobs (Carmichael et al ., 2016; Deepak and Mahesh, 2021) and facilitate the development of a healthy socio-emotional environment. Finally, we contribute to the scant literature on leader humor in the context of China's construction industry.…”

“…The current issue and full text archive of this journal is available on Emerald Insight at: https://www.emerald.com/insight/0969-9988.htm Deepak and Mahesh, 2021). Therefore, the construction project managers must maintain a positive working ethos to meet the industry's demands for creativity (Cooper and Sosik, 2012;Ogunlana et al, 2006;Wijewardena et al, 2019).…”