Occupational Health and Safety Drivers in the Workplace , July 2000
Contents
- Overview *** You are here ***
- Quality Framework
- A. General Information
- B. User Requirements, Survey Objectives and Budget
- C. Alternative Sources of Data
- D. Data Outputs
- E. Questionnaire Design and Data Collection
- F. Respondent Load
- G. Population / Frame
- H. Sample Design
- I. Estimation and Analysis
Overview
 | Portfolio: | Employment, Workplace Relations and Small Business | ||
| Agency: | National Occupational Health and Safety Commission | ||
| Contact Person... | Name: | Greg Holloway | |
| Email: | hollowag@nohsc.gov.au | ||
| Phone: | 02 9577 9427 (International +61) | | |
Summary
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1. Explore the effectiveness of regulation, inspection and enforcement regimes as a motivational pathway in relation to Occupational Health and Safety we test; 2. Identify the potential effectiveness of using non-regulatory pathways including: 3. Identify preferred sources for obtaining health and safety information. 1. Organisational structure: In order to correctly categorise workplace by size, industry type, and supply chain position. That is, the role the organisation plays in either manufacturing or delivering goods to the marketplace. This information will be used to analyse industry demographics against results on other measures in order to offer NOHSC more specific recommendations from the results. 2. Interviewee role toward OH&S in the organisation: Attempt to identify the level of involvement the target respondents have, in conjunction with organisation size and structure, with OH&S issues. These questions will assist in evaluating various attitudes and importance placed on OH&S issues in relation to the level of respondent involvement in OH&S. These questions will also assist to identify the degree of organisational support for health and safety issues. 3. Occupational Health and Safety interest and practice: Lists of statements are to be read out to identify OH&S practices and subsequently to evaluate the perceived interest and importance on OH&S. Analysis will be undertaken across respondent type and level of involvement with OH&S. It is anticipated that these results will assist NOHSC to effectively target their communication materials and messages. 4. Awareness and experience of OH&S regulation, guidelines or enforcement practices: To identify to what degree respondents are in contact with, aware of and believe in the OH&S regulations and guidelines. It is important to determine effectiveness of the regulation enforcement mechanisms currently in place to assess feasibility of additional emphasis in these areas. 5. Access to information regarding OH&S: Identifying the effective sources when supplying health and safety information. |
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Reference Period & Frequency
| Reference Period: | July 2000 |
| Frequency: | Once only |
| | |
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Response Rates
| | | As planned | Actual |
| Number of businesses... | | ||
| | | | |
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| | 4000 | 4000 |
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| | 2000 | 2000 |
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| | 1000 | 1017 |
| | | | |
| Average time to complete questionnaire: | | 10 mins | 12 mins |
| Statistics... | | | |
| Response rate: | | 50% | 51% |
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Clearance Information
| Survey reviewed by | |
| Stat. Clearing House: | July 2000 |
| Status: | Approved |
| Approval period: | July 2000 |
| For additional clearance information, please contact the Statistical Clearing House by phone, fax, post or email. | |
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Quality Framework
This data quality framework has been published internationally (Brackstone G., Managing Data Quality in a Statistical Agency, (1999) Survey Methodology, Vol. 25, no. 2, Statistics Canada) and has been recommended by the ANAO as 'better practice' in specifying performance measures (ATO Performance Reporting under the Outcomes and Outputs Framework, Australian Taxation Office, Audit Report No.46 2000-01, pp63-64.) on advice from the ABS Statistical Consultancy Unit.
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Relevance
The relevance of statistical information reflects the degree to which it meets the needs of the clients. It is usually described in terms of key user needs, key concepts and classifications used, the scope of the collection and the reference period. |
Why do you need to conduct a survey? (B1)
- The information obtained will assist the National Occupational Health and Safety Commission (NOHSC) to identify the principle messages and pathways, as well as specific approaches and strategies best utilised to increase awareness of health and safety in the workplace. The survey will:
- Awareness of regulations,
- Awareness of responsibilities,
- ‘Ownership’ of responsibility toward enforcing health and safety regulations,
- Level of contact with Health and Safety inspectors and perceived value of information they provide,
- Level of contact with and knowledge of regulations and health and safety codes of practice, and their perceived value,
- The level to which actions are taken on H&S matters primarily on the basis of regulations and or inspections,
- Whether organisations believe there is a likelihood of detection and/or threat of fines for breaches of safety regulations,
- Understanding the costs/benefits of implementing safe workplace practices as perceived by organisations,
- Level of importance of a range of threats and issues toward motivating change in safety practices.
- Likelihood of motivating attention onto Occupational Health and Safety issues in larger organisations through use of corporate image, corporate credibility and personal incentives,
- Impact of concept of ‘duty of care’ toward employees
- Identifying the perceived benefits and/or losses of company expenditure on Occupational Health and Safety management,
- Identifying the prevalence of supplier pressure to ‘force’ good Occupational Health and Safety compliance,
- Identifying third parties (ie. accountants, insurers, Unions) impacting health and safety information dissemination and compliance.
1. Explore the effectiveness of regulation, inspection and enforcement regimes as a motivational pathway in relation to Occupational Health and Safety we test;
2. Identify the potential effectiveness of using non-regulatory pathways including:
3. Identify preferred sources for obtaining health and safety information.
- 1. Organisational structure: In order to correctly categorise workplace by size, industry type, and supply chain position. That is, the role the organisation plays in either manufacturing or delivering goods to the marketplace. This information will be used to analyse industry demographics against results on other measures in order to offer NOHSC more specific recommendations from the results.
2. Interviewee role toward OH&S in the organisation: Attempt to identify the level of involvement the target respondents have, in conjunction with organisation size and structure, with OH&S issues. These questions will assist in evaluating various attitudes and importance placed on OH&S issues in relation to the level of respondent involvement in OH&S. These questions will also assist to identify the degree of organisational support for health and safety issues.
3. Occupational Health and Safety interest and practice: Lists of statements are to be read out to identify OH&S practices and subsequently to evaluate the perceived interest and importance on OH&S. Analysis will be undertaken across respondent type and level of involvement with OH&S. It is anticipated that these results will assist NOHSC to effectively target their communication materials and messages.
4. Awareness and experience of OH&S regulation, guidelines or enforcement practices: To identify to what degree respondents are in contact with, aware of and believe in the OH&S regulations and guidelines. It is important to determine effectiveness of the regulation enforcement mechanisms currently in place to assess feasibility of additional emphasis in these areas.
5. Access to information regarding OH&S: Identifying the effective sources when supplying health and safety information.
- There are two slightly different versions of the questionnaire where a few questions are modified or more relevant for each of the two target respondent groups:
- CEO/Business Owners, and
- Supervisors.
- CEOs awareness of their OH&S responsibilities
- CEOs ownership of their OH&S responsibilities
- whether CEOs or their staff have some contact with inspectors or some knowledge of OH&S regulations and codes of practice
- whether CEOs and their staff find that the advice/information provided by OH&S inspectors and regulations/codes of practice is useful
- whether CEOs and their staff act on this OH&S information and advice
- whether CEOs believe there is a likelihood of detection and a credible threat of penalty in the event of non-compliance
- whether CEOs believe that this penalty would be high relative to the cost of making the workplace safe.
- whether supply chain pressure leads to improved OHS management in small and medium sized firms, or just ‘paper compliance’
- whether CEOs think the savings in premiums (and/or productivity) outweigh the costs in improving safety
- rating of the impact of third party pressure on their approach to OHS
- sources of information on OHS CEO's have found useful.
- the extent to which supervisors are aware of their OHS responsibilities
- the extent to which supervisors ‘own’ their OHS responsibilities
- Supervisors’ views of the legitimacy of regulation and inspection
- Supervisors’ perceptions of whether organisational policies and objectives for OHS are implemented on the shop floor
- the importance of regulation and inspection as a motivational pathway for supervisors, compared to other motivators
- CEOs/Business Owners
- Supervisors
- Micro
- Small
- Medium
- Large
The vast majority of questions are the same on both questionnaires.
Principle Data Items
Supervisor survey
Data will be analysed according to:
1. Respondent type:
2. Industry size and type (utilising ANZIC codes):
QUESTIONS CROSS-TABULATED VARIABLES
All questions Respondent type
Industry type
Respondent type within each industry type
- We anticipate only simple cross-tabulations and percentages will be utilised.
Statistical significance testing will be performed (probably Z score) to measure differences between states or industry size and type.
- Single level ANZIC codes will be used for classifying industry type.
- Target population includes Australian Workplaces across industries classified as ‘average to high risk’ for workplace injuries.
- The sample frame is the population of workplaces identified by state and territory OH&S or workcover authorities.
- Workplace, stratified by size will be the unit. A single interview will be conducted at each workplace.
CEOS/owner interviews will be obtained from medium, small and micro businesses. Supervisor interviews will be obtained from medium and large businesses.
The only overlap between CEO/owner and supervisor interviews will be among the medium businesses, and a separate sample frame will be used for each group to avoid duplicate sampling of same workplace.
- Telephone interview
- Previous 12 months from time of survey
- Once only
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Accessibility
The accessibility of statistical information refers to the ease with which it can be referenced by users. It includes the ease with which the existence of information can be ascertained, as well as the suitability of the form or medium through which the information can be accessed. |
How will the results of the survey be explained / presented to the major users? (I8)
- Tables and graphs will be provided with simple per cent scores.
Results reported on will be those that have achieved statistical significance with suitable sample sizes.
Campbell Research & Consulting always offers a separate section in our reports outlining how to read the tables and graphs to avoid inappropriate conclusions being drawn.
Company specific information will not be reported on, it will not be in the data set. No individual company will be identified in the report or results.
- Employment, Workplace Relations and Small Business
NOHSC - National Occupational Health and Safety Commission
- KPMG Consulting have been contracted to manage the overall larger project encompassing consultations with business and combined report writing of the quantitative data and the business consultations. Campbell Research & Consulting have been subcontracted by KPMG Consulting to undertake the design and implementation of the survey.
- Survey Manager
Greg Holloway
Senior Project Officer
Prevention Strategies and Facilitation Branch
NOHSC
Phone: (02) 9577 9427
Fax: (02) 9577 9204
Email: hollowag@nohsc.gov.au
Primary contact person in Campbell Research & Consulting
Kristin Diemer
Campbell Research & Consulting,
Phone: (03) 9482 4216
E-mail: kristin.diemer@campbellresearch.com.au
- All contact details are securely destroyed from the contact information sheets provided to interviewers at the end of the project. In addition, after each interview is conducted the personal details of the respondent are disassociated from the questionnaire.
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Timeliness
The timeliness of statistical information refers to the delay between the reference point to which it pertains and the date on which the information becomes available. |
To what reference peiod(s) does the survey refer? (A6)
- Previous 12 months from time of survey
- Pilot testing to be conducted prior to SCH approval (week of May 29)
- Pilot survey: May 29-June 1 2000;
- Clearing House approval obtained: July 4, 2000;
- Data collection commences: July 17, 2000;
- Data collection completed: August 1, 2000;
- Preliminary Tables available: August 14, 2000
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Accuracy
The accuracy of statistical information is the degree to which the information correctly describes the phenomena it was designed to measure. It includes measures of both sampling and non-sampling error.
Questionnaire to be conducted as soon as SCH approval obtained (ie. Mid July 2000)
Data collection will take approximately 4 weeks
Results of data will be available in preliminary table format 2 weeks after interviews are completed
Our anticipated time line is as follows:
- 8,500 business names have been obtained to construct the sample population. 200 interviews are to be achieved within five strata.
- 200 supervisors large sized businesses
- 200 supervisors medium sized businesses
- 200 CEO/owners medium sized businesses
- 200 CEO/owners small sized businesses
- 200 CEO/owners micro sized businesses
Target sample includes:
- The sample also will be stratified across each state/workcover jurisdiction on a pro rata basis to match the proportion of population of medium and high risk workplaces in each state/jurisdiction. The specific number of target interviews will be specified as we finalise the samples and population statistics from each jurisdiction.
Cost is the primary constraint determining quota size.
- We expect the sample frame to be the most up-to-date able to be utilised and therefore will reduce sampling error.
Due to random selection procedures we anticipate we will be able to generalise results across industry size and type. Generalising at a broader level will be done with caution, explicitly stating limitations of the sample.
In addition, analysis of non-response (as stated in H7) will be undertaken to ascertain that non-sampling bias has not occurred.
- We are expecting a 50% response rate out of the total sample population. Based on past experience with previous projects we expect:
- 50% of phone numbers to be incorrect
- 50% of correct phone numbers will refuse to participate in the survey
- Sufficient sample population has been obtained to work through numbers to achieve our target sample of n=200 per strata.
- 50% of phone numbers to be incorrect
- 50% of correct phone numbers will refuse to participate in the survey
We expect:
- Where telephone numbers can not be provided by state/territory OH&S authorities, matching organisation name against telephone directories will be required. This may result in up to 50% loss of sample per jurisdiction.
- Data will be entered directly into the computer during the telephone survey. This process eliminates the vast majority of data entry errors.
No open-ended questions are included and therefore we will have minimal coding of ‘other’ responses.
Frequencies will be examined by data analysts and project managers to identify potential data processing errors.
- Pilot testing between May 29 and June 1, 2000
- South Australia & Victoria
- Micro business CEOs & owners
- Medium and large business Supervisors
- Length & timing of survey
- Questionnaire flow
- Ease of question understanding
- Ease of contacting respondents
- Likely refusal rate
- Best time to make contact with potential respondents
- Estimate how many sample numbers are needed to achieve an interview
- Questionnaire length is 10 minutes
- Any necessary changes to question wording were adjusted during the pilot so adjustments have been tested
- 31 numbers were used to achieve 12 interviews
- 16 numbers used to achieve 9 CEO/owner interviews (75% achievement rate)
- 15 numbers for 3 supervisor interviews(20% achievement rate)
- Factors influencing supervisor interview achievement rates include time of day and ability to come off the floor to take a phone call
- Some supervisors are out in the field for extended periods, or between 8:30am and 4pm
- Some supervisors are only able to leave the floor to take a call during their lunch break
- Refusal rate was very low, only 1 CEO/owner and 1 Supervisor refused
- Other than refusals, non-contacts were still within the middle of a call-back cycle where the target respondent had yet to be spoken to by interviewer or appointments were to be made ( a cycle of 5 call-backs and appointment system was employed, as will be used for the project)}
Twelve (12) interviews were conducted over 3 days to test:
- A series of non-structured interviews have been conducted with micro, small, medium and large organisations in order to identify relevance of topic questions and potential barriers to data collection by telephone. There should not be any problems with data availability as we are interested only in the attitudes and perceptions of respondents.
- 8,500
- Adequate sample data has been obtained to allow for 50% loss of numbers through lack of availability of telephone numbers, as well as an estimated interview achievement rate of 50%.
- Total target sample size is 1,000. All of which are expected to be live and in scope. After the target sample of 1000 is obtained interviewing will cease. Appointments will be managed so that target respondents are followed up if an appointment has been scheduled
Out of the total sample population we expect 50% of phone numbers to be no longer active, of the remaining numbers we expect a 50% refusal rate.
- Random sampling procedures have been put into place both for generation of sample population and for target sample achievement. Refusals, non-contact and non-response can be tracked through the Computer Assisted Telephone Interviewing (CATI) system, which will then allow us to analyse industry type, business size and jurisdiction to assess non-response bias for the numbers called, not resulting in an interview.
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Interpretability
The interpretability of statistical information reflects the availability of the supplementary information and metadata necessary to interpret and utilise it appropriately. It includes appropriate presentation of data such that it aids correction interpretation. |
How will the results of the survey be explained / presented to the major users? (I8)
- Tables and graphs will be provided with simple per cent scores.
Results reported on will be those that have achieved statistical significance with suitable sample sizes.
Campbell Research & Consulting always offers a separate section in our reports outlining how to read the tables and graphs to avoid inappropriate conclusions being drawn.
Company specific information will not be reported on, it will not be in the data set. No individual company will be identified in the report or results.
- Simple stratified random sample. We will not be conducting a census.
- 20% with 1 - 4 employees («Micro»)
- 20% with 5 - 20 employees («Small»)
- 40% with 21- 99 employees («Medium»)
- 20% with 100 or more employees. («Large»)
We will stratify the sample by employer size as follows:
Where number of employees is not available remuneration based on Average Weekly Earnings will be used. Table 1 below identifies the sample strata by state and industry size both by number of employees and remuneration.
- Stratification will be undertaken by:
- Enterprise size (micro, small, medium, large)
- State
Stratification will assist in identifying issues specific to industry size as well as effectiveness of current advertising
and marketing strategies within various state jurisdictions.
- Sufficient sample population has been obtained to work through numbers to achieve our target sample of n=200 per strata.
- 50% of phone numbers to be incorrect
- 50% of correct phone numbers will refuse to participate in the survey
We expect:
- Not to be identified.
- Sample has been generated by random sample and we anticipate an equal representation of industry size and type across all strata.
If we decide to aggregate data, weights will be applied based on available ABS data on the breakdown of industry size and type by state.
- We expect the sample frame to be the most up-to-date able to be utilised and therefore will reduce sampling error.
Due to random selection procedures we anticipate we will be able to generalise results across industry size and type. Generalising at a broader level will be done with caution, explicitly stating limitations of the sample.
In addition, analysis of non-response (as stated in H7) will be undertaken to ascertain that non-sampling bias has not occurred.
- We anticipate only simple cross-tabulations and percentages will be utilised.
Statistical significance testing will be performed (probably Z score) to measure differences between states or industry size and type.
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Coherence
The coherence of statistical information reflects the degree to which it can be successfully brought together with other statistical information within a broad analytical framework and over time. The use of concepts, classifications and target populations promotes coherence, as does the use of common methodology across surveys. |
Is the survey a new survey or a cycle of an existing repeated survey? (A7)
- New survey - never previously conducted
- Once only
- Not applicable
- It is not anticipated that this survey will be repeated.
Prior Research
We have taken some questions from a recent survey conducted as an evaluation of the effectiveness of Hazardous Substances and Manual Handling Regulations in higher risk industries. Part of that research was to identify the role of OH&S managers and their management of hazardous substances and hazardous manual handling. This was conducted on behalf of the Victorian Workcover authority. These questions have already been thoroughly tested and will allow future comparative analysis if required.
- The first phase of this project involved a review of literature and current practices. No recent research has been identified to target the current issues and objectives across a large national sample of various industry sizes.
The most relevant and recent publication comes from:
Claire Mayhew, 'Barriers to Implementation of Known Occupational Health and Safety Solutions in Small Business', WorkSafe Australia, National Occupational Health and Safety Commission and Department of Training and Industrial Relations (Queensland government), May 1997.
- Previous research that has been identified, focussing on similar issues have small samples, and are not nationally or industry size representative.
The larger sample research that has been undertaken within the past 2 years has been undertaken by ourselves at Campbell Research & Consulting. This work has been primarily limited to individual health and safety state jurisdictions, focussing on measuring compliance rather than motivational pathways for engendering interest in the topic of health and safety.
While the information gained from previous research has informed our research design, the data can not be transferred because the objectives are different or they focus either on limited industries, within small samples or among single jurisdictions.
- Single level ANZIC codes will be used for classifying industry type.
- Not applicable
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