Speaking up about safety concerns in high-risk industries: Correlates of safety voice in the offshore oil rig sector

Abstract

Speaking up about safety issues – or safety voice – is a proactive response involving people at all levels of the organization who are willing to express their concern in response to perceived hazards. This study investigated psychosocial correlates of safety voice and effects of safety voice on safety measures. Drawing on Job Demand Resources theory (JD-R) we suggested that job resources in the form of supportive leadership and job control are positively associated to safety voice and that job demands are negatively associated with safety voice. Furthermore, we studied the association between safety voice and the outcome variables safety risk and personal injuries. Data were derived from the “Trends in risk level in the petroleum activity” (RNNP) survey and included 7505 respondents from the Norwegian offshore oil rig sector. As hypothesized, we found a negative association between job demands and safety voice and positive associations between safety voice and the resource variables leader support and job control. Moreover, safety voice behaviour was negatively associated with the outcome variables safety risk and personal injuries. An implication from these findings is that safety voice should be encouraged in the high-risk industries by nurturing healthy work environments in which employees have the capacity and support to speak up to prevent hazards.