"If you cannot measure it, you cannot improve it": Measuring health and safety performance in the construction industry

The Australian construction industry has traditionally relied on 'lagging' indicators of health and safety performance. Lagging indicators, including lost time injury rates, are limited in usefulness because they rely on after the fact recording of statistically low probability events. They are subject to random variation, which can provoke 'knee jerk' reactions immediately following a reportable incident and encourage management complacency when no reportable incidents have occurred for a period of time. An update is provided on the development of a multi-level measurement method, which combines 'leading' safety performance indicators and safety climate measures. It is argued that leading performance indicators and climate measures can (in combination with lagging indicators) provide a more comprehensive analysis of health and safety performance in the construction industry. The opportunities for internal (between project) and external (between organization) benchmarking of health and safety performance are discussed.