The Boeing Blower Effect - Whistleblowing for Workplace Health Safety Issues

Not once have I seen an article that discusses the impact & implications of the newly imparted Whistleblowing laws & Workplace Health and Safety Issues.

As a leader in your business - How "across" safety & possible deep or even shallow issues are you?

What do you know about your teams, safety, environment & quality; are there issues that have been raised & squashed... maybe we should've asked that of the very public issue of the Boeing 737 Max .

A 30 year Boeing employee - whom never in a million "yes sir - no sir - years" would we have expected him to bleed Boeing Green on Blue....

The business missed their greatest public enemy - from within!

In a business culture such as Boeing with many ex defence; this kind of cultural act to "Whistleblow" is a huge step and makes me think that other businesses with a different employment culture would be much more vulnerable to the same fate as they don't have the same master commander business flavour and probably face a much higher turn over than businesses such as Boeing.

Let's add a level of complexity... High Reliability Organisation...

Boeing is also perceived as a "high reliability organisation" when it comes to safety - systems and processes and regulation - they are well beyond the small to medium levels a "normal" or non-airline style work system works within or operates.

There is whole books and articles written adorning the shimmer and shine of how perfect the systems can be;

In short HROs feature;

• Hyper complexity and tight coupling: the organisation is characterised by a variety of components and systems, which are interdependent and its processes are unpredictable (due to their complexity) and difficult to interrupt (Perrow, 1984).
• Existence of extremely hierarchical structures with clear roles and responsibilities.
• Redundancy whereby several individuals make decisions and oversee important operations.
• High levels of accountability with expectations regarding strict adherence to procedures and ‘getting it right first time’ and substandard performance is not tolerated.
• Compressed time factors whereby major activities need to take place in seconds (e.g. naval flight operations).

But if the risk is here for Whistleblowing in a HRO then it is even GREATER at Non High Reliability Organisation as we don't feature some of the greatest aspects of of a HRO as per McKinsey.

Is your Business Ready for The Boeing Blower Effect?

To be honest I'm not yet sure that businesses are ready for the real impacts of our new Whistleblower laws and I know that we are not yet ready to admit we too could easily face the "Boeing Blower Effect"...

How many disgruntled employees do you have - who knows too much...?

How big is your risk?

Do you know if you have green, blue, yellow or red risk employees?

The "Green on Blue" refers to Army terms - The Phrase "green on blue" is a derivative of an earlier phrase "blue on blue", referring to firing on one's own or otherwise friendly forces. The colour blue is used for friendly forces, green for neutral forces, yellow for unknown and red for hostile forces.

VOLUME: The Size of the Macro Whistleblowing Risk

All public companies (including charities & NFPs), "large" proprietary companies (as defined in legislation) & trustees of "registrable superannuation entities" (not trustees of SMSFs) must have a specific whistleblower policy in place by 1 January 2020.

The requirement carries a penalty for non-compliance, and applies to:

• public companies;
• large proprietary companies (characterised by having any two of the following: $50+ million in consolidated revenue; $25+ million or more in consolidated gross assets; or 100+ employees);
• registerable superannuation entities.

We checked some numbers:

According to Grant Thornton 1% of the 2,672,325 companies registered in Australia (ASIC data of registrations March 2019 ) are these kind of businesses with $50m - $500m = 26,723 companies

Publically Listed Companies in Australia - top 20 businesses account for 952,903 workers - there are 2190 listed companies today;

There are 57,417 registered charities in Australia; in December 2017 the statistics sited by the Treasury.gov.au whilst reviewing Charities and NFP ACNA Legislation it was said that they employ more than 1.3 million people and engage 3 million Australians in volunteering their time and effort to helping others; a number that could be said as 6 million volunteers when the broader not for-profit sector is considered. The same report suggested approximately 257,000 non-profit organisations operating in Australia.

The NFP sector encompasses over 600,000 organisations - from large to very small - and employs well over one million staff (around 10% of all employees in Australia) according to https://treasury.gov.au/sites/default/files/2019-03/CCA-310865.pdf

If we consult the Australian Bureau of Statistics the number of people employed in November 2019 is 12,954,400; 10% = 129,544 people plus volunteers = 6.1295 MILLION people.

In total October 2019, there are approximately 12,960,500 employed people in Australia (ABS trend data).

So we thing that the number of employees within Australian businesses who were under an active whistleblower policy last year was around 7% and now is estimated at around 75%... check the numbers for yourself...

75% Easily of which about was 7% now know about Whistleblowing = this represents an increase of 650%.

So if all of these new people are at their usual establishments - facebook, the pub the shopping centres and everyone is just hearing about this now - you can bet that we are about to face a storm of newly informed employees who have something in common to talk with each other about their work!

TIMING: Everyone is Supposed to be Trained Already or Right Now...!

From 1 January 2020 the new requirements start for your Whistleblower Policy

So it could be expected that 68% of Australian workers are being newly trained in the following....

To comply with section 1317AI, the policy must contain:

• the protections available to whistleblowers;
• how and to whom an individual can make a disclosure;
• how the company will support and protect whistleblowers;
• how investigations into a disclosure will proceed;
• how the company will ensure fair treatment of employees who are mentioned in whistleblower disclosures; and
• how the policy will be made available.

Further - ASX-listed companies should also consider the ASX Corporate Governance Principles and Recommendations, which further recommends that policies:

• link to the company’s values;
• identify the types of concerns that may be reported under the policy;
• provide for the training of employees about the policy and their rights and obligations under it;
• provide for the training of managers and others who may receive whistleblower reports about how to respond to them; and
• state that the policy will be periodically reviewed to check that it is operating effectively and whether any changes are required to the policy.

WHY NOW: Why does it matter for Workplace Health & Safety - People could have reported to the Inspectors Already I hear you say...?

The majority of workers who already "Whistleblow..." by calling to WHS Inspectors to their own worksites - work in High Risk Businesses; often with many inductions, training and know all the laws - Construction and Manufacturing for example and are often unionised workforces.

This action will mean that any person who didn't know they could - can now be part of the Boeing Blower Effect - YOU'VE even trained them to do so... because it was required by law...

Often training is very ethical, very topical, it includes the greatest whistleblower stories of all time....

This is an ethical conundrum for the some of the best employees and the business - as the more ethical your employee is; if the business doesn't respond appropriately to their concerns - the more legally compelled they are required to report the issue!

Greater risk is when uninformed players, who set to benefit from being seen to provide assistance in Whistleblowing to other parties for more membership or political gains for their firms/organisation will also start to challenge and assist maybe your Green Sleeper...

The next challenge is when our No Win No Fee Legal Industry works up "Operation Whistleblower" - any way possible to make a further $20k per person as they walk through the door!

HELP: How do I Calm the Storm?

How can I control the Greens...? how can we prevent this kind of event at our workplace!

It's really is about having an organisation that is willing to listen - one that is open to hearing and having the hard conversations - this will only start at the top and Boards and business owners should consider this following suggestions to see how they could reduce their possible exposure.

For some businesses it might be prudent to take this specific article in and line of thought, to your Safety, Environment and Quality teams and ask them....

What will be our Blue on Green Event?... Tell me what will bite us?

What is our Front Page - Front Cover Story?

If you are not sure you have the right business maturity right now for this conversation you may benefit from an external review for Legal Compliance.

What is your businesses level of understanding of your Safety Governance?

How long has it been since your people undertook Directors and Officers Training for WHS - if it was in 2010... a lot has changed since even last year legally for WHS Laws Australia wide.. its time to refresh - but with a course that takes in the new requirements.

How long has it been since you took up a true Risk Review to Legal Compliance not a Safety Accreditation Audit, not a Self Insurance Audit not an Internal Audit to your system by your usual Auditor?

Who checked your system even meets the new laws?

How is your communication and internal reporting lines?- Is it to please or are we open to ripping off the bandaid and getting the real work done to identify and address risk which means your internal staff are not 30 years disgruntled before they explore on BBC news the Blue on Green...

We are far from immune because that is the USA and this is Australia... close to home the Dreamworld Incident sights a record of a letter from the Engineering Manager who recorded the risk issues prior to the incident and pre ASX requirements for Whistleblowing Policies... change the date - how would have the incident altered...

Unfortunately - It really doesn’t matter what is your policy how much good you do - when the whistleblower gets the media’s attention the real story becomes theirs!

The financial implications are astounding and debilitating.

Time to write your own storylines with black white and purple - time to "all up" for your businesses approach to your risk. 

Time to empty your bottom draws and check the deleted files before that’s not "your John" on BBC News... giving you a "Boeing Blower Effect".