Communication Skills Contribute to Culture of Safety

With a goal of creating a culture of culture of safety, Arizona Public Service Company (APS) wanted to improve communications at one of the utility's generation stations. Employing nearly 2,500 people, the Palo Verde Generation Station had two primary objectives: to foster open communication by encouraging employees to raise concerns, and to create a welcoming environment for concerns by building specific managerial skills and behaviors. Peter Rail, who was the Employee Concerns Department Leader, wanted to change the culture so that managers would be more responsive and prompt in handling employee concerns. He also wanted the plant managers to understand employee rights with regard to raising issues. To build this environment, managers and employees alike needed to develop new communication skills.

The Approach:

APS partnered with ELI to deliver the Safely Speaking for Managers^® and Safely Speaking^® for Employees programs to all supervisors and front-line employees at Palo Verde. The programs were implemented as elements of an overarching cultural change strategy that included several key initiatives designed to firmly anchor a new culture that would encourage employees to express their concerns. For optimum results and to further the impact on the culture, APS chose to certify several internal instructors in the Safely Speaking series, and these instructors then delivered the training jointly with ELI professional instructors.

 How the Learning Has Made a Difference:

According to Rail, the implementation has given their supervisors “a broader understanding of their responsibilities and of management’s expectations.” Prior to implementing the training, the Employee Concerns Department had six representatives and engineers who investigated issues – particularly nuclear safety issues – raised by employees. Rail reports that in the two years following the training, the number of issues dropped considerably, necessitating only two representatives to handle incoming concerns. “I believe that the ELI training has contributed substantially to that change, because it has improved communications between supervisors and employees. Employees are comfortable raising safely concerns to their front-line supervisors in a manner encouraged by both APS and the Nuclear Regulatory Commission. These concerns are being addressed at that level, rather than through a third party.”