newsdigest
by Dirk Dusharme and Alexander Karolyi
OSHA and Labor:
'No' to ISO Health and Safety Standard
The International Organization for Standardization is hosting a meeting
in Geneva this month to discuss the possibility for an international occupational
health and safety management standard. As reported last month in "News
Digest," few U.S. stakeholders in occupational health and safety are
excited about the idea. The problem seems to boil down to turf wars and
labor-management issues.
Whether the American National Standards Institute, which represents the
U.S. position to ISO, should support an international health and safety
standard is "fraught with questions," says Joseph Dear, assistant
secretary of labor for Occupational Safety and Health Administration, which
is already working to establish national health and safety standards.
Dear points out that since the United States' voting strength in the ISO
process is disproportionate to its impact on the world's economy, there
is a strong possibility that an ISO health and safety standard would not
jive with U.S. health and safety concerns.
"The United States has only one vote in the ISO process, although it
accounts for more than one-fifth of the world's economic output," explains
Dear. "The European Union has done good work on occupational safety
and health, but it has 15 votes. It doesn't take higher math to question
the fairness of the process."
Dear also questions the impact an ISO standard would have if third-party
certification of a company to an ISO standard would exempt that company
from OSHA inspection-Dear does not want to relinquish OSHA's enforcement
program. (Those who follow ISO 14000 will recognize that this is roughly
the same question raised by the Environmental Protection Agency vis-à-vis
EPA audits.) It's important to note that OSHA has a program called the Voluntary
Protection Program that does exempt participants from OSHA inspection lists.
Dear suggests that VPP could serve as a model for an ISO standard.
Labor's concerns with an ISO health and safety standard center around adequate
employee representation and concern for the employee in the standardization
process. Unlike ISO 9000 or ISO 14000, which deal with management and engineering
practices, an occupational health and safety standard has more to do with
human resources and labor relations, says Peg Seminario, director of safety
and health with the AFL-CIO.
"I don't see ISO, as a technical group, being able to deal with the
kinds of issues that come up in this context," explains Seminario.
"And given that you can't deal with these issues without dealing with
the rights of workers, the question becomes 'Is ISO the right organization
to be doing this?' "
The AFL-CIO's stand is that before the United States moves on an international
health and safety standard, it must first come up with its own national
standard, says Seminario.
Much of labor's problem with U.S. acceptance of an international health
and safety standard may have more to do with labor-management issues than
any concerns that such a standard could not satisfy U.S. health and safety
concerns, says Michael Wright, director of safety and health and the environmental
department for United Steelworkers of America.
Wright points out that some countries, Mexico and Canada for instance, have
labor-management safety and health committees that are mandated by law.
The United States has no such law and, in fact, in the past few years, OSHA
reform bills along this line have repeatedly failed in Congress, meeting
strong resistance from business. "The companies saw it as a step toward
unionization," claims Wright.
Although a good ISO standard almost requires a joint health and safety committee,
it's hard to see how U.S. employers would accept that, says Wright. "How
would you draft an ISO standard that would be acceptable to U.S. business
on the one hand and the rest of the world on the other?" he asks.
Given the arguments posed by OSHA, the AFL-CIO and others (about two-thirds
of the participants at ANSI's May meeting voted either "no" or
"not at this time" regarding the proposed standard), it is difficult
to see any kind of consensus coming out of the Geneva meeting.
Next month: the results of the Geneva meeting, and "Are there any U.S.
stakeholders in favor of an international occupational health and safety
standard?"
TEAM Act
Defeated
As promised, President Clinton has vetoed the Teamwork for Employees and
Management Act. The controversial bill would have amended a section of the
National Labor Relations Act, which rules that labor-management teams in
a nonunion setting are illegal if the teams address important workplace
issues with management (February and June "News Digest").
The Senate had recently approved the Senate version of the TEAM Act (S.
295) by a vote of 53 to 46. Last September, the House passed its version
of the TEAM Act (H.R. 743) by a vote of 221 to 202.
Because there is no chance that the presidential veto could be overridden,
supporters will drop the bill for now. "We're going to start working
on it again and see what the elections hold, and try to make some headway
next year," promises Jeffrey McGuiness, president of the Labor Policy
Association.
Next year, TEAM Act proponents hope to get more democrats behind them. McGuiness
claims there is a large block of democrats that would support the act if
a few issues could be ironed out. With enough democratic support, the act
could pass on an override should the next president also veto the act, he
says.
http://www.teamwork.org/index.html
Employees Seek Culture
Work environment is becoming a hot topic for those seeking employment, indicating
that people are becoming increasingly interested in the quality of organizations.
A recent survey of executives reveals that, apart from questions about salary,
job applicants inquire almost equally about corporate culture as they do
benefits, according to Robert Half International Inc., a staffing service
specializing in accounting, finance and information technology.
Executives were asked, "Other than base salary and bonuses, what do
most applicants ask about during job interviews today?" Their responses:
Benefits 36%
Corporate culture 34%
Job security 15%
Equity opportunities 11%
Other 4%
New Law Coordinates
Federal/Private Standards
A new federal law will eliminate the duplication of standards between the
Federal government and the private sector, and clear the way for federal
use of existing international quality management system standards. Currently,
companies that produce products for the private sector and for government
often must undergo multiple conformity assessments. The result is increased
product cost, wasted time and staff resources, and what could be perceived
by trading partners as a technical barrier to trade, according to the National
Institute of Standards and Technology.
Section 12 of Public Law 104-113, signed by President Clinton in March,
charges NIST with coordinating "federal, state and local technical
standards activities and conformity assessment activities, with private
sector technical standards activities and conformity assessment activities,
with the goal of eliminating unnecessary duplication and complexity "
In other words, if the private sector is already doing it, there is no need
for government to duplicate the effort (and the expense). In particular,
NIST will focus on standards developed by private, consensus organizations,
such as the American National Standards Institute.
Because the definition of "technical standards" includes performance-based
or design-specific technical specifications and related management system
practices, ISO 9000, ISO 14000 and related standards (including the proposed
ISO Occupational Health and Safety standard) are covered by this law as
well, says NIST.
In this regard, NIST will be responsible for coordinating federal support
for international quality and environmental system standards and working
with private-sector EMS and QMS registration bodies to ensure that federal
viewpoints are represented. With NIST's guidance, federal agencies will
work through the Government and Industry Quality Liaison Panel to ensure
the use of one quality system per supplier in the federal procurement process,
and NIST and other federal agencies will work together to develop recognition
plans for the competence of private-sector QMS and EMS suppliers.
Recognition Helps
EH&S Programs
Many managers agree that reward-and-recognition programs are essential for
improving organizational performance, especially when it comes to environmental,
health and safety efforts.
As the role of EH&S programs has expanded in the last five years-from
a technical function to a more integral part of corporate policy-the number
of reward-and-recognition programs has grown accordingly, says a recent
study of 45 companies conducted by The Conference Board's Townley Global
Management Center for Environment, Health and Safety.
Key findings of the survey include:
> Whether cash or noncash awards are utilized,
all reward-and-recognition programs rely heavily on symbols of recognition,
such as trophies or plaques, letters of commendation from senior management,
etc.
To enhance the importance of companywide recognition,
many companies hold ceremonies chaired by senior management.
Employee compensation is an important component
of many EH&S reward-and-recognition programs.
Unfortunately, for many companies, the EH&S awards budget is less than
1 percent of the total EH&S budget. Also problematic for compensation
purposes is that most of these programs have not been formally evaluated
or measured, and are often changed based on trial and error.
ANSI and RAB Agree
By the time you read this, the ink will have dried on the agreement between
the American National Standards Institute and the Registrar Accreditation
Board regarding joint ISO 9000 and ISO 14000 accreditation.
John Donaldson, vice president for conformity assessment at ANSI, and Joseph
Dunbeck, CEO for the RAB, have been hammering out an agreement for the past
few months.
Dunbeck gave us a sneak preview:
The agreement will establish the ANSI/RAB
National Accreditation Program for quality management system and environmental
management system registrars and course providers.
RAB alone will provide QMS and EMS auditor
certification and operate accreditation programs.
The existing ANSI EMS council will be absorbed,
intact, into the joint program, as will the RAB QMS program.
ANSI will represent NAP in the international
arena, with input from RAB.
their separate accreditation criteria for registrars and course providers.
Five Steps to
Great Leadership
What makes a great leader? Well, for many, it takes more than a big office
and a snappy job title.
A new grass-roots model of leadership has surfaced in today's business world,
according to a recent study conducted by management consulting firm Zenger
Miller. More and more people not traditionally considered leaders are performing
leadership behaviors. And employees who have been considered leaders-executives,
managers and supervisors-are no longer automatically seen as leaders just
because of their job titles.
The survey reveals that successful executive leaders focus on five strategies.
These strategies make up what Zenger Miller calls the CLIMB model.
Create a compelling future-by creating, communicating
and sustaining a vision.
Let the customer drive the organization-by
knowing what customers want and need and by helping the organization use
this information to make key decisions.
Involve every mind-by giving employees and
teams the responsibility, resources, training and support they need to improve
both their work and the organization.
> Manage work horizontally-by focusing on interdepartmental
work processes and the technologies underlying them, applying systems thinking,
using analytic methods to analyze results and creating links among groups.
Build personal credibility-by walking the
talk all the time, not only when it's convenient, by sharing mistakes as
well as successes, by encouraging others to do the same and by demonstrating
personal commitment.
The study covers 450 U.S. and Canadian organizations, ranging in size from
fewer than 250 employees to more than 10,000 and including a mix of heavy
manufacturing, high-tech and service industries as well as government agencies
and educational institutions.
Tooling and Equipment Standard Released
The Big Three automakers' "Tooling and Equipment Supplement to QS-9000"
was released this August, but, despite the name, it is neither a supplement
to nor an extension of QS-9000, according to industry sources.
TE-9000, as it was nicknamed more than a year ago, is a Big Three document
that takes the existing ISO 9001 standard and adds language making it specific
to tooling and equipment suppliers to the automotive industry.
"The title is quite misleading," says Radley Smith, director of
the automotive industry division for KPMG Quality Registrar. "Calling
it the supplement to QS-9000 implies that the tooling-and-equipment people
have to go through QS-9000, which they don't."
Because the supplement does not contain the text of either ISO 9001 or QS-9000,
you must first obtain a copy of the ISO 9001 standard. The document adds
tooling-and-equipment-specific criteria to the relevant ISO 9001 elements.
Although Smith says that the tooling-and-equipment supplement is a nonauditable
document for information only, there are rumblings that the voluntary nature
of the supplement may only last to late 1997 or early 1998. After that,
mandatory deadlines for conformance will probably be issued. As one source
said, "The Big Three haven't gone through all this in order to provide
an information-only requirement."
For a copy of the "Tooling and Equipment Supplement to QS-9000,"
contact the Automotive Industry Action Group at (810) 358-3003 or fax (810)
358-3253. The TE Supplement and the TE Assessment sell for $5 each.
