A new study examining health and safety data from over 2,600 firms across New Zealand, Australia, and the UK has revealed considerable leadership deficiencies at the governance and executive management levels.
The report said these shortcomings contribute to New Zealand’s struggle to reduce workplace incident rates to align with those in Australia and the UK.
The Safe365 Safety Culture Maturity Report 2024 showed that gaps in director and manager knowledge are particularly hindering safety culture development in New Zealand.
It indicated that director knowledge maturity in risk management practices stands at 48%, while manager knowledge is at 46.3%. This suggests a significant lack of understanding of industry-specific safety practices.
Nathan Hight, co-founder and managing director of Safe365, a New Zealand-based health and safety technology platform, pointed to a systemic issue in director knowledge regarding effective governance within organisations. This includes a lack of the necessary insight to question organisational spending, ensure compliance with management practices, and focus on critical areas impacting worker safety.
“Nobody is questioning the best intentions of senior leadership, nor are we suggesting indifference, but rather a lack of understanding of effective governance of work health, safety, and wellbeing,” he said. “The solutions are often not complex. Directors need to be equipped with the knowledge to ask good questions that check and challenge senior management, and to exercise visible leadership on health, safety, and wellbeing within the business and, importantly, possess a willingness to address and solve these problems.”
Hight stressed the importance of directors and senior management having access to effective insights, such as:
He said these insights can help provide oversight and leadership that enhance workplace risk management, incident reduction, and regulatory compliance.
“There is a prevalent assumption that meeting legal compliance obligations with health and safety regulation equates to safe outcomes for workers. Company directors and senior management need to realise that regulatory compliance represents the minimum viable threshold and does not necessarily reflect a comprehensive safety picture,” he said. “Unfortunately, health and safety training is often focused on meeting compliance requirements, which does not reflect the systemic changes needed in the profession.”
Hight calls for investment in the training and development of directors, senior management, and safety professionals to meet modern governance and safety standards. This investment aims to encourage senior leadership to look beyond compliance and strive for excellence in leadership and accountability.
The report also highlighted that while systems and processes are in place to address potential risks or incidents, verification that these risk management practices are effectively implemented and performing as intended is inconsistent due to low levels of internal audit and verification maturity. This inconsistency leads to many companies operating under the illusion of safety, resulting in continued preventable harm.
“Workers and/or contractors that role-model best practices in health and safety are usually only informally recognised,” Hight said. “This report is a reminder that a true safety culture goes beyond compliance and requires a commitment to continuous improvement and excellence in leadership, accountability, and organisation-wide engagement in safety outcomes, leading to reduced harm and improved overall business performance.”
Another study published this year showed that weak corporate culture is linked to unethical behaviour, with the main barrier to reporting unethical behaviour being the belief that the organisation would not do anything about the concern (36%).
