IOSH call to starve media myth
30 November 2009
The IOSH Media team has challenged health
and safety professionals to consider the possible PR fallout of
their decision making.
In posting a response to the IOSH forum thread Reactive
letters from IOSH, IOSH Media Manager Jeremy Waterfield asks if
our industry hasn’t allowed the ‘elf ‘n’ safety’ myth to be fed by
some of its own actions.
The call was made in response to an original forum post which
stated, ‘It’s about time we started to tackle the root causes of
the media frenzy and not be reactive with meaningless letters.’
Jeremy’s full posting reads:
Nonsense health and safety stories are not
only very irritating to those in the industry but genuinely
damaging to both people’s perception of health and safety and,
potentially, their own physical health and personal safety. Such
‘bonkers conkers’ stories have been about as welcome to us all as a
coned fake tree at Christmas or a bonfire without flames or Fawkes
(only joking).
Yet there have been times when this seemingly
immovable cloud has had a silver lining. It’s often said that good
news doesn’t hit the headlines: ‘No office accidents this year,
thanks to health and safety team’ or, famously, ‘Small Mexican
earthquake – few dead’, are unlikely to make page lead.
So, from a media profile point of view, at
least the ‘bonkers conkers’ stories have given health and safety
some column inches. And while I’d never subscribe to the old,
misguided chestnut that ‘all publicity is good publicity,’ this
kind of myth making has given IOSH the chance to make its presence
felt in the media through its rebuttals made in the letters
pages.
This aspect of our ‘Stop taking the myth’
campaign has seen IOSH-signed letters appear in The Times, Daily
Telegraph, Independent, Observer, Daily Mirror, Daily Mail and
various regional newspapers (though, of course, not all the letters
we send get published). So these silly stories have given IOSH
opportunities to fly the health and safety flag and get our views
noticed. There are recent signs this has even started to temper
some of the reporting (Daily Mail excepted, of course).
John Tremelling, however, may well have a
point in the sense that by making these rebuttals IOSH is, in fact,
feeding the Myth. Certainly, the Myth shows little sign of going
away, no matter how many letters we write. Our media relations are
only a part of the equation. Maybe the health and safety industry
needs to look at itself, assess its approach to sensible risk
management and how this affects how health and safety professionals
act and behave.
Do we need to make decisions that give less
encouragement to the myth builders and mickey takers? Despite all
the bias and fabrication, is it even possible, in some instances,
that health and safety gets the reputation it deserves? Is it time
for our industry to look at itself and change some of its practices
and behaviour?
While IOSH isn’t intending to give up its
letter writing entirely, we’re being much more selective now in
deciding which negative stories are worth responding to, which ones
invite us to move the debate forward and at least give health and
safety the prospect of a fairer hearing.
Yes, we’ll continue to work on our existing
campaigns – Get the Best; Back to health, back to work; Putting
young workers first; and Stop taking the myth – and look to create
new campaign opportunities in the future. The Myth does, however,
call for the health and safety industry as a whole to get its PR
right, backed up by a commitment to practise what we preach on
sensible risk management. As John Holden said in his opening IOSH
Presidential address, it’s time for all those in the profession to
stand up and become heroes for health and safety.
To get involved in this discussion, go to the Reactive
letters from IOSH thread.