The unintended consequences of no blame ideology for incident investigation in the US construction industry

Abstract

A ‘no blame’ approach within incident investigations is common practice across many industries. It seeks to optimize worker engagement with the process, enhancing information collection and subsequent organizational learning from any incidents that do occur. Workers are assured they will not be blamed for accidents when they swiftly report and fully comply with investigations. A no blame ideology has been widely adopted across the US construction industry, yet it can bring unintended consequences to aspects of the investigative process that, ironically, can also limit organizational learning. Discourse analysis of n = 34 empirical incident investigation simulated interview transcripts, carried out with construction safety experts in an experimental setting, revealed a discourse we termed ‘new blame’ that detrimentally influenced and shaped investigation interviews. The discourse renders interviewers reluctant to unpack the people in the process, and instead directs focus on things easily blamed without consequence, such as inanimate objects, organizational procedures, or paperwork. Yet without understanding of how workers interact with their work, and what went wrong this time, learning is inevitably limited. At its most extreme, ‘new blame’ takes incident investigation back to ‘Acts of God’; people absolved from any and all responsibility. As no blame is likely to endure, awareness and acknowledgement of such unintended consequences is essential to ensure ‘new blame’ is not hindering learning from incidents and thus the enhancement of occupational safety in the future.