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Leadership Styles and Safety
Do Certain Leadership Skills Reduce Workplace Injuries?
April 23, 2009
Wendy L. Stein
Research Concepts and Skills
Clemson University

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Leadership Styles and Safety
Abstract
This research project examines certain leadership skills and the effect those
skills have on workplace safety performance. The purpose of this research is
to define leadership skills and explore the relationship with current safety
practices, culture, and outlines statistical reporting requirements by the
Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA). According to the
article, “Transforming Safety Culture”, Simon and Cistaro, published in the
April 2009 issue of Professional Safety, Top Management’s buy-in of safety
and establishing an organizational safety culture is not the only key to a
successful safety record. The article claims leadership initiatives must be
put in play in order to facilitate the change for a positive safety culture.
The focus of the research is to align first line supervisor’s skills and
their abilities to be creative in their initiatives for safety and promotion
of the safety culture.
The energy and manufacturing sectors have expended considerable research
dollars in determining the importance of the leadership factor for
organizational safety effectiveness, Flin and Yule, 2004. Although senior
management has the most influence on the safety culture of the organization,
that same management must focus that influence down to the supervisor who is
in fact ultimately responsible for enhancing the safety culture by
cultivating it and allowing it to grow on the front line.
The outcome of this research suggests that when recruiting supervisors, the
selection, hiring and promotion practices should incorporate a requirement to
look for specific leadership traits, primarily transformational leadership,
in order to foster the current safety culture, attitudes and attributes.

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Leadership Styles and Safety
Safety leadership is really about setting the example and leading by the
example that is set. What types of traits do safety leaders harbor? What
are important safety goals? How well does the supervisor achieve their
safety goals? And, what types of leadership techniques do those supervisor’s
employ to influence subordinates? This research will reveal that the
transformational leader is more instrumental in achieving safety goals than
the transactional leader.

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Leadership Styles and Safety
Do Certain Leadership Skills Reduce Workplace Injuries?
Numerous definitions exist as to, “What makes a leader” “What traits
define a leader?” The military’s description of primary leadership goals,
(many still believe a leader must be born), are that the basic non-
commissioned officer’s leadership skills must be present and are necessary to
be effective, the list goes on. Wikpedia and other web based definitions
focus on the visionary, the one who sets the example, the one who puts all
others needs before his, or the one who is action oriented. In a health and
safety setting the word leadership is broadened to encompass certain duties
such as, legal and statutory compliance, organizational core values, and
someone who can influence others to adopt those behaviors. The general
consensus in the safety leadership can be loosely defined as, “A supervisor
who possesses knowledge, skills and the aptitude necessary to fulfill a job
requirement, and will put safety at the forefront of every task or
assignment. The safety leader strives toward continuous improvement, and is
able to influence subordinates into thinking safety and acting safely, thus
reducing workplace injuries. A list of leadership skills and requirements
was noted by Health and Safety several years ago, but one factor that hasn’t
changed is a heightened requirement for increased training of leaders. This
study was based on the safety results of a transactional leader versus a
transformational leader.
The act of punishment and rewards between a supervisor and a
subordinate is a “transaction”. The transactional leader gets tasks done by
focusing on persuading their employees to perform well by promising rewards
in the form of pay increases or bonuses. The employee who does not perform
well receives no rewards and may be penalized by receiving disciplinary

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Leadership Styles and Safety
actions and/or a suspension of pay. This type of leader may focus on
workplace standards and procedures, and pay little attention to subordinates
unless a problem arises. When the leader does not control the rewards and
penalties it can and usually does result in ineffective performance by all
parties concerned where safety is concerned.
The transformational leader puts their employee’s needs above his/her
own. This leader uses charisma and power to influence employees into wanting
to do a good job, taking pride in their work, and looking after each other
where high hazards exist, this type of intangible reward focuses on behaviour
and praise. The relationship requires a good deal of trust in the leader on
the part of the subordinate. Employees focus on the leader’s behavior and in
an effort to please him/her and their co-workers strive to be the very best
employee possible. The employee will put out the “extra mile” if they
believe in their leader. Bernard Bass (2000) maintains that a
transformational leader “intellectually stimulates” their employees by
challenging them to be the best at what they do. The leader teaches new ways
of doing things and inspires his employees to be creative in their approach
to completing assigned tasks.
The research and performance evaluations studied by different
researchers suggest that a transformational leader can be developed
regardless of their level in the organization. Correlations between a
successful safety record and the transformational leader have been noted
through the Multifactor Leadership Questionnaire (Bass 2000) and through
review of performance records of successful safety leaders. Studies note
that transformational leaders are more likely to take the lead in the

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Leadership Styles and Safety
organizational safety programs, thus are more visibly recognizable and
therefore respected by both supervisors and subordinates across the board.
A study of 228 employees of a large engineering firm was completed and
leadership skills were ranked on the Multifactor Leadership Questionnaire
(MLQ). Employees were asked which supervisors would they be most inclined to
put forth extra effort for. Supervisors were ranked from one to four star
leaders, four being the highest ranked transformational leaders. 22% to 24%
of one star leaders had employees who stated they frequently exerted more
effort on the job than what was required of them. An overwhelming 75% to 82%
of employees stated they frequently went the extra mile for the four star
transformational leaders (Bass 2000).
Many scholars and proponents of the behavior based safety (BBS) culture
are demonstrative in their view, a positive organizational safety culture
must begin at Top Management. The first argument is, the first line
supervisor is instrumental in persuading the employee to buy into the culture
and vision, ultimately demonstrating the success of the culture through a
reduction in workplace injuries. The safety message can be the same, but the
face to face individual reinforcement the transformational leader provides to
subordinates is indicative by the reduction in workplace injuries.
A study conducted by Dov Zohar, (Journal of Organizational Behavior
2002) on the relationship between a safety climate and leadership, suggested
that both transactional and transformational leadership had an impact on
safety behavior among workplace employees. This study by was conducted
almost simultaneously with a study by Hoffman and Morgeson (1999). Zohar
studied the relationship of leaders and subordinates based on the supervisor

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Leadership Styles and Safety
having a genuine concern for well being of employee safety before production
The supervisor’s response to safe versus unsafe acts could lead to a
predictor of workplace injuries. Hoffman and Morgeson conducted their study
on a leader’s commitment to safety and that relationship to safety records.
The results of the two studies led to a mediation model which states that
“job performance has direct safety implications, the quality of leader-member
interaction influences the leader’s concern for members’ welfare, which in
turn influences the safety-climate perception within the group, hence the
safety behavior of the group” (Bass, 1990; Fairhurst 1993, 2000).
The overall premise of the studies is that a management and leaders
must exhibit a genuine concern for safety and the well being of subordinates.
People want to know their leaders and company management care about their
well being. Keeping this in the forefront will subsequently yield the fruit
of open discussion around routine tasks and their associated risks; as well
as, high risk tasks which may require deeper discussion and assessments of
the associated hazards. Transformational leaders that can foster this type
of trusting relationship with subordinates can predict a reduction in their
workplace injury rates. Where safety is demonstrated as the priority over
production, the group is more likely to perform safely and look out for each
other’s safety. The perception and relationship will eventually lead to a
positive safety culture promoted and endorsed by Top Management. Of the 49
initial workgroups at a manufacturing plant Zohar studied, 42 groups
completed the entire study. Injury rates were recorded and calculated by on-
site medical practitioners; Safety surveys were distributed to each member of
the workgroups to assess safety leadership. The surveys measured tasks and
the associated risks and the Preventive Action (PA) factor of supervisor’s

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concern for well being, safety directives, and actions related to safety
being a priority over production. A five point scale assigned values from
“completely agree” to “completely disagree”. The results indicated that
supervisors who report to the same superior had varying ratings with respect
to safety being a priority over production. When the focus was put on high
hazard tasks both leadership styles assumed an ordinal order. Zohar’s
Hypothesis I - Transformational leadership will be positively related to the
safety climate (culture) and was shown to have a positive relationship.
Hypothesis II - The safety climate will mediate the relationship between
leadership and workplace injury. However, the results did not yield a
reduction in injury based on the climate differences between transactional
and transformational leaders; although it did indicate that a positive safety
climate was positively related to the level of hazard and indirectly to
leadership style. These findings could be indicative of a heightened level
of awareness, which as a result was noted and reported on yearly performance
evaluations. Whereas, the transformational leader has a more open
communication process – promoting safety through the expression of the well
being of subordinates, Komaki (1998) stresses the importance that
transactional supervision is necessary “because effective monitoring and
rewards...is needed to maintain reliable performance during routine job
operations”. Safety priority was assigned a scale rating of one to five with
questions ranging from, “supervisor turns a blind eye to safety, as long as
there are no injuries” to statements like “supervisor was angry when he
witnessed an unsafe act”. The pattern indicated that transformational
leadership in respect to concern for others and closer personal relationships
among supervisor’s and subordinates promote a higher respect for safety

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practices and should lead to lower injury rates. Zohar suggests that future
research be conducted on the leadership-safety relationship.
Research conducted by Odea and Flin (2001) on offshore oil sites,
studied the managers experience level, style of leadership, and their safety
attitudes and beliefs. A questionnaire survey was used to study 36
organizations operating on the United Kingdom Continental Shelf, which
consisted of 157 sites. The questionnaire focused on experience, leadership
style, accident causation factors, safety climate, safety leadership, five
main outstanding safety issues, and data analysis. Their findings revealed
that experience had little to do with their leadership style or safety
attitudes. However, the study did point out that direct style leadership and
those with the least experience overestimated their capability in persuading
and influencing the workforce. Some Site Managers were aware of their
responsibility to safety; however, they had little influence over their
subordinates to behave safely, and often did not make on the spot corrections
regarding safety matters. An interesting correlation was found to exist, in
that a positive relationship between superior and subordinate open
communications in regard to safety accidents and near misses almost always
resulted in fewer workplace accidents. More than 50% of the Site Managers
preferred an authoritarian type of leadership style. Again, this study was
attempting to predict workplace injuries based on leadership style and
organizational culture.
Hale and Hovden, 1998, highlighted an array of managerial behaviors,
which have been linked back to safety studies that are interwoven with
positive safety cultures. They claim that the broad spanning term
“managements commitment to safety” be replaced with the term ‘participative

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management’. The critical focus in participative management is that
management actually gets involved in work and safety practices.
One common factor in these studies is the desire to enhance human
resources in the recruitment, selection, hiring, and promotion phases. The
assumption being that while studies can predict the type of leader that can
effectively reduce workplace injuries, inspire, educate, and develop a
productive workforce, everything else will fall into place.
After reviewing the cited research on the relationship between
leadership style and workplace injury reduction, I conclude that more studies
need to be conducted to validate more of the proposed hypothesis. The
occupational health and safety fields are currently being bogged down by
unreasonable targets and objectives that are based solely on days away from
work and restricted duty. The studies revealed interesting approaches on
human behavior and the direct relationship to workplace accidents. This
approach to leadership focus is quite different than the traditional approach
of engineering controls and constant work-site monitoring which typically
invalidate the role of the first line supervisor. The future possibility
that certain leadership styles may in fact reduce workplace injuries,
creating the ultimate safe working environment is hopeful.

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References
Avolio BJ, Bass BM, Jung DI. 1999. Re-examining the components of
transformational and transactional leadership using the MLQ. Journal of
Occupational and Organizational Psychology 72: 441-462.
Bass BM. 2002. From transactional to transformational leadership:
Learning to share the vision. Organizational Dynamics 23: 19-31.
Catchpole, K. (2009). Who do we blame when it all goes wrong? Quality
and Safety Health Care 18: 3-4.
Fairhurst GT. 2000. The leader-follower communication. In Handbook of
Organizational Communication, 2nd edn. Jablin F, Putnam L (eds). Sage: Newbury
Park, CA.
Hoffman DA, Morgeson FP. 1999. Safety-related behavior as a social
exchange: the role of perceived organizational support and leader-member
exchange. Journal of Applied Psychology 84: 286-296.
Komaki JL. 1998. Leadership from an Operant Perspective. Routledge: New
York.
O’Dea A. Flin R. 2001. Site managers and safety leadership in offshore
oil and gas industry. Safety Science 37: 39-57.
Reason JT. Managing the Risks of Organizational Accidents. Aldershot,
U.K: Ashgat

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Zohar D. 2002. The effects of leadership dimensions, safety climate,
and assigned priorities on minor injuries in work groups. Journal of
Organizational Behavior. 23: 75-92.