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ERASMUS, B.J. and MUNROE, M. Lonmin’s innovative approach to safety: ’safety focus on leading indicators’. The 6th International Platinum
Conference, ‘Platinum–Metal for the Future’, The Southern African Institute of Mining and Metallurgy, 2014.
Lonmin’s innovative approach to safety: ’safety focus on
leading indicators’
B.J. ERASMUS and M. MUNROE
Lonmin
Lonmin Mining's safety journey has reached a lost time injury frequency of 0.71, which represents
an 80.4% improvement during the past five years. At current performance levels, making use of
lagging indicators will not drive further safety improvements. An EXCO decision has been taken
to adopt a more daring approach, and focus on leading indicators and predictive analysis in our
journey towards zero harm.
The ICMM Leading Indicator Guideline defines and re-iterates:
‘With the well-being of people in the mining industry an overriding priority, prevention of harm
is a core driver of management approaches to OHS’. The closer an organization gets to “zero
harm, as measured using lagging indicators, the more difficult it is to ensure safety through
tracking lagging performance, and to determine whether it is luck or design that is keeping
numbers low (Step Change in Safety, n.d.); confidence intervals are infinitely wide for rare events,
including catastrophic accidents (i.e. low-probability, high-consequence events) (Grabowski
2006). It is therefore unreliable to make any generalized causal inference from too few data
points (Hopkins 2007). Management efforts should preferably be focused on more frequently
measurable leading indicators of precursor circumstances. Moreover, lagging indicators have
lost their ability to motivate or influence measurable safety performance improvement (Broadbent
and Arnold, 2011c). For a leading indicator to contribute to achieving zero harm there needs to
be a reliable and valid cause and effect relationship established between the leading indicator
and OHS performance (Janicak, 2003). The further away from the undesired outcome (such as a
safety incident) a leading indicator is identified up the causal pathway, the better the chance of
addressing the shortcomings that might result in the incident, but the more difficult it is to identify
causality (CCPS, 2008). This is because OHS outcomes can result from an accumulation of
multiple causes.’
To successfully adopt leading indicators across Lonmin’s mining operations a change
management process needed to be carefully considered, which included design criteria and
business information management flow optimization, which would support the safety strategy. It
is vital that the implementation of leading indicators is not experienced by mining leaders and
managers as an ad hoc and add-on ‘flavour-of-the-month’ initiative, but is truly integrated and
supports the mining teams’ values and behaviours.
To continue with sustained improvement, the implementation of leading indicators in all the
mining operations has proven to be a positive step in the right direction. It is clear that this bold
initiative is similar to sailing in uncharted waters and there are many perils and pitfalls along the
journey. Yet, it provides the opportunity for the discovery of key learnings.
Introduction
‘Too often we look back after mistakes are made, draw
lessons, and try to correct the results. With fatalities and
accidents, doing so is too late. We need to look forward,
anticipate and prevent the incidents before they occur.’ (Dr.
R. Anthony Hodge, President, ICMM)
Fisher shows that, underpinning all incidents, there are
latent risks involved. These risks pertain to conditions. As
behaviours vary and preventative and proactive measures
(energy) are taken, the probability of an incident is
decreased. However, the effectiveness of preventative and
proactive measures (energy) decreases in some instances
over time. It is in the management of the underlying safety
threats that leading indicators must be instituted. This
pertains equally to how behaviour is directed. Cultural
diversity requires that during the leading indicator planning
phase the extent to which hearts and minds are to be guided
needs careful consideration. (Figure 1).
Adopting a leading indicator approach does this by
offering a perspective change that illuminates root causes of
unwanted events and outcomes, in order to implement
effective and proactive control measures before an incident
occurs. This approach reflects part of what is needed to
prevent undesired outcomes, such as loss and harm to
people, the environment, and/or equipment. It encompasses
leadership and human behaviour that together establish a
deep, values-based corporate culture that champions respect
for human health and safety above all else. To develop the
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Figure 1. Modified Fisher Improvement Diagram
leadership corps within context is of the utmost importance.
The link to the business risk has to be calibrated and
correlated to perception surveys and culture surveys. Figure
2.
Lagging or outcomes indicators have been used for some
time in the mining industry to track when damage, injury,
or harm has occurred, in an attempt to introduce measures
that will prevent future harm. Leading or activities
indicators measure the direct and indirect precursors to
harm, and give advance warning of an event that might lead
to an undesired outcome, providing an opportunity for
preventative action to be taken.
The value proposition for the use of leading indicators is
that of prevention of loss or damage, whether to people, the
environment, or property. To be effective, leading
indicators must be integrated with the overall business
objectives, strategy and decision-making processes to
deliver on desired performance. The closer an organization
gets to ‘zero harm’, as measured using lagging indicators,
the more difficult it is to ensure safety through tracking
lagging performance, and to determine the factors that
contribute to improved performance. Any generalized
causal inferences based on these rare events are also
unreliable. Management efforts should therefore be focused
on more frequently measurable leading indicators of
precursor circumstances. It is reported that lagging
indicators have also lost their ability to motivate or
influence measurable improvements in safety performance.
• Employee understands that safety is as important as
production and has accepted responsibility for all
aspects of safety performance
• Employee has established (maintains) appropriate
safety goals for the section / unit and implemented
plans to meet these goals
• Employee has communicated to those who report to
him the company’s safety standards and goals.
• Sufficient training to know how to achieve expectations
• A determination of whether or not the expectations
have been achieved
• A reward (based upon the performance sufficiently
large to gain attention and maintain interest.
Background
The ICMM Leading Indicator Guideline (ICMM, 2012)
explains that:
‘The use of leading indicators contributes directly and
indirectly to the mining value case. The precursors of
undesired OHS outcomes lie in areas relating to people
(including behaviour and degree of ownership),
organizations (including culture), systems (across all
business areas), processes (especially technical, but also
administrative), physical plant and processing (technical
and technological). The business case for the use of leading
indicators is loss prevention across all of these areas.
Lagging indicators can only measure performance after the
potential for harm, loss or damage has manifest. Leading
indicators can assist in anticipating outcomes in which
damage or harm may be a consequence by identifying
Figure 2. Leadership Development in relation to business risk exposure
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Figure 3. The roles within organizations (Step Change in Safety, 2002)
Figure 4. Positive engagement behaviours ( Step Change in Safety, 2002)
weaknesses in OHS management, thus creating the
opportunity to implement proactive measures to reduce the
risk of the harm occurring. Leading indicators require an
organization to change its mindset (Broadbent and Arnold
2011), from one of exclusively event tracking and external
benchmarking, to one of value preservation, risk avoidance
and sharing of measures shown to improve performance
(Goldcorp 2011). Leading indicators are an important tool
for risk avoidance’.
Leadership
The ICMM Leading Indicator Guideline research shows
that:
‘Some organizations believe that leadership, culture and
beliefs about safety may be the most important factors in
determining organizational safety performance. Other
organizations believe that it is more valuable to focus on
failures closer to the incident, by monitoring the
implementation of critical control integrity linked to
material risks. Irrespective, it is widely recognized that in
the absence of sound leadership, other measures to manage
OHS often fail. The use of leading indicators relating to
appropriate measures of leadership (as opposed to the
more commonly recognized “behaviour-based safety”
measures) is an area of increasing research and focus’.
As organizations mature the safety goals need also to
mature and migrate away from lagging to leading
indicators. The measurement of safety requirements drives
the process, but it is extremely important that the quality
requirements be established and assist to drive the
discussion and collaboration processes. Firesmith (2003)
has presented an information model for safety engineering
that depicts a holistic view. Safety risk should always be at
the centre of attention. The reduction of accident frequency
is poor measure of safety indicator success. Figure 5.
A well-defined business process needs to be established
to drive leading indicators. It has to be a focus area and
dealt with at the sustainability board level. To initiate the
way forward a ‘looking down and into the organization’
process is required. Figure 6.
Stakeholders’ leading indicators and
management systems
Unlike lagging indicators, leading indicators evolve
throughout the life of an organization, depending on a
number of factors, not least of which is the organization’s
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Figure 5. Information model for safety engineering (Firesmith, 2003)
Figure 6. Lonmin safety operational model
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level of maturity. Three levels of leading indicators –
compliance, improvement, and learning – have been linked
to five levels of organizational maturity. The intention in so
doing is not to create expectations of ’advancing upwards’
towards higher maturity levels. Rather, it has been shown
that if an organization attempts to implement a higher-level
leading indicator and is not at the appropriate level of
maturity, these measures can be unsuccessful. For the
purposes of this overview, an organization that has a mature
OHS culture is one in which leadership is demonstrated at
all levels of the organization, through a caring culture that
is explicit in all activities, communication, interactions,
tasks, and measures of OHS success.
This ongoing evolution therefore means there is no single
set of leading indicators that can be used in perpetuity
within an organization. Similarly, leading indicators
appropriate for use in one organization may not be
transferable to or comparable with other organizations. As
the maturity of the organization evolves, the intention is not
that the ’lower level’ maturity leading indicators are
discarded. Appropriate compliance and improvement
leading indicators must be retained to ensure that basic
preventative management measures are delivering the
expected outcomes. Leading indicators should be linked to
the highest priority OHS risks affecting an organization. As
per the traditional risk-control hierarchy, leading indicators
that can identify measures relating to the elimination or
avoidance of risk have the greatest potential to deliver the
desired OHS outcomes. Figure 7.
The implementation process
The ICMM has identified a 15-step iterative process to
assist organizations in implementing leading indicators.
Leading indicators are most effective when they are
identified and used across all levels and functional areas of
the organization. This provides multiple partial views of the
organization that together give a more complete picture of
management efforts than any single measure might.
Leading indicators are of most use when they are
developed, applied, and used by the people responsible for
implementing the appropriate preventative action. The
process of developing leading indicators should,
nonetheless, be informed by multidisciplinary viewpoints
and by representatives from all levels of the organization,
because of the complexity of the causal pathways.
Adoption needs to consider perceived attributes of
innovation, type of innovative decision, communication
channels, and nature of systems as well as change agent
promotional efforts. Figure 8.
Data and reporting
The ICMM Leading Indicator Guideline recommends that
’Leading indicators can be presented as qualitative and
quantitative data, and should ideally demonstrate trends,
rather than instantaneous measures of performance. This
approach does not correlate well with current OHS
reporting practices, which may need to evolve to
accommodate leading indicator reporting’.
In support of the adoption process of a leading indicators
programme, the functional and non-functional requirements
that relate to data, quality and interface need to be
methodically articulated. This is not always possible, but
the best available resources need to be collated. The
implementation, design, and architectural constants need to
be established and discussed at length. Figure 9.
The Lonmin leading indicator matrix is relevant to the
Group’s maturity journey, which can best be described as
‘involved’. In this phase the key actions are legally
compliant leadership, ISO accreditation, and business rules
fully implemented. The resultant outcome is ‘walk–thetalk’ and show commitment in VFL self-governance in preemptive compliance / legislation, and zero harm
maintained. The mining safety journey needs to progress to
the next phase, which is termed commitment, then finally
attain a ‘passion’ phase. Figure 10,
Figure 7. Working formula (Step Change in Safety, 2002)
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Figure 8. Adoption risk areas
Figure 9. Requirements information model (Firesmith, 2003)
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Figure 10. Lonmin’s leading indicators applicable to 3.1a appointees
Leading indicators results are consolidated over total
performance and should not be seen as an additional
measure
Complex causal pathways
OHS outcomes can result from an accumulation of multiple
causes; for a leading indicator to contribute to improved
OHS performance there must be a demonstrable cause-andeffect relationship established between the leading indicator
and OHS performance. Leading indicators can point to root
causes of OHS outcomes. Precursors of undesired OHS
outcomes lie in areas relating to:
• People (including leadership, behaviour, and degree of
ownership)
• Organizations (including culture)
• Systems (across all business areas)
• Processes (especially technical, but also administrative)
• Physical plant and processing (technical and
technological). Figure 11.
Individuals
• Put an achievement focus on safety
• Bring out the best in people with effective leadership
and success seeking mindset
• Support and sustain active involvement
• Help people transition from being held accountable to
Figure 11. Employee interactions actions (Step Change in Safety, 2002)
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feeling responsible for safety.
• Fuel participation and dedication
• Use the competency motive to make safety a value
rather than a priority
• Explore the connection between personality and
workplace safety
Conclusion
Leading indicators thus contribute to an organization’s
ability to develop appropriate proactive action strategies to
prevent harm, through recognizing early signals, with
significant benefits to safety, health, financial, and other
business aspects.
• The closer an organization gets to ‘zero harm’, as
measured using lagging indicators, the more difficult it
is to ensure safety through tracking lagging
performance
• To successfully adopt leading indicators across
Lonmin’s mining operations, a change management
process needed to be carefully considered, which
included design criteria and business information
management flow optimization, which would support
the safety strategy
• Leading indicators are most effective when they are
identified and used across all levels and functional
areas of the organization
• Leading indicator discussions should be held be at the
appropriate level and representative of all employees,
and culminate in sustained risk reduction programmes
(no disconnect), which influence the right decisions
being taken by all
• Prior to implementing leading indicators, the relative
advantages, compatibility, complexity, trialability, and
observability need to be quantified and assessed
• For a leading indicator to contribute to improved OHS
performance, there must be a demonstrable cause-andeffect relationship established between the leading
indicator and OHS performance
• Business as a collective must agree on strategies on
how to:
o Lag times associated with leading indicators
o Identify best practice in leading indicators.
Safety, being an ambiguous term on the one hand and
being ubiquitous term on the other hand, requires that
safe production accountabilities are well established
• Safe production must be a way of operation that is
subscribed to by all levels of the organisation and
across the entire spectrum of activities
• The safe production, energy-forward model is driven
by the mine’s leadership and committed to by all
• A structure, fit for purpose, must be established that
sustains safe leading indicator programmes.
Recommendation
Empowerment of mine managers and ensuring the
successfully adoption of leading indicators involves the
following:
• Leading indicators should be linked to the highest
priority OHS risks affecting an organization
• Best practice in processes to identifying leading
indicators needs to be established.
The ICMM has identified a 15-step iterative process to
assist organizations in implementing leading indicators. The
ICMM Leading Indicator Guideline recommends that
’Leading indicators can be presented as qualitative and
376
quantitative data, and should ideally demonstrate trends,
rather than instantaneous measures of performance’.
Acknowledgment
The authors wish to thank first and foremost the employees
of Lonmin, including management, unions, and
associations, for committing to, embarking on, and
sustaining their journey throughout all the difficulties. Too
often when challenges arise, decisions made are changed,
with the resultant negative effect on focus and traction. We
thank Ben Magara, CEO of Lonmin plc for his personal
attention, support, and encouragement, and Mike Da Costa,
Vice President, Technical Services, for his advice and
editorial assistance.
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Barend Jacques Erasmus
Head of Safety: Mining, Lonmin
Jacques Erasmus, is the Head of Safety at Lonmin platinum. He joined Lonmin on July 2008 as
the Senior Manager (SHREQ). He was recently appointed to the Mine Health & Safety Council
(MHSC) by the Minister of Mineral Resources, and this appointment recognises the achievement
of every employee on the journey for Zero Harm. The main task of the Council is to advise the
Minister on Occupational Health and Safety Legislation and Research outcomes aimed at
improving and promoting occupational H&S in South African mines. In September 2002, he
joined Department of Mineral & Energy as the Principal Inspector of Mines, in 2006 he was
appointed as the Deputy Chief Inspector of Mines. During the latter part of 2006 he acted
extensively as Chief Inspector reporting to the Director General and Minister. Then in February
2007 he joined AngloGold Ashanti and was appointed as the Regional Safety Manager for Africa
Operations. During the beginning of 2008 he was appointed to the Board of JIC Mining in his
capacity as Director (Technical Services).
He affiliates with AMMSA (Association of Mine Managers of South Africa) and AMPSA (Association of Mine Safety
Professionals of South Africa). Jacques has 35 years of experience in leading senior mining positions and holds a Master’s
Degree in Engineering. Jacques is vision lead, values driven and goal orientated. He embraces diversity, he is on a mission to
achieve Zero Harm, being fatal free.
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