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Procedia Economics and Finance 35 (2016) 705 – 712

7th International Economics & Business Management Conference, 5th & 6th October 2015

Safety And Health Practices And Injury Management In

Manufacturing Industry
Fatini Hanim Binti Mohamed Taufek*, Zulhafiza Binti Zulkifle, Siti Zubaidah Binti
Abdul Kadir
College of Business and Accounting, University Tenaga Nasional, 26700 Muadzam Shah, Pahang

Abstract

This study was conducted to determine the relationship between safety and health practices and injury management among
employees in manufacturing industry. The purpose of this study is to know the relationship between safety and health practices and
injury management among employees in the workplace. Nowadays, most of the companies are not implementing safety and health
practices towards their employees. This will give an impact for accidents and injuries happened. The study was being done among
132 respondents in two manufacturing companies, which located in Pahang. Thus, the data were collected by using questionnaires
and analyzed by using Statistical Package for the Social Sciences (SPSS version 22) software. In this study, statistical analysis
included is descriptive statistics, reliability and the correlation test. In terms of result, it shows all hypotheses were accepted and
the safety and health practices indicated that they had a positive relationship with injury management.
© 2016 Published by Elsevier B.V. This is an open access article under the CC BY-NC-ND license
© 2015 The Authors. Published by Elsevier B.V.
(http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/).
Peer-reviewed underresponsibility
Peer-reviewed under responsibility of Universiti
of Universiti Tenaga
Tenaga Nasional.
Nasional
Keywords: Safety and health Practices, Injury management

1. Introduction

The right to work in a safe and healthy environment is the fundamental right of every worker. Safety and health
practices are very important to be provided to the community as well as for employees. From this study, the outcomes
that employees can get through safety and health practices are they know how to work and live safety within their
daily environments and to act in case of an emergency in their workplace. Besides that, safety and health practices
may reduce the chances of an accident in your workplace. Most of the accidents caused within employees are due to
lack of awareness. Most of the cases, due to lack of trained people, accidents get worse and people end up losing lives.
If proper precautions are taken, strict laws, rules and regulations are made, regular employee awareness programs
were held, the number of accidents in their workplace could be controlled.Throughout this research, it gives greater

2212-5671 © 2016 Published by Elsevier B.V. This is an open access article under the CC BY-NC-ND license
(http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/).
Peer-reviewed under responsibility of Universiti Tenaga Nasional
doi:10.1016/S2212-5671(16)00088-5
706 Fatini Hanim Binti Mohamed Taufek et al. / Procedia Economics and Finance 35 (2016) 705 – 712

benefits of maintaining a safe work environment among employees, but first and foremost, safety is about what an
organization can do to protect their workers. Employers should send their workers home in the same condition they
came in. Then, it can give greater benefit for employees such they are motivated and increase their morale and may
reduce absenteeism. Kawakami (2001) stated that employers need to implement safety and health programs to ensure
employees working on safe and healthy work environments. Workers have the right to participate in safety and health
programs and they must be able to give full of cooperates with employers.
Moreover, the safety and health practices among employees also bring a financial benefit which is saving
money. While productivity and overall revenue are important, if the personnel aren’t following safe practices and
keeping themselves healthy, the result will eventually become a loss in earnings due to less productivity and
compensation for sick days. A safe work environment for employees give impacts a project’s bottom line both directly
and indirectly, including lost costs, insurance costs and legal fees are minimized in a safe work environment.
Employers that invest in workplace safety and health can expect to reduce fatalities, injuries, and illnesses. In addition,
employers often find that changes made to improve workplace safety and health can result in significant improvements
to their organization's productivity and financial performance.

2. Literature Review
2.1 Safety And Health Practices

According to Biddle (2005), Gilding (2002), Linhard (2005), firms are attention on occupational safety performance
and it has greater potential for influencing the productivity of that organization. However, the greater challenge for
employees is to meet occupancy load standards for the purpose of establishing and maintaining a safe working and
learning environment in their workplace.Moreover, safety awareness concerns the need for conducting research that
links occupational safety performance and productivity. Brown (1996), European Agency for Safety and Health at
Work (2004) and Shannon (2001). According to Barreto (2000), Brown (1996), Brown (2000), Clarke (1999),
Courtney & Webster (2001), Dedobbeleer & Beland (1991) and Mearns (2001) stated that injuries tend to reduce
worker morale and can cause personal suffering.

2.1.1 Training

Training will encourage employees to become productive and increase safer work environment. In addition, H. Ali,
N. Abdullah, and C. Subramaniam (2009) suggest the occupational accidents and injuries will increase because of the
ineffectiveness of safety training. Carroll (2001) stated supervision is a combination of the elements such as goals,
functions, tasks, roles, strategies, process elements, personalities, beginnings, middles, and endings to make a process.
It is a very complex process.
In safety training, employees are under responsibilities of an employer. Thus, they should care about its employee’s
safety Barling (2005). In addition, Mearns (1991), Milton and Ashley (1998) and Moore (1991) stated that supervision
is based on own experiences and it is reflected in nature. The employees should have high supervision to manage
safety practices and control from injuries. Bailey & Petersen (1989), Brown (2000), Cooper (2002) and Zohar (1980)
agreed on in order to reduce workplace injuries or accidents, safety programs for example, give a briefing and
induction training about safety and health practices should implement in industrial production and manufacturing
companies.
Arboleda, Morrow, Crum, & Shelly II (2003), Brown (2000), Carder & Ragan (2003), Clarke (1999), Cooper (2002)
and Petersen (1996) addresses that the root causes for accidents or injuries is the implementation of the safety and
health practices in an organization. According to Zohar (1980), beliefs and attitudes have a significant positive
relationship towards safety and health practices in an organization.

2.1.2 Safe Work Procedures

Safe work procedures are an important to employees to ensure their organization in a safer work environment with
implementing safety and health practices to manage injuries and accidents in the workplace. In manufacturing
industry, employers should implement and complied with all the guidance and procedures on safety and health at the
workplace to minimize the number of accidents. Hagan (2001) stated that favorable and unfavorable outcomes are the
determination of employee’s behavior to know their future behavior. According to Gordon, Flin, and Mearns (2005),
 Fatini Hanim Binti Mohamed Taufek et al. / Procedia Economics and Finance 35 (2016) 705 – 712 707

they said workplace injuries can be decreased or avoided and all the employees can manage the human error properly
if proper procedure's safety implementing for employees. Thus, employees should work towards demonstrating a
positive safety attitude, a sound knowledge of safety, and maintain safe working conditions.
According to Hagan, Montgomery, & O'Reilly (2001), many accidents happened when the employees using
facilities that have safety work procedures. The employees must follow the safety work procedures at workplace to
reducing the rate of injuries or accidents. When employees feel that their safety programs might not be effective or
their employer takes less responsible, employee may use safety work procedures in their work. Hagan (2001) noticed
that management must consider about their employee in terms of safety and health programs where the management
must responsible for all employees for safe work environments in their workplace.
The employer must fair in actions towards their employees. In order to ensure the workplace safer, employees must
follow safe work procedures Yule, Flin & Murdy (2007). Meanwhile, Alli (2008), the employers and employees must
aware of the importance of establishing safe working procedures. Griffin & Neal (2000) and Hagan (2001) addressed
that injuries or accidents in the workplace may happen because of employees were ignores the safe work procedures
and it will increase the risks of behavioral to injure.Vredenburgh (2002) stated that the poor usage and handling of
tools and machinery is the main causes of workplace accidents and injuries that will affect the productivity and this is
about technology improvement in the organization. An organization must care about safety and health practices.

2.1.3 Consultation

In order to encourage consultation and communication, it is important not to blame employees when accidents
occur. As managers have gained experience with the techniques used to improve quality, they have learned the
importance of improving the process of production. Referred to Dundon (2004), consultation is the relationship
between management and employees in order to exchange views and engaging in dialogue. Besides that, it is variable
from a collecting bargaining between employer and employees.
According to Coupar and Stevens (2005: p. 52), consultation is defined as “something of a mystery, located
somewhere between two-way communication and joint decision-making”. Alli (2008) stated that the participation of
employee in safety and health matters is basic employee’s right and an employee may give some opinion and
suggestion to improve the worker’s safety in the workplace. In reduce injuries or accidents, the employer must practice
the consultation between employees. The level of consultation and employee involvement must matches and higher
on safety and health matters. For example, management does not hear out about safety and health matters and they do
not give any feedback on the safety issues.

2.1.4 Reporting Safety

In these practices, (Micel & Near 1994) stated an internal reporting as a person to handle all those reporting from
employees in that organization. It is important for lecturers to encouraging internal reporting gives upper management
more control to the problem and creates opportunities for their organizations to deal with their own misconduct in an
effective and responsible manner. Normally, many lecturers would disclose information externally if they have no
confidence in management actions or believe their concerns will not be considered properly.
Breslin, Polzer, MacEachen, Morrongiello, & Shannon (2007) addressed that in reporting safety, young male
workers are passive in communicating about safety matters, but it’s different with young female workers, where they
are more concerned about safety matters. They also make a report to their employer in terms of their safety in the
workplace. This attitude is not good for male workers because they are in risks without reporting safety.
Azaroff, Levenstein, & Wegman (2002) stated that an employer cannot identify and manage safety and health
matters properly if they do not accurate the injuries or accidents happened to their workers in the workplace.
Furthermore, managers should encourage and be open to injury reporting, for example they educating workers on
reporting requirements.

2.1.5 Management Commitment

Management commitment is about the employees committed to their employer in safety and health issues. The top
management plays an important role in reducing the injuries or accidents to their workers in the workplace while
employees also are crucial to give commitment to support the practices. Hsu (2007), management commitment defined
708 Fatini Hanim Binti Mohamed Taufek et al. / Procedia Economics and Finance 35 (2016) 705 – 712

as the management always show a positive and supportive safety and health attitudes to their employees’ perception
about safety in the workplace. Brown (2000) also suggests that the perceptions of management and employees are equal
and they understand about workplace safety.Both of them must show participation towards safety and health practices
in the workplace. The management practices concerning to safety are management commitment. Management
commitment is defined as the involvement and engagement of employer and their employees in actions to achieving a
goal (Cooper, 2006). According to Zohar (1980), the organization’s safety program can successfully through the
effectiveness of management commitment with safety and health awareness program, the participation of employees
within that organization and the measurement of the scope of the work of the organization.As discussed by Zohar
(1980), Arboleda (2003) and Choudhry, Fang & Ahmed, (2008), found that management’s commitment to safety is
one of the determinants that cause an organization’s safety program successful. If the management level is committed
and aware of their employees’ safety, so it will reduce unsafe working environment for them.Besides that, Argyris
(1998, p. 99) stated that commitment is the combination of human energy and human mind to produce a new ideas or
people come out with something new. According to Ramus (2001) culture can influence innovation and risk taking to
achieve management commitment by adding value, norms, attitudes, and behaviors.Marsh (1995), management
commitment plays a crucial role in all aspects of safety. Then, Hsu (2007) stated the organization’s top management
shows positive and supportive safety attitudes towards their employees’ safety.

2.2 Injury management

Safety is the state in which the risk of harm to persons or property damage is reduced and maintained at or below,
an acceptable level through a continuing process of hazard identification and risk management. Injury management
as referred to Murphy. G, Foreman. P, Young (1997) is one of the safety and health’s tools in order to manage
workplace injuries and accidents with support by legislation.Kingma (2001), McPhaul and Lipscomb (2004) and
Miranda (2011) stated that the determinant of injury risk is the attitudes and safety and health practices in the
workplace. The injury management can improve the safety and health practices in the workplace and employee also
less suffering towards injuries and accidents. However, the injury management can reduce costs for an organization.

3. Research Framework

The framework of this study has proposed safety and health practices of safe work environments (includes training
and supervision, safe work procedures, consultation, reporting safety and management commitment) as an
independent variable and injury management as a dependent variable.

Safety And Health Practices

1. Training and Supervision

2. Safe Work Procedures

3. Consultation
Injury Management
4. Reporting Safety

5. Management Commitment

Source: Colla (2005)

Figure 1: Conceptual framework

 Fatini Hanim Binti Mohamed Taufek et al. / Procedia Economics and Finance 35 (2016) 705 – 712 709

4. Reliability
Table 1:Realibility Analysis
Variables No of items Cronbach’s Alpha

Training and Supervision 4 0.802

Safe Work Procedure 7 0.881

Consultation 6 0.833

Reporting Safety 7 0.913

Management Commitment 8 0.883

Injury Management 5 0.828

Table 1 shows the reliability of all the variables which are five from independent variables and one is from the
dependent variable. In this study, the first independent variable is training and supervision, the value of α is 0.802
where the no of items are 4. Next, the reliability of the second independent variable which is safe work procedure, the
value of α is 0.881 and the no of items are 7.The reliability of the third independent variable which is consultation
shows the value of α is 0.833 where the no of items are 6. Then, the reliability of the fourth independent variable
which is reporting safety, the value of α is 0.913. In this study, the no of items for management commitment is the
highest which is 8 items. The reliability of the last independent variable which is management commitment, the value
of α is 0.833. Besides that, for this research study, the reliability of the dependent variable which is injury management,
the value of α is 0.828. The most important is this variable’s alpha value is more than 0.6

5. Correlation Test
Table 2: Correlations analysis
Correlations

ts swp C rs mc im
ts Pearson Correlation 1 .775** .541** .587** .639** .630**
Sig. (2-tailed)
.000 .000 .000 .000 .000

Sum of Squares and Cross-products

839.636 1047.455 569.455 854.273 948.455 582.636

Covariance 6.409 7.996 4.347 6.521 7.240 4.448

N 132 132 132 132 132 132
swp Pearson Correlation .775 **
1 .720 **
.730 **
.769 **
.760**
Sig. (2-tailed) .000 .000 .000 .000 .000
Sum of Squares and Cross-products
1047.455 2176.515 1220.348 1709.576 1837.848 1131.788

Covariance 7.996 16.615 9.316 13.050 14.029 8.640

N 132 132 132 132 132 132
c Pearson Correlation .541** .720** 1 .735** .673** .725**
Sig. (2-tailed) .000 .000 .000 .000 .000
710 Fatini Hanim Binti Mohamed Taufek et al. / Procedia Economics and Finance 35 (2016) 705 – 712

Sum of Squares and Cross-products

569.455 1220.348 1320.265 1341.242 1251.515 841.621

Covariance 4.347 9.316 10.078 10.238 9.554 6.425

N 132 132 132 132 132 132
rs Pearson Correlation .587** .730** .735** 1 .827** .808**
Sig. (2-tailed) .000 .000 .000 .000 .000
Sum of Squares and Cross-products
854.273 1709.576 1341.242 2519.879 2125.242 1294.939

Covariance 6.521 13.050 10.238 19.236 16.223 9.885

N 132 132 132 132 132 132
mc Pearson Correlation .639 **
.769 **
.673 **
.827 **
1 .793**
Sig. (2-tailed) .000 .000 .000 .000 .000
Sum of Squares and Cross-products
948.455 1837.848 1251.515 2125.242 2621.515 1296.121

Covariance 7.240 14.029 9.554 16.223 20.012 9.894

N 132 132 132 132 132 132
im Pearson Correlation .630 **
.760 **
.725 **
.808 **
.793 **
1
Sig. (2-tailed)
.000 .000 .000 .000 .000

Sum of Squares and Cross-products

582.636 1131.788 841.621 1294.939 1296.121 1019.970

Covariance 4.448 8.640 6.425 9.885 9.894 7.786

N 132 132 132 132 132 132
**. Correlation is significant at the 0.01 level (2-tailed).

Table 3: Summary of hypothesis testing

No Hypothesis Finding
H1 There are significant relationships between training and supervision and injury management Accepted
H2 There are significant relationships between safe work procedure and injury management Accepted
H3 There are significant relationships between consultation and injury management Accepted
4
H There are significant relationships between reporting safety and injury management Accepted
H5 There are significant relationships between management commitment and injury management Accepted

The relationship between training and supervision is tested against injury management. The result indicates that
there is a strong relationship between training and supervision and injury management (r=0.630, N=132, p<0.01).
Therefore, hypothesis 1 are accepted.The relationship between safe work procedures is tested against injury
management. The result indicates that there is a very strong relationship between safe work procedures and injury
management (r=0.760, N=132, p<0.01). Therefore, hypothesis 2 are accepted.The relationship between consultation
is tested against injury management. The result indicates that there is a very strong relationship between consultation
and injury management (r=0.725, N=132, p<0.01). Therefore, hypothesis 3 are acceptedThe relationship between
reporting safety is tested against injury management. The result indicates that there is a very strong relationship
between reporting safety and injury management (r=0.808, N=132, p<0.01). Therefore, hypothesis 4 are acceptedThe
relationship between management commitment is tested against injury management. The result indicates that there is
 Fatini Hanim Binti Mohamed Taufek et al. / Procedia Economics and Finance 35 (2016) 705 – 712 711

a very strong relationship between management commitment and injury management (r=0.793, N=132, p<0.01).
Therefore, hypothesis 5 are accepted.

6. Discussion And Recommendations

The aim of this study is to identify the relationship between safety and health practices of safe work environments
(includes training and supervision, safe work procedures, consultation, reporting safety and management commitment)
as an independent variable and injury management as a dependent variable. In this study, overall independent variables
are having a strong relationship with the dependent variable.Many organizations did not really take the safety and
health practices issue on safe work environments (includes training and supervision, safe work procedures,
consultation, reporting safety and management commitment) as a serious matter. These will lead to increase the
occupational and accident at the workplace. For the future research should be improved safety and health practices
issue on safe work environments for employees to avoid injury and accidents happen. The employer must have good
responsibilities in handling their workers while doing their work. Thus, this is very important to ensure the employees
are safer.Another suggestion for the future research is the researcher may have looked at relationship between safety
and health practices and injury management for whole industry not only in manufacturing industry. Instead of in this
study, the researcher only focuses on the relationship between safety and health practices and injury management on
manufacturing industry, the sample may low compare with the whole industry in Pahang.

7. Conclusion
As a conclusion, in this study, the researcher has explored and identify the relationship between safety and health
practices of safe work environments (includes training and supervision, safe work procedures, consultation, reporting
safety and management commitment). From the reliability analysis, the result shows all variables are reliable and
valid. Thus, from the correlation test, the result shows that all independent variables are positive relationship to injury
management. Out of five of safety and health practices (includes training and supervision, safe work procedures,
consultation, reporting safety and management commitment), the reporting safety is high correlation compare with
other variables. This means, this variable will give an important impact and show that the employees use reporting
safety on their safe work environments for their workplace.

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