Safety Brings You Home

It’s more than a slogan; it’s our promise to our workers and their families.

There’s no denying that construction can be a dangerous job. According to data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS), the construction industry had the highest number of fatalities for any field in 2022.[1] That year there were 1,069 workers who didn’t come home to their families one night. That means thousands of loved ones left to grieve, thousands of coworkers affected by the loss of a comrade, and an incalculable loss of knowledge, experience, labor, and potential.

When we say that safety is our priority at Jaynes, we mean it. Because we know all too well that following safety protocols isn’t a matter of evading fines or ticking off a box on a to-do list. It’s what ensures we all have a chance to go home to our loved ones at the end of every day.

Our Zero-Incident Culture

Construction comes with inherent jobsite risks. Massive, specialized equipment, structural components, and sophisticated tools and processes all mean when something goes wrong, the consequences can be severe. So how much risk is acceptable? How many incidents are allowable?

At Jaynes, we believe that number is zero.

That doesn’t mean we’re perfect. But it does mean that we operate on the belief that every accident is preventable, and where an incident occurs, it means we need to take a hard look at our safety procedures to see why that happened and how to stop it from ever happening again.

Part of that means paying close attention to even minor or seemingly inconsequential incidents. It also means creating a culture of mutual accountability, where we all share the weight of keeping our teammates safe each day.

Learning from Near-Misses

OSHA recommends investigating every incident that occurs, including near-misses and close calls—those events that could have had a worse outcome if the circumstances had been slightly different.[2] This is a recommendation we follow and something we fold into our processes, because a minor problem or close call is often a warning sign of potential danger.

More often than not, for a truly serious incident to occur, multiple failures need to have piled up. This is because safety protocols and procedures layer in ways that there should never be a single point of failure.

But knowing that is not permission to rest on our laurels and become complacent. If one element is ignored or bypassed, or if it does not function as intended, we need to identify it, ask why, and find a better solution. Root cause analysis, which looks deeper than the surface explanation of how something occurred, is a vital part of upholding our zero-incident ideal.

Safety Is All of Our Responsibility

Understanding jobsite risks and building safety protocols is important, but it’s meaningless if we’re not all committed to keeping each other safe.

Part of our zero-incident policy is keeping the focus on prevention rather than blame. It’s a proactive approach, looking ahead to future incidents and finding solutions to problems that may arise. It also centers what’s most important: the safety of each person on the site.

A culture of blame erodes trust. It encourages people to hide their mistakes and dwell in defensiveness rather than promoting accountability and communication. It’s vital that every worker be empowered to watch for potential risks, speak up about potential hazards, and act on problems as they arise.

Safety isn’t always the most exciting thing to talk about. Sometimes it can feel like harping on the same point, obsessing over a minor detail or making a big deal out of something small. But it’s that exact intensity that means we all get to go home to our families each night.

That’s The Jaynes Way.

SOURCES:

1 – Construction had the most fatalities of any industry last year. Construction Dive.

2 – Incident Investigation. OSHA.

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