A MULTIFACTORIAL ANALYSIS ON THE ROLE AND EFFECTIVENESS OF SAFETY REPRESENTATIVES IN PETROLEUM INDUSTRIES OF EGYPT

Introduction: The industrial safety management is an open complex giant system with the complex characteristics of multidisciplinary, multi-factor, complexity and multi-scale. One of the important participants in the industrial safety management is the safety representatives (SRs). SRs have an important role in application of safety management systems and there are many factors that may affect the role of SRs at their firms. Aim of the work: to present a multifactorial analysis on the role and effectiveness of safety representatives into workplace health and safety practices in petroleum and petrochemical industries in Egypt. Materials and Methods: Data collection was accomplished utilizing a self-structured predesigned questionnaire sheet of nine domains including 55 questions, mapping the SRs’ and managers’ attitudes towards their own rights, duties and obligations. The questionnaire was distributed to 32 petroleum companies targeting SRs and their managers (186 SRs and 51 managers). Results: revealed a huge gap in opinions and understanding between the two major parties and a lack of consistency between identified problems in the role of safety representatives and proposed measures of improvements in their role and functions. Conclusion: The distance between the two parties in their view on the safety representative’s role and position must be taken seriously, and could itself be a threat to safety. The detected gaps between points of views of SRs and their managers on SRs’ role put emphasis on the requirement of mutual understanding and acceptance of the SRs’ contribution to safety performance which are fundamental for mutual trust and constructive collaboration between the parties.