Simmons Foods

Do Traditional Safety Metrics Tell the Full Story?

In high-performing manufacturing companies, we take pride in repeatable and reliable results. The line runs, product ships and the team delivers. The production process seems to be working the way it was designed. But we need to look for a hidden risk that tends to creep into even the best organizations, one that may not be obvious when we look at overall safety performance. It is called the “Normalization of Deviation,” and it can turn “the way we do things” into something more dangerous than it appears to casual observation.

Normalization of Deviation is not a new concept; it has been discussed often by safety practitioners and educators.  Normalization of Deviation happens gradually. It’s not the result of one bad decision, but rather a series of small shifts over time. A step gets skipped. A shortcut gets taken. A workaround becomes routine. Because nothing immediately goes wrong, these behaviors begin to feel acceptable, maybe even more efficient. Eventually, what was never intended to be the standard for doing the work “the right way” becomes the standard.

I feel most of us can say with a high degree of certainty that Team Members do not come to work intending to break rules and put themselves at risk. This concept is not about being careless or having blatant disregard. It’s about a process or a system drifting. It’s about how people who are doing their best to succeed at their assignment, adapt to what seems to work or helps them in the moment.

When a task is completed repeatedly without incident, that reinforces the belief that the method is safe. Leaders in manufacturing environments understand that new Team Members learn by observation, not just instruction. If they see experienced Team Members skipping steps or modifying procedures they were instructed to follow, they naturally assume that’s the real standard. Over time, written procedures, work instructions and job hazard analyses lose their authority and are replaced by work habits and tribal knowledge.

Challenging Normalized Risk and Redefining Safety

This is where the concern lies. Everyone has heard the saying, “Hope is not a strategy.” We know that being lucky or fortunate is not a control. If the definition of a successful production run depends on “nothing going wrong” to be considered safe, that alone may be unsafe and Team Members are exposed to risk.

Normalization of Deviation often shows up in ways that feel small by themselves but carry significant risk:

• Basic PPE gets skipped for a “quick task” or “just a sec.”

• Lockout/Tagout (hazardous energy control) steps are shortened because “we know this machine.”

• Guards are bypassed to keep production moving or are adjusted to fix a possible quality issue while machines are running.

• Shortcuts are taken because “we’ve always done it this way.”

Different scenarios. Same underlying issue: taking risk has been normalized.

And here’s the most important truth we must remember:

The absence of an incident does not mean the presence of safety.

Just because a task hasn’t hurt someone yet does not mean it won’t. In fact, it often means the opposite simply hasn’t failed yet. If a process only works because nothing has gone wrong, it isn’t proven safe. It’s untested under failure.

A People First culture demands that we challenge “normal” when normal drifts away from safe.

That responsibility starts with leadership on the floor, every shift, every day.

Supervisors, superintendents, and managers have one of the most powerful tools available: pre-shift conversation. In just 3 to 5 minutes, leaders can reset expectations and surface risks that might otherwise go unnoticed.

“Working safely must not be part of a rallying tagline.”

Start by asking a simple, honest question: “Is there anything we will do today because it’s easier or faster, not because it’s the safest way?”

This question opens the door. It gives permission to speak up. It signals that safety isn’t about blame, it’s about awareness.

Reinforce what matters

The standard is the defined work instructions and the work procedure, not what we’ve gotten away with. If changes must be made to the procedure, evaluate them; if they improve the way the task is done, put them into the standard. Re-educate the entire team in a new way to perform these tasks.

Most importantly, observe the work effectively and frequently. To do that, make sure you, as the observer, understand what doing the work the right way is supposed to look like. Watch the work as it is being done. Look for any shortcuts that may have slowly become “just the way we do it.”

Those are the moments where leadership makes the difference.

Working safely must not be part of a rallying tagline. It is the non-negotiable imperative—the expectation for how work will be done, with no exception. This expectation must be continually reinforced. As managers and leaders, we are obliged to look at and verify that this expectation is occurring. If we observe work being done differently than what is expected, we owe it to the team to determine whether changes are appropriate; if not, we must correct them immediately.

Ultimately, “Situation Normal—Working Safe” is true only if we have done our due diligence by identifying the specific requirements for how to do the work, educating Team Members on those requirements, and observing the work being done the correct way.