Safety Knights

My personal opinion is that Maintenance needs to be the Safety rep's best friend (at least in a manufacturing facility). They're generally the folks exposed to the riskiest hazards, as well as the ones that help fulfill work orders to correct safety hazards. They can be either your best friend or biggest hurdle.

At my new job I've prioritized building a strong relationship with Maintenance and it has paid off for all parties. :)

Usually going to be the department where the employees have the highest risk of being injured. In my experience this is typically maintenance.

I see your point on maintenence. Personally, I think it's operations. They are the ones driving the front line workers. If they're telling workers to bypass safety, whether directly or indirectly (e.g., by stressing the importance of meeting quotes), then it's going completely against all of your efforts. If production truly makes safety a core value of what they do, then if you say workers need to do something, they'll help make that happen.

HR is typically only used for enforcement of violations, which we don't want to do unless it's a last resort in most cases. Similar concept with legal - they're mainly used when you're in legal issues (or trying to stay out of them). Maintenence will help you implement changes and improvements, but if production says they're not shutting a line down, then there's nothing they can do.

I see your point on Maintenance. However I disagree! I actually have two picks.

#1 Ops/Production! In my 45 years that is always the case in manufacturing. Where do all the employees work? Whom do all the floor leaders report to (the supervisors and/or leaders? Especially in small to medium sized facilities Maintenance even reports to Ops! Where are all your problems and injuries? I was taught on my first day in manufacturing that there is one primary department, Ops, that is where the money is made! Everything else is there to support Ops! That enough?

#2 All else is equal. It takes everyone working together to make an awesome Lean World-Class Safety culture!

My $.02

I selected other, because I believe it’s leadership. In my opinion none of the other stuff matters if the company’s leadership isn’t behind actively engaged. All of the best companies I’ve worked with didn’t stand behind their safety professionals, they hired safety professionals to fulfill their goals and vision.

I have to say that, at least for me working for a City municipality, the Safety Division is under our HR department. So I'm good there. Always good to know the policies and procedures that our employees are held to. But with that being said, I love to build relationships with all of our Divisions. This way during inspections when a hazard is identified I can ask them to fix the hazard. Some Divisions quickly address the hazard faster than others. But one of my great relationships is with our Building maintenance and Fleet maintenance. Building maintenance to get things fixed, upgraded, etc. Fleet maintenance as a double check. When operators bring in vehicles or equipment for preventative maintenance, our Fleet mechanics are very observant. When they see any damage that has been done, they send me an email and then I follow up with that Division's Supervisor. This has greatly decreased the amount unreported incidents. As far as legal, I just stay as far away from that division as possible. LOL

I have found that Safety business partners are all of the above. The situations are dynamic, and can't really be stove piped. One Other one that could be listed would be quality control or quality assurance. As a services deliverable organization I have to have a partnership with each one. Contracts and legal requirements with subcontractors for scopes of work and compliance standpoints can get confusing.
Of course without good leadership support the rest of the team is more than likely a product of their environment and a culture is formed or developed that is going to be a rough road.