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Accepted manuscript. The published version is available from:
http://www.inderscienceonline.com/doi/abs/10.1504/IJPOM.2012.048220
Sunindijo, R.Y. and Zou, P.X.W. (2012). “How project manager’s skills may influence the development of
safety climate in construction projects”. International Journal of Project Organisation and Management, 4(3),
286-301.
How Project Manager’s Skills May Influence the Development of Safety
Climate in Construction Projects
Riza Yosia Sunindijo* and Patrick X. W. Zou
Faculty of the Built Environment, University of New South Wales
UNSW SYDNEY NSW 2052, Australia
Email: r.sunindijo@unsw.edu.au
Email: p.zou@unsw.edu.au
*Corresponding author
Abstract: The construction industry has a significant impact on global economy. However, it
is also responsible for a significant amount of fatal injuries, thus undertaking research on
safety is crucial to improve the situation. This paper argues that construction project
managers play an important role for developing safety climate in their projects. Based on
previous literature, this paper conceptualises that essential skills for construction project
managers, which comprise of conceptual, human, political, and technical skill, can be used to
develop safety climate in construction projects. These skills influence how construction
project managers perform their safety management tasks, which is essential to provide safety
leadership. This safety leadership promotes the development of positive safety climate which
can lead to safety improvement in construction. Future studies on this topic should focus on
collecting empirical data to validate the proposed argument.
Keywords: safety performance; safety leadership; safety climate; project manager’s skills;
construction project management.
Biographical notes: Riza Yosia Sunindijo has M.Eng in construction engineering and
infrastructure management and B.Eng in civil engineering. He is currently a PhD candidate in
construction management and a casual lecturer in the Faculty of the Built Environment at the
University of New South Wales, Sydney, Australia. He has worked as a project engineer,
sustainability champion, and project manager with international construction and property
companies in Thailand and Indonesia.
Patrick Zou has PhD in Civil Engineering. He is an Associate Professor in Construction
Management and Director of Construction Management and Property Program in the Faculty
of the Built Environment at the University of New South Wales, Sydney, Australia. He is also
the Regional Vice President of the UK Chartered Institute of Building (CIOB) Australasia.
He has more than 100 publications in international journals and conferences. He has won an
Outstanding Paper Award 2009 from Emerald Literati Network and Innovation Award
2007/2008 from UK CIOB. He received two awards from UNSW Vice-Chancellor and
Australian Institute of Building for his teaching.
1 Introduction
Construction is a massive industry that has a significant impact on global economy. The
industry spends more than three trillion dollars every year globally, accounting for
approximately 10% of the world’s gross domestic product (GDP). It provides employment
for 180 million people or 7% of global employment (Murie, 2007). Furthermore, it supports
other industries, such as the steel, lumber, paint, concrete, and machinery manufacturing
industry (Jackson, 2004). Despite its significant contributions to the global economy, the
construction industry is also notorious for its reputation as dirty, difficult, and dangerous. It
employs about 7% of the world’s workforce, but responsible for 30-40% of the world’s fatal
injuries. It is estimated that 100,000 workers are killed on construction sites annually, or
equals to one person killed every five minutes, due to bad and illegal working conditions
(Murie, 2007). This fact highlights the importance of undertaking research on safety in the
construction industry.
Safety is a vital aspect, which has been considered as one of key objectives in construction
projects. Lack of safety increases the probability of accidents and fatalities, conditions that
cannot be justified by any means because they negatively impact the wellbeing and lives of
people. Nowadays safety has become a social and moral responsibility for every construction
company. The society and the norm impose that it is the right of every employee to go home
safely every day and it is erroneous to treat employees as mere objects to achieve corporate
goals (Lingard and Rowlinson, 2005). Furthermore, when accidents happen, they can incur
extra costs and cause delays, which will potentially ruin the budget and delay the target
completion date of the project. Accidents also can lead to prosecution and civil claim that will
jeopardise the future of the project, cause adverse publicity, and threaten the financial health
of a company (Holt, 2005). Safety has been enforced by law, thus it cannot be compromised
under any circumstances (Lester, 2007; NSW, 2009). As a result of this new paradigm, safety
performance has become one of key success factors in construction projects. Accordingly, all
these reasons signify that safety is such an important factor in the construction industry, thus
this research focuses on safety as a determinant of project success.
The role of construction project manager is crucial in achieving project success. The
construction project manager is the highest position in the project level, thus he or she is the
key person responsible for the success or failure of the project. In relation to safety,
construction project managers are responsible for the implementation of the company’s safety
policy as well as the coordination of the project safety plan. They also should monitor the
safety management system, report and investigate accidents and near misses, and receive
feedback from safety personnel (Fewings, 2005). As one of key project leaders, they have the
capacity to create and influence the climate of the project. Consequently, if construction
project managers consider safety as one of the priorities, they also can provide safety
leadership to support safety management implementation and improve safety performance
(Office of the Federal Safety Commissioner, 2007). Construction project managers have to
manage complex and challenging tasks which require them to have sufficient skills. A study
by Sunindijo and Zou (2010) proposed that conceptual, human, political, and technical skill
(CHPT construct) are the essential skills for construction project managers to perform their
job effectively and achieve project objectives, which include time, cost, quality, safety, and
sustainability.
Many studies have been carried out in the area of safety in the construction industry
showing the importance of the topic. In the past, these studies focused on identifying and
classifying risks and accidents (Yi and Langford, 2006; Zou and Zhang, 2009) and exploring
the importance of safety in construction projects and organisations (Langford et al., 2000;
Muñiz et al., 2009). Other studies focused on procedures, techniques, tools, and management
system to implement, measure, and improve safety performance (Dingsdag et al., 2006; Ng et
al., 2005; Seo et al., 2004; Teo et al., 2005). Moving up on the life cycle of the project, some
studies focused on safety during the design stage (Hadikusumo and Rowlinson, 2002; Zou et
al., 2009). Then, there were also studies on the psychological aspect of safety, such as safety
culture, behaviour, and perception (Aksorn and Hadikusumo, 2008; Glendon and Litherland,
2001; Loughborough University, n.d.).
Despite all the research in safety and the advancement of technology, the implementation
of safety procedures, tools, and management system to manage safety risks, prevent
accidents, and improve safety performance still depends on people to make decisions and
take actions to plan, implement, and control various project activities to make sure that they
are done safely. The problem here is that people tend to make mistakes because they do not
understand safety procedures, unaware of hazards associated with works, underestimate risks,
have negative attitudes towards safety, and have lack of understanding on how to implement
safety measures effectively (Lingard and Rowlinson, 2005). Therefore, research on human
aspect in safety is important to ensure continuous improvement of safety performance in the
industry. Through examining previous literature, there has been no past research that explores
the influence of construction project manager’s skills on safety. Therefore, this paper aims to
fill this gap and conceptualises the importance of construction project manager’s skills on the
development of safety climate in construction projects.
Firstly, this paper develops a framework to show the whole picture of a construction
project. This particular framework portrays the complexity of construction project manager’s
responsibility and various constraints that may influence the outcome of the project as well as
demonstrating the relationships between safety and other aspects. Secondly, the paper argues
how construction project managers can contribute in safety implementation and develop
safety climate. The tasks that they need to perform in relation to safety will also be explored.
Thirdly, the essential skills for construction project managers and how each skill may
influence safety are discussed. Finally, the paper integrates all the aspects that have been
discussed and provides directions for future studies. Throughout this paper, the terms projects
and project managers are used frequently. The former refers to construction projects while the
latter refers to construction project managers.
2 Theoretical background
Safety can be simply defined as a condition of being safe from undergoing or causing hurt,
injury, or loss (Merriam-Webster, 2009). As discussed previously, safety has become one of
the key objectives in construction projects. In order to achieve the required safety
performance, project managers need to have a clear understanding about the constraints that
could have an effect on safety. These constraints can be classified into two major groups:
project stakeholders and project environment. A stakeholder is a person or organisation that
has an interest in the project or the outcome of the project. There are numerous stakeholders
involved in a project and each stakeholder has different expectations. It is the responsibility
of the project manager to manage these expectations. At the same time, the project manager
should also consider project environment forces that may influence the achievement of
project objectives (Rosenau and Githens, 2005). Figure 1 shows these constraints and
presents the whole picture of the relationships between safety and other aspects in a project as
well as the complexity of project manager’s responsibility.
Figure 1 here
A project is progressively elaborated, which means that it is completed in stages. It has
been widely accepted that there are five project stages, namely initiation, design,
procurement, construction, and commissioning stage. Each stage may overlap with each other
depending on the project delivery system, but the five stages are always there and discernable
(Lester, 2007; PMI, 2008; Rosenau and Githens, 2005). Each stage has various activities and
constraints that should be considered and managed by the project manager. Eventually the
main objective of these stages is to create a project that meets required standards and
specifications of time, cost, quality, safety, and sustainability. In the past, projects only
focused on the triple bottom lines of time, cost, and quality. However, nowadays safety and
sustainability have been increasingly accepted as integral parts of project objectives. Figure 1
also shows various stakeholders who may involve in a project in which the project manager
has to manage their expectations. Stakeholders in the organisation level are top management,
bosses, team members, and personnel from other departments. Company culture as well as
the system and technology available and implemented in the organisation are project
environment factors that should be considered in this level.
In the construction task environment level, the project manager has to consider external
project team members like consultants, designers, subcontractors, and the client. Other
stakeholders in this level are government with their law and regulations, the community that
lives around the project, and public that may be around the project site. Lastly, the project
manager should also be concerned about external project environment, such as economic,
political, sociocultural, technology, global condition, and the demographic where the project
is built (Robbins et al., 2009). All these stakeholders and project environment factors could
become constraints and influence the achievement of project objectives, which include safety.
Without proper management from the project manager, these constraints can easily hinder the
project and cause failures.
Figure 2 presents the role of project managers in influencing and improving safety in their
projects. Safety is always a management issue in which the top management who has the
authority to allocate resources and enforce company’s policies is the key for successful safety
implementation (Anton, 1989). The top management has to initiate safety implementation,
demonstrate commitment towards safety, and provide supports by developing and
communicating safety culture throughout the organisation otherwise the implementation will
not be successful (Zou and Sunindijo, 2010). There are three dimensions of safety culture:
psychological, behavioural, and corporate. The psychological dimension is the perceptions of
people towards safety in the organisation. The behavioural dimension is what people do in
relation to safety-related activities. The corporate dimension is what the organisation has,
which is reflected in safety policy, safety procedures, and other aspects of safety management
system (HSE, 2005). These three dimensions have been considered and included in Figure 2.
Figure 2 here
Once the top management is committed and supports the development of safety culture,
the next step is to develop a safety management system so the safety culture can be
implemented both in the organisation and project level. This step concerns with the corporate
dimension of safety culture signifying the need to create safety policy and procedures,
develop a safety control and monitoring system, and establish communication flows (HSE,
2005).
As the key leader in the project level, the role of project managers in safety is to lead the
implementation of safety management system in their projects. They play an important safety
leadership role in creating and influencing safety climate in their project (Office of the
Federal Safety Commissioner, 2007). Dingsdag et al. (2006) have identified 29 safety
management tasks (listed in Table 1) that project managers need to perform to provide safety
leadership. This is basically what project managers need to do to lead and promote safety
implementation in their projects. This aspect is related to the second dimension of safety
culture, that is, the behavioural dimension.
Table 1 here
This paper argues that by providing safety leadership, project managers can promote the
development of safety climate in their projects. Safety climate is “shared employee
perceptions of how safety management is being operationalised in the workplace, at a
particular moment in time” (Cooper and Phillips, 2004, p. 497). Safety climate refers to the
third dimension of safety climate, which is the psychological dimension (HSE, 2005).
Developing safety climate is necessary because many studies have revealed the importance of
safety climate in predicting or measuring safety-related outcomes, such as accidents and
injuries. In fact, safety climate has become a common method to measure safety performance
for more than two decades in various industries including the construction industry (Glendon
and Litherland, 2001). The advantages of measuring safety climate are (Zou and Sunindijo
2010; Seo et al. 2004; Davies et al. 2001):
1. Traditional safety measurements, such as accident rate and incident rate, are not sensitive
enough to provide useful information about safety problems. On the other hand, safety
climate can identify safety problems before they develop into accidents and injuries
(leading indicator instead of lagging indicator).
2. Measuring safety climate can focus on safety efforts to improve problematic areas, which
can lead to improvement of other functions in the company. It provides a mechanism to
optimise investment on safety-related improvements.
3. Safety climate measurement serves as a valuable tool to identify trends in the
organisation’s safety performance and to establish benchmarks both internally and
externally.
4. Although safety climate measurement cannot replace other diagnostic tools and safety
activities, a safety climate survey costs less money and time to be conducted.
5. Research has shown increasing evidence that safety climate is significantly related to
safety practices, accidents, unsafe behaviour, productivity, and business performance.
6. It involves employees in the process, which can help identify key issues that need to be
addressed. There is also an assurance that employees will not be identifiable, thus
encouraging them to express their true feeling without any fear of reprisal.
The development of safety climate will promote the elimination of unsafe acts and
conditions in the project and ultimately will lead to accident prevention and safety
improvement. This line of reasoning is in agreement with a study that investigates the causes
of accidents. Holt (2005) explained that there are two direct causes of accidents: unsafe acts
(e.g. horseplay, smoking, working without proper personal protective equipment) and unsafe
conditions (e.g. defective equipment, poor housekeeping, insufficient lighting). There are also
two secondary or indirect causes of accidents: failure of management (e.g. financial
limitations, lack of commitment) and negative social pressures that promote the occurrence of
unsafe acts and conditions (e.g. group attitudes toward safety, tradition, risk-taking as
acceptable behaviours). Frequently, the two indirect causes are the main sources of the
problem that make unsafe acts and conditions flourish in the project. Accordingly, this paper
argues that in order to eliminate unsafe acts and conditions, it is important for construction
organisations to develop safety culture through management commitment and support,
implement a safety management system, and require project managers to be accountable
towards safety by providing safety leadership through performing their safety management
tasks. This strong management approach promotes the development of safety climate, which
abolishes negative social pressures that may cause unsafe acts and conditions.
3 Project manager’s skills and safety
Project managers’ tasks and responsibilities are varied and multifaceted. They need certain
skills to effectively manage these tasks and responsibilities. A study by Sunindijo and Zou
(2010) proposed that there are four essential skills for project managers called CHPT
construct in which C stands for conceptual skill, H for human skill, P for political skill, and T
for technical skill. Figure 3 presents the skills as well as components that form each skill set.
The next sections discuss the skills further and conceptualise how they can influence safety.
Figure 3 here
3.1 Conceptual skill and safety
Conceptual skill can be described as “the ability of the project manager to envision the
project as a whole”. The skill recognises that various functions in the project depend on one
another where changes in one part could affect other parts (El-Sabaa, 2001, p.2). Conceptual
skill is essential for project managers to think about abstract situations, to see the project in a
big picture, to understand the relationships between different departments, and to imagine
how the project fits into its broader environment (Robbins et al., 2009). Due to the diversity
of the project system, conceptual skill is essential to ensure that all elements function together
as an integrated whole (Goodwin, 1993).
There are three components of conceptual skill, namely visioning, scoping, and integration
(Sunindijo and Zou, 2010). The first component, visioning, is the ability to observe the
project as a whole and visualise the relationship of the project to the organisation, the
industry, the community, and other external environments (El-Sabaa, 2001). Scoping is the
second competency and its function is to define and control what is and is not included in the
project. Scoping is critical to ensure that all the work required for the project and only the
work required has been included to complete the project successfully. The third competency
is integration, which is essential to ensure that all project components are properly identified,
defined, combined, unified, and coordinated (PMI, 2008).
In relation to safety, conceptual skill is essential for project managers to appreciate the
impacts and necessities of good safety practices towards the workers and their families, the
organisation, the community, and the achievement of project objectives. The visioning
component gives a big picture perspective on the role of safety in the project, which helps
project managers realise that safety is actually an important and integral part of the project.
When project managers recognise this relationship and perceive the importance of safety,
they are able to act in a way that advances safety. Furthermore, this skill also allows project
managers to address safety issues from a life-cycle perspective rather than focusing on safety
only during the construction stage. For example, they could influence the designers to
consider the implication of the design on safety during the construction and operation of the
facilities.
With the scoping component, project managers will understand the safety measures
required to be implemented in the projects. It ensures that proper safety measures are
implemented, not too much that they will increase the cost unreasonably and not too relaxed
that the workplace will be the source of unsafe acts and unsafe conditions. Lastly, by
exercising their integration skill, project managers can identify safety risks and develop a
plan to mitigate the risks. This plan then can be integrated into the overall project plan.
Integration also helps project managers put safety as equally important as other key project
objectives.
3.2 Human skill and safety
Human skill is the ability to work with and through other people (Goodwin, 1993; Katz,
1974; Robbins et al., 2009). Human skill is crucial for managing various expectations from
different stakeholders involved in a project. Furthermore, throughout the project life cycle, it
is people who perform the works, thus an understanding of human skill to manage these
people is vital. Strohmeier (1992) stated that 88% of project managers spend more than half
of their working time cooperating with others, which again demonstrates the importance of
human skill for them. There are three components of human skill: emotional intelligence,
interpersonal skill, and leadership (Sunindijo and Zou, 2010).
Emotional intelligence is “the capacity for recognising our own feelings and those of
others, for motivating ourselves, and for managing emotions well in ourselves and in our
relationships” (Goleman, 1998: pp. 375). Studies have indicated that emotional intelligence is
crucial at work (Carmeli, 2003; Goleman, 1998; Sunindijo et al., 2007). The second
component is interpersonal skill or the ease and comfort of communications between project
managers and their staff, colleagues, superiors, clients, and other stakeholders, which is
important due to various stakeholders involved in a project (Peled, 2000). Lastly, leadership
is the process of influencing a group of people to achieve goals, thus leaders in organisations
are people who make things happen (Robbins et al., 2009). Leadership is vital to bring
different stakeholders together and influence them to do what must be done to achieve project
objectives (Lewis, 2003).
Working with people is always the key aspect of the project managers’ job. This is also
true when it comes to safety where project managers depend on others to perform the work in
a safely manner, which signifies the importance of human skill. This paper argues that
emotional intelligence is essential for project managers to manage safety because it helps
project managers distinguish the emotional currents of others, thus enable them to use the
right strategies for encouraging others to achieve required safety standards. Further project
managers’ emotional intelligence and interpersonal skill work simultaneously to promote
teamwork and cooperation as well as motivate others to remain focus on safety issues. They
help project managers resolve conflicts that can hinder the attainment of safety goals.
Interpersonal skill is also essential for project managers to communicate to others concerning
the importance and necessity of safety measure implementation in the project. When it comes
to leadership, it has been discussed that project managers have to provide safety leadership by
performing their safety management tasks. They need to be the leaders in safety
implementation and set themselves as examples. With a strong leadership skill, project
managers can create a safety vision to bring project team members together and guide them
to do what must be done to create a safe working environment.
3.3 Political skill and safety
Political skill is “the ability to understand others at work and to use that knowledge to
influence others to act in ways that enhance one’s personal or organisational objectives”
(Ferris et al., 2005a: pp. 7). The main difference between political skill and human skill is
that political skill is specific to interaction aimed to achieve success in organisations. The
interactions can take place anywhere, but the main goal is always the organisational influence
and success. None of previous forms of human skill was developed explicitly to address
interpersonal interactions in organizational settings (Ferris et al., 2000). Political skill is a tool
and without it, a project manager can be really sincere and devoted to achieve project
objectives, but still find that people doubt his or her motives and withdraw from him or her.
Project managers are the focal points of interaction and political skill is particularly crucial
for them to interact with people outside their direct control, but who have impacts on project
success (Block, 1983).
Ferris et al. (2005a, b, 2007) proposed four key dimensions of political skill. Social
astuteness is the first dimension. It is argued that people with high political skill are astute
observers of others and they are keenly attuned to diverse social situations. They are also
sensitive to others, thus they are considered as ingenious and clever in dealing with others.
The second dimension is interpersonal influence. Another characteristic of people high in
political skill is their convincing personal style that exerts a strong influence to people around
them. They are flexible and they can appropriately adapt their behaviour to each situation in
order to extract certain responses from others. The third dimension of political skill is the
ability to develop and use diverse networks of people or networking ability. People included
in the networks are considered to hold assets deemed as valuable and necessary for attaining
successful personal and organisational functioning. People with high networking ability are
often expert negotiators, deal makers, and at ease with conflict management. The fourth and
the last political skill dimension is apparent sincerity. This competency is the key to influence
others because it focuses on the perceived intentions of certain behaviour exhibitions. The
influence attempts will be successful when there are no ulterior motives behind the behaviour
exhibited. People high in apparent sincerity inspire trust and confidence because they do not
appear to be manipulative or coercive.
There were many instances in which safety is relegated below other project objectives like
time and cost. This paper argues that by exercising their political skill, project managers are
able to demonstrate genuine interests towards safety, which will influence others, both project
team members and other stakeholders, to realise the importance of safety in the project, thus
convince them to put safety as equally important as other project objectives. Furthermore,
sometimes project stakeholders are unwilling to offer their help and support on safety unless
they perceive that it is in their interests to do so. Consequently, project managers need to use
political skill effectively to cultivate relationships with power holders and make the deals that
need to be made to improve and maintain safety performance (Pinto, 1998). That is, political
skill is a clever way to achieve behaviour coordination and eliminate many barriers that might
disrupt safety implementation. It inspires trust, confidence, and support as well as
orchestrates and facilitates the interaction among team members that can boost safety
performance (Ferris et al., 2007).
3.4 Technical skill and safety
Technical skill is the job-specific knowledge and techniques that are required to perform
specific tasks proficiently (Robbins et al., 2009). It involves specialised knowledge,
analytical ability within that specialty, and facility in the use of the tools and techniques of
the specific discipline (Katz, 1974). There are six components of technical skill (Sunindijo
and Zou, 2010). The first one is scheduling, which involves an understanding to determine
the dates when different activities will be performed, recognise activities that drive other
activities, and determine when the activities are due. Budgeting and cost management is the
second component and it involves determining the types and quantities of resources needed to
perform various project activities, developing cost estimation for all resources, allocating the
budget to individual work activities, and controlling changes to project budget.
Quality management is the third component, which includes activities such as identifying
relevant quality standards and determining how to meet them, evaluating project performance
periodically to provide confidence that the project will meet the standards, and monitoring
specific results to determine their compliance with the standards as well as finding ways to
eliminate unsatisfactory performance (Farooqui et al., 2008; PMI, 2008). The fourth
component is document and contract administration, an understanding of procedures for
implementing construction contracts according to the accepted practices and regulations
within the construction industry. In addition, it includes the setting up of management system
for keeping records and reports of daily activities (Fisk, 1997). The fifth component, risk
management involves five steps: establishing the context, risk identification, risk analysis,
risk evaluation, and risk treatment (Standards Australia, 2009). The last component is
procurement management, which includes the processes required to attain goods and services
from outside the organisation or from external parties, such as consultants, subcontractors,
vendors, and suppliers (PMI, 2008).
In relation to safety, project managers have to exercise their technical skill to ensure that
all site activities are performed in a proper and safe manner. For example, project managers
need to use their risk management skill to identify, evaluate, and manage safety risks. The
cost management and scheduling skill makes project managers realise the severe impacts of
accidents towards their project. With the procurement management skill, project managers
can evaluate tender submissions properly and award works to contractors that have offered a
reasonable price along with good safety records. Document and contract administration skill
is important to make sure that all documents, permits, audits, procedures, safe work method
statements, and policies about safety are processed and distributed in a timely manner to all
concerned people in a daily basis.
4 Discussion and implication
One of the roles of project managers is to provide safety leadership in their projects. In order
to provide this leadership, project managers need to perform their safety management tasks as
listed in Table 1. By performing these safety management tasks, it is argued that project
managers will promote the development of safety climate, an important indicator to measure
safety performance. This research further argues that essential project manager’s skills
comprising of conceptual, human, political, and technical skill, are what project managers
need to perform the safety management tasks effectively. Figure 4 demonstrates the
relationships between the three aspects. Project manager’s skills are the input and they
influence the performance of project manager’s safety leadership, which is expressed in the
form of the implementation of safety management tasks. When project managers perform
safety management tasks effectively, they will influence the output or safety climate in their
projects.
Figure 4 here
The implication of this paper is that project managers will have an understanding on how
they can contribute and influence safety in the projects under their management. Firstly,
project managers should have essential skills which include conceptual, human, political, and
technical skill. Then project managers need to be aware of safety management tasks that they
need to perform to provide safety leadership. Lastly, project managers can use safety climate
as a tool to measure safety performance in their projects. Similarly, construction
organisations can train their project managers to improve their essential skills as well as
including the safety management tasks and safety climate in their safety management system
to improve safety performance throughout the organisation.
5 Concluding remarks
Safety implementation in construction projects is crucial because it involves the wellbeing
and lives of people. Despite the advancement of technology and implementation of safety
management system, it is important to consider that people are the ones who use the
technology and implement the system. This situation causes problems because people tend to
make mistakes, thus it is important for safety research to focus on human aspect to improve
safety performance. Project manager is the key person in the project level and has an
important role in achieving safety goals. However, there is lack of studies that investigates
the influence of project manager’s skills on safety, thus this paper provides a theoretical
background to fill this research gap.
It has been discussed that the role of project managers is to provide safety leadership by
performing their safety management tasks. Essential project manager’s skills, which comprise
of conceptual, human, political, and technical skill, are required by project managers to
perform these safety management tasks effectively. Each skill including its components and
its roles towards safety has been discussed in this paper. As a concluding remark, this paper
argues that project manager’s skills support project managers in performing their safety
management tasks. Furthermore, the implementation of safety management tasks can
promote the development of safety climate, which will lead to safety performance
improvement, such as the elimination of unsafe acts and conditions as well as accident
prevention. Future studies on this area should focus on collecting empirical data to validate
the arguments proposed in this paper.
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Figure 1 Project constraints
Project stages
Design
Procurement Construction
Commissioning Handover
Initiation
Cost
Time
Quality
Safety
Project objectives
Sustainability
Top
Management Superiors/
Bosses Project team
members
Other
departments
Company culture System & technology
Organisation
Consultants/Designers Sub-contractors
Client
Laws & regulations Community General public
Task environment
Economic Political Sociocultural
Technology Global Demographic
External environment
Project
Figure 2 The role of project managers in safety
Top management supports
Safety culture
Safety management system
Project manager performs
safety management tasks to
provide safety leadership
Safety climate development
Elimination of unsafe acts
and unsafe conditions
Accident prevention
Project level
Safety improvement
Organisation level
Figure 3 Essential skills for project managers (Source: Sunindijo and Zou, 2010)
Project
manager’s skills
Conceptual
skill
Human
skill
Political
skill Technical
skill
Visioning Scoping
Integration
Emotional
intelligence
Interpersonal
skill
Leadership
Social
astuteness
Interpersonal
influence
Networking
ability
Apparent
sincerity
Scheduling
Budgeting
Quality
management
Document &
contract mgt
Risk
management
Procurement
management
Figure 4 Relationships between project manager’s skills, safety management tasks, and safety
climate
Input
Project manager’s skills:
- Conceptual skill
- Human skill
-Political skill
-Technical skill
Process
Implementation of safety
management tasks to provide
safety leadership
Output
Development of
safety climate
Table 1 Project manager’s safety management tasks (Source: Dingsdag et al., 2006)
Category
Safety management tasks
Proactively identify, assess, and
determine appropriate controls
for safety risks
• Carry out project risk assessments.
• Consider and perform safety reviews for
constructability, operability, and maintenance.
• Undertake formal safety review of tenders.
• Develop project safety management plans.
• Develop project safety procedures and instructions.
• Carry out workplace and task hazard identification,
assessments, and control (Safe Work Method
Statement).
Effectively communicate and
consult with stakeholders
regarding safety risks
• Provide general safety information and provide basic
safety instruction.
• Deliver site/workplace-specific induction.
• Facilitate group safety discussions and meetings.
• Plan and deliver toolbox talks.
• Participate in site safety committee.
• Consult on and resolve safety issues.
• Speak to senior management about safety issues in
the workplace.
• Challenge unsafe behaviours/attitude at any level
when encountered.
• Make site visits and speak directly to workers about
safety in the workplace.
• Recognise and reward people who have positively
impacted on safety.
Monitor, report, review, and
evaluate safety program
effectiveness
• Carry out formal incident investigations.
• Carry out basic project safety system element audits.
• Carry out formal inspections of workplace and work
tasks.
Engage with subcontractors in
safety performance management
• Monitor subcontractor safety activities.
• Identify and include suitable safety requirements into
subcontractor packages.
• Evaluate safety performance of subcontractors.
Identify and implement relevant
components of the safety and
workers’ compensation
management system
• Understand and apply general legislative safety
requirements.
• Apply full working knowledge of the organisation’s
safety management system.
Provide leadership and manage
staff and subcontractor safety
performance
• Mentor staff and follow their progress in relation to
safety.
• Conduct employee safety performance appraisals.
• Work with staff to solve safety problems.
• Discipline staff for poor safety behaviours and
attitude.
• Recruit and select new staff.
