In this episode of the Longshore Insider Podcast, AEU Loss Control Manager Brad Whitney joins host Mike Jernigan to explore how supervisors and safety professionals can earn trust, strengthen their credibility, and turn that foundation into a more effective and resilient safety culture.
Transcript
Announcer:
Welcome to the Longshore Insider Podcast from the American Equity Underwriters. At AEU, we are passionate about helping waterfront employers protect their workers and their businesses. Join us as we explore practical strategies for improving workplace safety, effective claims management, and much more. So let's dive in. Welcome to the Longshore Insider Podcast.
Mike Jernigan:
Hello, and thank you for listening to the Longshore Insider Podcast by the American Equity Underwriters. I'm Mike Jernigan, your host, and today we're speaking with AEU's very own loss control managers to learn what they do to help organizations build, maintain, and improve their safety programs. Today I'm joined by Brad Whitney, and we're going to talk about how to build trust and credibility within the workforce by supervisors and safety managers. Brad, it's great to have you.
Brad Whitney:
Great to be here. Thank you, Mike.
Mike Jernigan:
So Brad, tell me a little bit about yourself and how you became a loss control manager?
Brad Whitney:
Well, it's been about 30 years now I've been working. I got out of college, needed a job. I have a science degree. So the first job was in a wastewater testing lab. The second one was in a dairy. I'll talk about the dairy real quick. I was in the quality control lab and I had never worked in a dairy. I don't have a dairy science degree, but I'm a quick learner and they hired me in the quality control lab, for a time I was the quality control manager because my boss left. But one of the things I didn't know but learned quickly about a dairy bottling and processing facility is you have an enormous sanitation team that cleans every 24 hours, cleans all the equipment. It's called the CIP system. It cleans in place with really harsh chemicals. And in the two years that I was there, I saw three devastating injuries to young men who were in the sanitation department.
One of them was blinded by chemical. It was a quaternary ammonium cleaner that was superheated. He turned the pipe and looked into it, wondering why stuff wasn't coming out. It came out, he was like looking down the barrel of a gun. He wasn't wearing his safety glasses. The second individual had his pants tucked into his waders, which you don't do when you're working around chemicals, and he dropped a whole bunch of acid into his boot, lost most of the skin on the bottom of his leg. The third individual fell off of tanker truck trying to take a sample, a new employee who, again, we didn't have a safety manager. He wasn't trained well, didn't really know what he was doing. Because he was just told to go up there and take a sample out in the rain. He slipped and fell and broke multiple bones. He never returned.
So those incidents are what really drove me to get into safety. But after a few jobs in other areas, including Lockheed Martin and I was an asbestos consultant for the State of California, I went to an interview for a loss control position 20 years ago with a different company. It wasn't AEU, but I knew immediately this is the job I want. This is I get to utilize all my skills, all my knowledge to help companies with their safety programs and their safety cultures. So I was with the company for seven years, and then AEU hired me 13 years ago, and I've never looked back. This is the best job and best company I've ever worked for.
Mike Jernigan:
So you've got some years under your belt and you've seen a thing or two?
Brad Whitney:
I have. I've probably seen several hundred different companies in my time and assessed their safety programs, been able to observe their safety cultures, what works, what doesn't. I've seen the good and the bad, the ugly, and that's what I'm sharing today. I'm not a trained expert on trust and credibility, but what I'm sharing comes from decades of experience from some trainings that even we have, our AEU lead program, but most of it comes from just experiential learning from me, seeing what works and what doesn't and observing. And that's what I'd like to share today on a narrower focus because talking about trust and credibility, like we're going to do, this could be a seminar that could be hours long. We're just going to try to narrow it down and make it for practical knowledge that a supervisor or a safety manager can use.
Mike Jernigan:
Sure. Well, you say that you're not an expert in trust and credibility, but you're a loss control manager and you walk these yards every day.
Brad Whitney:
I do.
Mike Jernigan:
So you see these things.
Brad Whitney:
I see.
Mike Jernigan:
So you may not feel as if you're an expert on these things, but what you do have your expertise comes into play is you know what it takes to have an effective safety program.
Brad Whitney:
I do. And I'm sorry. I guess I am an expert. Sometimes it's hard to, I'm humble. That's a part of building trust and credibility is being humble. I do have knowledge and experience. I don't have a degree on my wall in trust and credibility is what I'm saying. It's just from the school of hard knocks, being out there and seeing when trust fails and what that looks like and when trust is built and earned and you can see the difference. It's night and day.
Mike Jernigan:
Well, I'm glad you said it, because no one has a degree on their wall in trust and credibility.
Brad Whitney:
Oh, there's some. Probably a little certification.
Mike Jernigan:
Right, right. But seriously, that's one of those things that you can go to. Certainly you can go to seminars, you can go to classes and you can absorb all that, but without actually putting it into practice on the job, it does you very little good. And so to that end, what are some of the unique traits that you're looking out for that you say, "Hey, this is how you build trust and credibility with your team?"
Brad Whitney:
Credibility is people's belief in your expertise, in your knowledge, your abilities, your ability to do the right thing. So your credibility is people believe that you know how to do the right thing. Trust is a little more personal. They both take time to earn, but trust is that you are going to do the right thing, the belief that you are. Credibility is the belief that you know how, trust is the belief that you are going to do the right thing. So the things I look for when building trust, which I think is utmost important is, first of all, being honest, a hundred percent honest with the workforce. You say that and people go, "Well, you're going to tell them everything?" You go, "Well, there's some things you can't tell them, but you tell them that you can't tell them that. I can't tell you that at this time, but when I can, you're going to be the first to know," at least be honest in what you can share and don't lie.
Mike Jernigan:
Transparency.
Brad Whitney:
Transparency.
Mike Jernigan:
Right.
Brad Whitney:
Being consistent in how you approach. Every day coming in and handling issues on an even keel, not being an emotional roller coaster. Having some control of your emotions is very important to build trust, especially with workforce. You don't have huge relationship with them. They're not your friends. You want to be likable, but they don't necessarily need to like you. You just need to be consistent in your actions and fair in how you treat people. Being authentic and genuine I think is a good part of building trust. Showing what you know and being, again, transparent about what you don't know, not acting like you know everything. If you walk through the yard, especially a new safety manager or even a new supervisor, acting like you know everything, people know that you don't, that sort of cockiness. It's not good.
So admit what you don't know and use your strengths and show those, and serve and support the workforce. That is so important for a supervisor to say, "Hey, I may not know how to do your job as well as you, I don't, imagine to, but I do know how to support you and that's why I'm here." And show that care and concern that you're there to help them. That's what I look for in the trustworthiness or with a supervisor that has trust.
Mike Jernigan:
Well, you make great points. You mentioned that they may not necessarily have to like you, and that's true. People often don't like to be corrected, right? It's not a very comfortable feeling if a safety manager approaches you on the site and has to correct you. And obviously that must be handled in a very particular type of way. Maybe it's not handled on the yard, maybe it's a private discussion later, maybe it's just a brief mention, maybe it's not a full-blown stop work situation. But to that end, it is important, in my opinion, to build relationships so that you view one another as human beings as opposed to just this authoritarian safety manager who's going to march through the yard and embark at me, right? So talk a little bit about that aspect of it. How important is it for safety managers and supervisors to have the trust and credibility of their team through relationship?
Brad Whitney:
Very important. And it's funny because as you talk, I don't have a checklist of things that I'm wanting to hit on every single one of them. But when you mention that, it's respect. So you respect people, they will respect you. So when someone is doing something wrong, treat them with respect that you would want. You almost have to look from overhead and imagine how that person feels if you're in their shoes and you yell at them in front of their coworkers. Things that are just, that's going to break the trust of the whole team. Treat them with respect and use it as a coaching opportunity as we like to say. You're coaching them, these first infraction or infractions to try to help them improve. We coach them up. Eventually you may have to coach them out, but you do this in private and you don't do this in a way that shows disrespect. I think that's very important is respect.
Mike Jernigan:
That's fantastic information and advice for people to hear. You mentioned you've been in this industry, in this field for decades. You have a lot of experience. Have you ever worked with a supervisor who came at you the wrong way or who didn't treat you correctly and didn't have your trust?
Brad Whitney:
Not many, but I've seen supervisors who have that I didn't respect because, I mean, not that I didn't show them respect. I didn't respect the way that they handled situations or the way that they were talking to workers. Again, I've walked hundreds of yards or companies terminals, job sites for construction, and I've seen how poor leadership treats workers and there's no trust between the labor and the supervision. Myself, I've had a couple of supervisors I worked with who they acted like they knew more than other people. They acted like they were more important than other people, treated people with disrespect, not me per se, but the people that I worked with yelled at people in front of me and others where they berated another worker. And I lost respect for that supervisor and I didn't trust them.
What if I made a mistake? Are they going to yell at me in front of everyone? So yeah, it's a horrible place to be. And that's the reason I left those companies really. And if I have to reflect back on it and say, "Why did I leave the company?" It's because I didn't trust the supervisor. Actually, a lot of the jobs I've had I enjoyed. They were challenging, they were fulfilling in some ways. But you leave because of your supervisor, not because of your job.
Mike Jernigan:
Speaking of your experience, you've been with AEU for 13 years and that doesn't happen unless something's going right. So how about your supervisor at AEU? Can you tell me a little bit about who that is and whether or not they have your trust and credibility?
Brad Whitney:
I very much trust my supervisor. That's, again, why I've been here for 13 years and I plan to retire. Well, if they'll let me, I'll plan to retire from AEU. My supervisor is Jimmy Burgin. He's our director of loss control, and he's been with AEU since the inception. So he has a lot of credibility, you could say, without even getting to know him. But as I've gotten to know him over the last 13 years, very trustworthy, very credible. He supports me. I feel like he sincerely cares about me, and he has all the traits he displays of what I like to see in a supervisor. It's why I'm here. And our leadership team in general, AEU has a great leadership team.
Mike Jernigan:
I agree. And they are there to support us and they treat us like people first, that's what I always say and we're lucky in that regard. But there are people out there who are working right now in a dangerous job for a supervisor or safety manager who is not trustworthy, who does not have credibility. But let's talk about how a supervisor gets to that point. What is it that erodes the trust?
Brad Whitney:
Trust is earned. And some compare it to a currency where every time you have an engagement, you make a deposit or withdrawal. So you make little deposits, every interaction, getting to know someone, thanking them for working safely, giving them credit for what they're doing, being appreciative of them and supporting them. These are all going to build their little deposits, but when you take out a withdrawal, it can be fairly small, but they're massive withdrawals. So if you've lost the trust of your workforce, you've either taken out one or many massive withdrawals. You need to listen to the workers. You need to start over.
As far as the relationship goes, you got to give trust yourself in order to get it back and admit that you're wrong. Take blame and give credit to the person. If you were wrong as a supervisor and you want to rebuild that trust, let's say you've wronged someone, you blame them for something that wasn't their fault. And it's hard for a supervisor. Some would rather just fire the employee and start over. But if you really do want to try to repair that trust, you need to listen, you need to be consistent, you need to give trust back, and it's going to take a lot of time.
Mike Jernigan:
And that goes right back to relationship building. I think you do have to bring yourself down a peg, and you've got to meet people where they are. You've got to be sincere, you've got to be genuine, and you have to say, especially if you're in a role where you are holding people accountable, you got to start with yourself. And I think that's something that is very important. But it reminds me too what you're saying of that old cliche saying, the best cure is prevention. Is that right?
Brad Whitney:
Yes.
Mike Jernigan:
Right?
Brad Whitney:
Don't break trust and you won't have to repair it. Yeah.
Mike Jernigan:
Right, right. I mean, and also, at the end of the day, people in these positions aren't just doing a job. Their job is literally to keep people alive. And I think that we really can't stress that enough. For a safety manager or a supervisor if they have done a good job, then everyone on their team goes home safe every day. And I think that just underscores how important it is that they take trust and credibility seriously.
Brad Whitney:
Absolutely. I've heard you say it's to save lives. Some supervisors might say, "Well, no, I got to get the job done. We got to get this done, we got to get paid." And there's a saying I heard that was, production and quality saves jobs, safety saves lives, and your life is worth way more than the production and quality. You need production and quality for your job, but you also need to be able to go home to your family, lift your kids, do the things you want to do outside of work. One injury, one second can change your entire life. And it's a lot of responsibility being a supervisor because ultimately you set the stage for safety of your crew, of the yard. It needs to be taken seriously and you need to care.
Mike Jernigan:
And you can't underestimate if you are driven by that production, then you need to understand that an injury, or God forbid, a death, is one that's going to stop production right there, in its tracks. And not only that, it's going to cost a significant amount, and those are the least important of the things that occur, right? Because you've lost a life or you've got someone who's permanently disabled. So it's extremely important that supervisors and safety managers specifically take their jobs and their responsibilities seriously. Because again, there's just nothing more important than making sure that your team is safe and that they get to go home and see their kids and their spouses, and that they get to live, literally live their life.
Brad Whitney:
Yeah. And take care of their families and support their families. We're not here... there's rare people who live to work. I'm not one of those. I work to live. I'm working so that I can do the things I love outside of work so I can support my family and do those things I love. Don't get me wrong, I do love my job, but I think most people are working to live and they're not expecting or wanting to get hurt on the job. I've heard the old saying, it's an old saying from many, many 70 years ago, to build a good ship, someone's got to die. And we don't live in that time anymore, fortunately.
Mike Jernigan:
Thank God we don't.
Brad Whitney:
And as a supervisor, I don't have these stories, but I've heard them. There's nothing more that hits you here more than having to go to someone's family and let them know that daddy's not coming home, that mommy's not coming home, that nobody wants to do that. They got to be the worst feeling. Yeah.
Mike Jernigan:
Well, you've seen a lot. You've been in this field, as we've said, for many years, and you have a lot of experience. And so I want to wrap this conversation up with this one question, what is it about safety that you wish more people understood?
Brad Whitney:
We actually have a banner that says this, so I'm going to keep it simple here. The banner says, "Your family is depending on you to work safely today," and there's so many other things. To sum this in one statement, it's a little short, but I feel like that hits here where everybody has family and they are depending on you to work safely today and every day, taking that into every decision you make when you're out there, because you're right, they're working in terminals, yards, on sites where there's hazards. We work in a very high hazard industry. And every decision, every risk, measured risk you think you're taking, you need to understand the consequence. And the consequence isn't just, "I'm falling 40 feet and dying," it's, "My family now can't afford to," they're out on the street maybe. I mean, it affects more than, "Okay, I lost my vision." Well, no, the consequence is not, you lost your vision, it's you can't provide for your family anymore. So I wish people would understand that more, that your family is depending on you to work safely.
Mike Jernigan:
And it starts with those supervisors setting the tone and being the example for their teams. And that is right there. That is right back at trust and credibility.
Brad Whitney:
Yes. Absolutely. Lead by example. That is so important. If you want your workers, again, I didn't have a checklist of things, but if you want your workers, you have to embody what you want them to do. So you have to wear the PPE, you have to follow the rules, you have to walk the talk. I walked into a machine shop one time with a safety manager who wanted to go right up and show me how they were using the lathe, and he wasn't even wearing safety glasses. And I stopped and I said, "Why aren't you wearing your safety glasses?" "Oh, it's okay." "No. That sets the tone. All the workers are seeing that." I mean, you can have a sign on the wall that says safety glasses is required. If the safety manager or the leadership, the supervisor isn't wearing theirs, no, there's no credibility.
Mike Jernigan:
It's going to be hard to read without your eyesight.
Brad Whitney:
Yep. And they have no respect for that sign or their supervisor, because they have no credibility when they're not following the rules themselves.
Mike Jernigan:
And that's why supervisors who are listening to this need to truly understand the importance of their job and their responsibilities, because they do have people's lives in their hands. And I think that is a great way to end this conversation. And Brad, I appreciate everything that you've shared with me today. It's been an awesome talk and I hope we get to do it again soon.
Brad Whitney:
Thank you. It's been an honor.
Mike Jernigan:
And also thanks to our listeners for joining us on the Longshore Insider Podcast. You can watch this episode and more on the American Equity Underwriters YouTube page. Also, be sure to subscribe to the Longshore Insider Podcast on your favorite podcast platform to check out even more content on our website amequity.com. Until next time, stay safe and take care.
