In the Telecom industry, the biggest hazards come from the construction and maintenance activities of the tall towers supporting antennas for mobile phone networks and broadcast transmissions. A survey by the Communications Workers of America found that more than 65% of technicians have seen a coworker injured or killed on the job.

We must stop this trend! This articles aims to review a small sample of the incidents in the telecom industry with the purpose of identifying the most significant lessons learned and thereby contributing to the prevention of their recurrence, in order to save lives!

Case Studies From the Incidents in Telecom Industry

1. AT&T: Fatality From a 250-foot fall (2023)

Incident Overview: Founded in 1983, the American Telephone and Telegraph Company or AT&T, as it is better known today, headquartered in Dallas, Texas, is currently number 32 on the list of Fortune 500. It serves almost 300 million U.S. consumers and nearly 2.5 million business by employing approximately 150,000 workers and contracting with more than 700 companies, in order to build and maintain its network. AT&T, like many other hiring clients, can control its own safety management systems easier than those of its contractors. So, on September 25, 2023, Darren Bishop, a 28-year-old tower technician, died after falling 250 feet from a 300-foot tower during an AT&T installation in Huntsburg Township, Ohio. Bishop was a 9-year-veteran of Telecom industry, employed by an AT&T contractor.  OSHA investigation revealed issues with fall protection practices, including multiple attachments on the same anchor point and improper application of the anchor hook. No citation was issued but the incident resulted in the following learnings.

Lessons Learned:

• Risk Assessment: The incident highlighted the need for comprehensive assessment of risks inherent in tower climbing, inclusive of planning for anchor points, their capacities, and proper ways of utilizing personal fall arrest systems.
• Improper PPE Use: OSHA’s investigation found temporary anchorages using “girth hitch” knots, which can reportedly cause a sling to lose 50% of its strength. The knot was found in multiple fall protection components and fall positioning devices on the tower.

2. T-Mobile: Construction Site Incident (2022)

Incident Overview: A subsidiary of the German telecommunications company Deutsche Telekom AG, founded in December of 1999, T-Mobile is headquartered in Bellevue, Washington. It serves 260 million users nationwide by employing 67,000 employees. In 2022, a contractor working on a T-Mobile tower site suffered severe injuries due to a fall while not using proper safety harness.

Lessons Learned:

• Training and Certification: T-Mobile reinforced the importance of safety training for contractors. They implemented mandatory safety workshops focusing on fall protection and equipment handling.
• Standardized Procedures: The incident prompted T-Mobile to update its SOPs for construction sites, ensuring all personnel adhered to strict safety protocols before commencing work.

3. Verizon: Fiber Optic Installation Incident (2023)

Incident Overview: Number 31 on the Fortune 500 list, Verizon Communications is the world’s second-largest telecommunications company by revenue and its mobile network is the largest wireless carrier in the United States. It is headquartered in New York City, serving 114 million subscribers by employing 105,400 workers. In 2023, during a routine fiber optic installation in New York City, a crew inadvertently damaged a gas line, leading to an evacuation of nearby businesses and a hazardous situation.

Lessons Learned:

• Permit-to-Work System: Verizon enhanced its dig permit protocols, particularly in the urban areas. They now conduct more comprehensive surveys before beginning any installation work.
• Collaboration and Sharing: Following the incident, Verizon initiated collaboration with local utility companies to share information and improve coordination during installation projects, aiming to prevent future accidents.

Conclusion

Although the case studies presented above represent only a small portion of the numerous incidents and near misses in the telecom industry, the lessons that originated from them are a good sampling of the important elements which must be corrected and implemented, in order to save lives of the personnel engaged in constructing and maintaining the infrastructure. No project and no new workday should ever be started without proper consideration of the risks inherent in the tasks involved and their mitigations. When the risks are properly assessed, many of the other puzzle pieces will fall into their right places, like correct application of the PPE. Training and certification is also essential in this industry, as the high risk of work involved must be approached intelligently and correctly. Of course, the standardization of procedures is critical in any industry where one wrong move can cost a life. The same goes for the permit-to-work systems, as they ensure that appropriate preparations and precautions have been utilized for the safe operations. Finally, no industry will succeed without the synergy that is accomplished by collaboration and sharing among the teams. Although this process may be a little more complicated when it has to be performed between the hiring client’s employees and those of the contractors, lives depend on it.

References:

Tommy Clift (2024). ‘Nobody Knows We Exist’ – The Overlooked Workers Impacted by Cell Tower Safety Failures. Broadband Nation. https://www.broadbandnation.org/cell-tower/nobody-knows-we-exist-dark-history-cell-tower-climber-safety

CWA – Communication Workers of America (2020). AT&T’s Web of Subcontractors: Building Next Generation Networks With Low-Wage Labor. CWA Union. https://cwa-union.org/sites/default/files/20201005attsubcontractorreport.pdf

Yang Rae Kim, Myoung Hwan Park, Byung Yong Jeong (2016). Hazardous Factors and Accident Severity of Cabling Work in Telecommunications Industry. Journal of Ergonomic Society of Korea, 35 (3). https://koreascience.kr/article/JAKO201620853201145.pdf

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Simon Goncharenko, PhD, CSP, CSHO is the Director of Implementation at Veriforce, LLC, member of the Veriforce Strategic Advisory Board, avid researcher, and an engaging speaker. Having been born and raised in Eastern Europe, Simon’s 30 years of professional experience have seen him lead teams on three continents and in various industries, including oil and gas, construction, and data center sectors. His most recent employment prior to Veriforce was with Meta Platforms, Inc. former Facebook, where he supported the EHS on the construction of AI hyperscale data centers. Dr. Goncharenko has authored or contributed to the creation of over 80 articles and six books, the latest of which, Save Lives: Pushing Boundaries in Human Factors, provides ideas for human-centric operations and processes that will improve safety and organizational performance, while increasing employee engagement and job satisfaction. The companion training to the book, entitled Save Lives Global Human & Organizational Factors©, the world’s first and only human factors program designed specifically for the operators, builders, and contractors of mission critical facilities, has been widely popular with hundreds of participants around the globe. Simon is an animated and engaging professor and Master Trainer, charismatic keynote speaker, and podcaster of the Save Lives Global Podcast.

QUESTION 1: Fatal Verses Non-Fatal Injuries – For the past 30 years and for a variety of reasons, we have seen a major decrease in the total number of recordable injury rate among workers. Beginning in 1992 from a 9 to present day slightly above a 2. But if you overly that trend with the fatality rate, the numbers are not as impressive. In fact, the number of workers killed in on the job accidents has plateaued from a statistical standpoint. We kill the same number of workers, year after year and in recent date we saw an 8.9% increase.

Given the statistical improvements in total recordable injury rates, should companies consider moving away from the historical lagging metric of TRIR to a program that focuses on Serious Injuries and Fatalities?

It depends.

What do I mean? If a move from TRIR to SIF and PSIF approach represents the next step towards a more comprehensive and holistic safety management system, where we are refining our focus, if you will, while at the same time not taking our eyes off all the other areas, then I think companies should incorporate this approach into their overall strategy. If, however, the move to SIF and PSIF approach is viewed as more of a final destination – one of those “we finally found the magic bullet that will solve our problems” – then all we are doing is trading one lagging indicator for another.

I bring all this up because there is a wide range of understanding of safety around the globe today. So organizational maturity matters. Some are fully engaged and constantly trying to push the boundaries, which is by the way part of my book title, and others are just checking it off like another task. It is the latter ones that I am thinking about when we engage the subject of SIFs and PSIFs because my fear is that they will switch their attention from one set of hazards that led to recordables to another set that leads to SIFs, and we’re going to inadvertently create a whole new category of incidents and ways to hurt our people.

QUESTION 2: What is a Serious Injury? Based on conversations that I have had with fellow safety professionals across various industries, many companies are launching SIF and PSIF prevention programs. In fact, looking at the agendas of ASSP’s recent PDC, the breakout sessions here at the NSC Congress and BCSP’s Global Summit, there were no less than twenty-four sessions focusing on SIFs and PSIFs. The state of California has even established regulatory requirements for reporting potential SIFS. While we all understand that a fatality is, what I have discovered is that there is no common definition of what a serious injury is.

Serious, according to OSHA, obviously is an amputation, loss of an eye, or hospitalization. Construction Safety Research Alliance folks out of Bolder, CO say it should be tied to life, as in is life-ending, life-threatening, or life-altering. At the same time, serious is somewhat subjective to at least an individual and job family, perhaps an industry too.

At the worker level, our default at defining serious is going to be by looking at one’s job description and aligning our definition at how the injury impacts someone’s ability to do their job. That is actually been one of the problems with our whole approach to safety as work-related only. But I digress. The point is what an employer may not consider as serious because someone can keep doing their job, may be considered as serious by the individual, their family, etc. So, that’s one of the challenges with a definition. On job family level, losing a fingertip may not be considered serious in oil and gas because the employee can still perform his work functions but it may be considered as serious in healthcare, because loss of sensitivity is impacting brain surgeon’s ability to do her job.

And then you’d have to consider what serious means within different industries. Theoretically, serious in oil and gas, which has 7x the fatality rates of other industries, would be caused by driving, struck by, falls and exposures. Serious in data centers are caused by electricity. Construction throws a curveball, at least according to the numerous recent studies showing that you’re 7x more likely to die of suicide, surprisingly, than any other hazard.

QUESTION 3: Professional Safety Journal, the flagship publication of the American Society of Safety Professionals, published an article by the researchers at the Construction Safety Research Alliance at the University of Colorado at Boulder. The article was entitled, “What is a Serious Injury?: A model for defining serious injuries.” Before I read the article, I did not understand all the complexities of determining if an injury is serious or not. I would like to provide each of you with a scenario that was contained in the article and ask each of you for your response as to whether this incident meets the definition of serious. A worker lost the tip of his finger when unstable materials unexpectedly shifted in the bed of a truck. The injury involves bone damage, and the piece of the finger cannot be reattached. Simply stated, the consequences of this injury will be permanent but there is technically no disablement because the functionality of the finger will not be affected. How would you classify this injury?

As I already mentioned above, it depends.

What is the worker’s job?

What industry?

Are we considering the potential psychological impacts of the injury on the worker and worker’s family?

Is the injury going to impact the worker’s career growth?

Some may argue that not all the questions I asked here are relevant and perhaps so. But the point is that we have to push the boundaries of our traditional and narrow understanding of safety if we are really interested in saving lives, and if we are really interested in advancing our profession to the next evolution.

QUESTION 4: By moving away from the TRIR as a determiner, which I believe is discriminatory to smaller companies and not predictive of future, to a SIF/PSIF model only what are the potential unintended consequences?

Some of this I already addressed above, but here are the quick bullet points/questions:

1. It is discriminatory to smaller companies – how do we make things more fair for them?
2. If a lagging indicator, like TRIR, is not predictive of future, who is to say that another lagging indicator, like SIF, will be?
3. Concerns have been raised about TRIR not being statistically stable or valid because it is not based on sufficient volumes of consistent data. Research shows that for your company’s TRIR to carry statistical meaning, you will have to accumulate a billion plus worker hours. In fact, Hallowell did an evaluation in 2021 of more than 3 trillion worker hours and found that the occurrence of recordable injures is almost entirely random. I say all this to say that focusing on SIFs will yield a a whole lot less data points, so less chance of statistical validity.
4. This brings me to another unintended consequence – ability to learn and share lessons learned. Because our serious injuries are more rare than recordable injuries, we will have harder time accumulating sufficient data, trending it, and coming up with lessons learned. This means we’ll have to open up and share our data across organizations, so we’ll see how that shapes up. Although some organizations have attempted to re-evaluate their existing incident data with a SIF/PSIF filter if you will, and expand their SIF databases in this way.
5. I can keep going but here’s the last one that comes to mind – there will be a real temptation to shift focus to only those hazards, near misses, and injuries that are serious, and create blinders in the process to other areas

QUESTION 5: How do we make the definition clear so that it can be consistently applied? The authors of the article recommend developing a uniform definition based on the “LIFE Model.” In that model an injury is classified as a SIF or PSIF if it results in the following outcomes: Life Ending, Life Threatening, or Life Altering. What say you?

I think we’ll have to first decide how comprehensive and holistic we want to be. Is our definition going to cover work-related considerations and consequences only? Is it going to include the impact outside of work? Is it going to extend to the career potential impact? Is is going to include potential emotional and psychological impacts? How do we gather data from the on-the-fly adjustments made by our personnel in work as performed vs work as imagined and how do we allow that data to inform the definition? Should we consider incorporating AI and machine learning to find the common denominators in incidents and flag projects with a similar set of conditions and factors, the way AECOM is doing it? Once we address these preliminary questions, we can move to aligning on definition.

One example of this phenomenon was the introduction of well-meaning bicycle helmet laws in New Zealand, Australia and Canada, which focused on increasing the safety of the riders. However, instead of increasing the safety of the riders, these laws had a number of unintended consequences, like:

• Suppressing bicycle usage by up to 60%;
• Instilling a false sense of security in experienced cyclists, which resulted in faster and harder riding and an uptick in injuries;
• Discouraging female riders, children, seniors, and minorities from even considering riding.

It seems that as of late we are experiencing this same phenomenon in another area of our lives in the United States of America – the area of drug use. And it seems that many other parts of the world are very much in the same boat. There seems to be a lot of confusion around the relaxation in medicinal and recreational drug laws throughout the world and all the repercussions that these regulatory decisions spell out for personal lives and work environments.

Take marijuana for example.

In the U.S., federal laws consider marijuana to be a Schedule I drug, with penalties for the possession, distribution, growth, or sale of marijuana. Schedule I drugs are also included in the testing requirements for safety-sensitive jobs. However, 92% of the US states, 46 of them to be exact, plus the District of Columbia, have legalized medical marijuana usage and 48% of US states, or 24 of them, plus the District of Columbia, have legalized recreational marijuana. There are several states, in addition to this, where marijuana is illegal but decriminalized, which means that smoking weed there may result in penalties but not prosecution. And then there are yet others where marijuana is still illegal and not decriminalized but CBD products are allowed.

So, plenty of confusion for the average citizen.

Outside the United States, marijuana is legal in Canada, Germany, Mexico, South Africa, and Thailand. Yet even in these geographies all is not so simple. European Union illustrates this perfectly. According to John Wicks, co-founder and CEO of Cansford Laboratories and one of the UK’s leading experts in drug testing, workplace drug testing in Europe is a tricky business. Why? Because of the often-conflicting expectations between the privacy laws, the human rights requirements, and the controlled substance regulations which vary quite widely between different member states.

Likewise, Australia is in flux at the moment, with federal regulations being often in conflict with various local, state, and territory laws. When it comes to Asia, unsurprisingly many countries on this continent maintain strict prohibitionist policies regarding cannabis – the possession, cultivation, trafficking, or use of cannabis is illegal here and can lead to severe legal consequences.

With so much fluctuation in the global regulatory requirements, the onus for implementing workplace controls is on the individual companies. The employers end up being the ones who must both ensure they provide a safe workplace and tread lightly in enforcing their policies and procedures, while dealing with regional privacy laws and medical doctors who may or may not be at liberty to disclose the results of the tests in different jurisdictions.

Then, there is a plethora of special case scenarios, where additional consideration must be provided, due to the extenuating circumstances. A good example of the above are those individuals who are approved for medical marijuana but work in safety-sensitive environments where such use could jeopardize their employment. Additionally, how should the U. S. organizations function who are not covered by the Drug-Free Workplace Act but still desire to provide a safe work environment for their employees? What is the best way for these companies to protect themselves from the risks of litigations challenging the validity of test results and conflicts with constitutional rights (against unreasonable searches and seizures by the Fourth Amendment of the U.S. Constitution) and other laws (e.g., the Americans with Disabilities Act prohibiting discrimination against qualified individuals with a disability based on prior drug-related problems)? This is a very pertinent question, though answering it may lie outside the scope of the present paper.

With so many nuances in state/region and federal regulations around the world, the challenge for the individuals residing within these jurisdictions must be real, especially when it comes to having a clear understanding of what they can and cannot do. This is especially pertinent for those individuals whose employment is in safety-sensitive jobs, which may have federally mandated drug testing associated with them.

So, what is the unintended consequence of this confusion between the federal and state requirements?

Cheating on drug tests.

Why even do drug tests?

First of all, why even conduct drug tests? From a higher-level perspective, substance involvement represents a significant public and occupational health issue that imposes economic and health-related societal costs. From an employer perspective, employee drug use can put employers at an elevated risk of accidents, increased absenteeism, lower productivity, and higher insurance costs. Plus, some job families in the U.S. for example belong to safety sensitive categories, which come with an automatic requirement for drug testing.

Is the drug testing system perfect?

I realize that some will challenge the necessity of drug testing all together, while others will question the meaningfulness of the metric that is not nuanced enough to test levels of inebriation like we do with alcohol, while yet others will attempt to prove that failure of a drug test is not causal to an incident. The current system of drug testing in the United States is certainly not perfect but the presence of an imperfect system is still better than no system at all. Given that the purpose of this article is not to defend a particular system and that even an imperfect system can save lives, drug testing is here to stay, at least for the time being.

Why test for marijuana?

Yet others will challenge the necessity of drug testing for marijuana. So, why should we test for cannabis in the workplace? The reasons are quite numerous.

The first reason why we should test for marijuana usage in the workplace is because quite frankly nothing good comes from marijuana. Clearly this statement might seem controversial, as people have argued over the benefits and the drawbacks of drug usage for quite some time now. But the fact of the matter is that there has been no research presenting evidence to date that identifies benefits of marijuana usage to the workplace, while at the same time there is an overwhelming amount of evidence of the harm and negative outcomes associated with this and other drugs.

Furthermore, the problematic drug consumption creates unique threats to the users and their families’ well-being and results in significant economic costs for society by increasing workplace injuries (Spicer et al., 2003), turnover (Bufquin et al., 2021), and absenteeism (Sorge et al., 2020; Van Hasselt et al., 2015). For instance, in 2020, 388 fatal work injury deaths (out of a total of 4,786) were due to unintentional overdose from alcohol and drug consumption, which has quadrupled within a decade (U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, 2020, U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, 2021). Here are just a few statistics borrowed from my Save Lives: Pushing Boundaries in Human Factors book, where an entire chapter (Chapter 16) is dedicated to this topic:

• Daily cannabis users have a 25% increased risk of a heart attack and a 42% increased risk of a stroke.
• Using marijuana before the age of 18 may permanently affect how the brain builds connections for functions like attention, memory, and learning.
• Marijuana users are twice as likely to get injured on the job, when compared to non-users.
• Of those injured on the job, cannabis users are 22% more likely to end up in ER or be hospitalized.

The list goes on, but the picture is clear. The state laws, which were designed to simplify people’s lives and free up the local law enforcement for more weighty matters, ended up pushing people to cheat on the drug tests, increasing the likelihood of getting hurt on the job because of use, exacerbating the extent of injury, and even causing some permanent brain connections which impact the users’ attention, memory, and learning.

When government restrictions ease, cheating on drug tests skyrockets

According to the Quest Diagnostics’ Annual Drug Testing Index, the percentage of US workers whose drug tests showed signs of tampering skyrocketed in 2023 to its highest level in over 30 years. The percentage of employees in the general U.S. workforce whose drug test showed signs of tampering increased by more than six-fold in 2023 versus the prior year. The increase in substituted urine specimens in the general U.S. workforce was 633%. Invalid urine specimens in the general U.S. workforce increased 45.2%. A result of substituted or invalid suggests a specimen has been tampered with in an attempt to conceal drug use.

“Given the growing acceptance and use of some drugs, particularly marijuana, it may be unsurprising that some people feel it necessary to try and cheat a drug test,” states Suhash Harwani, Ph.D., Senior Director of Science for Workforce Health Solutions at Quest Diagnostics. Dr. Harwani adds that “It is possible that our society’s normalization of drug use is fostering environments in which some employees feel it is acceptable to use such drugs without truly understanding the impact they have on workplace safety.”

A way forward

For Individuals

From an individual to an individual – my humble advice is don’t use marijuana. It’s as simple as that. The benefits derived from it are very few and very short-lived, while the negative consequences are very many and most are very permanent.

A recent New York Times article reveals that many marijuana users mistakenly assume that, since the drug is legal in much of the country, it must be nonaddictive and safe. This assumption is dangerously wrong and many if not most of those who begin using the drug for medical purposes report getting addicted and experiencing painful and lasting side effects.

Plus, not using marijuana in the first place, you will never be tempted with cheating on a drug test again.

For employers

As an employer, irrespective of the geography you are in or the specific controlled substance regulatory requirements you are under, you have a legal and a moral obligation to provide a safe and healthy work environment for your employees. As such, it is in your best interest to have sound drug and alcohol and employee assistance policies (EAP) and procedures to ensure that employee drug testing programs, among other things, are scientifically rigorous and effective. “Cheating on drug tests not only undermines workplace safety but also jeopardizes the safety of society as a whole,” said Katie Mueller, a senior program manager at the National Safety Council focusing on cannabis safety. “Companies, regulators and policymakers must prioritize accountability for the well-being of all individuals in our communities; lives depend on it,” she added. Additionally, research suggests that having both a workplace drug and alcohol policy and EAP is associated with significantly lower rates of marijuana and other illicit drug use compared to having neither of the two measures.

Canadian National Railway is a great example of a company that is successfully navigating the oft tumultuous regulatory waters for the sake of its workforce, contractors, tenants, and the communities they serve. Their secret? Amidst the confusing and contradictory federal and provincial requirements, Canadian National implemented a robust corporate Policy to Prevent Workplace Alcohol and Drug Problems alongside an Employee and Family Assistance Program. They understand the potentially catastrophic consequences of impairment at work, so they elected to have a zero-tolerance approach to impairment from both legal and illegal substances, not only for their Canadian-based employees but also for their contractors and tenants. Yet at the same time, there is a place for their employees who may be struggling with addictions to seek help before drug or alcohol use becomes a workplace or personal problem.

For governments

If you are part of the municipal, state or federal government that is wanting to decriminalize or reclassify marijuana to a less stringently regulated controlled substance, you may be responsible for increasing the risk of impaired workers.

How? Because both the decriminalization and reclassification more often than not adds scores of individuals operating under the influence into the workplaces and the public arena, which could have devastating results.

Take professional drivers for example. The loosening of regulations could lead to all the professional drivers and transportation workers being untested for marijuana, as Schedule II and III substances are not included in the testing requirements. So, the risk of simply being on the road will increase exponentially and not just for the drivers, but the rest of the public sharing the roads with them.

Please think twice about how your actions may introduce unintended consequences in our workplaces and our communities and cost lives as a result.

References:

Megan Twohey, Danielle Ivory and Carson Kessler. As America’s Marijuana Use Grows, So Do the Harms. The New York Times, Oct. 4, 2024.

John Wicks. Understanding the Workplace Drug Testing Rules Around Europe. Cansford Labs Blog. Jan 9, 2019. https://blog.cansfordlabs.co.uk/workplace-drug-testing-rules-around-europe

Workforce Drug Test Cheating Surged in 2023, Finds Quest Diagnostics Drug Testing Index Analysis of Nearly 10 Million Drug Tests. Newsroom. Quest Diagnostics. May 15, 2024. https://newsroom.questdiagnostics.com/2024-05-15-Workforce-Drug-Test-Cheating-Surged-in-2023,-Finds-Quest-Diagnostics-Drug-Testing-Index-Analysis-of-Nearly-10-Million-Drug-Tests

Simon Goncharenko. Save Lives: Pushing Boundaries in Human Factors. Midway, TX: Kindle Direct Publishing, 2024.

Frone, M. R., & Bamberger, P. A. (2024). Alcohol and illicit drug involvement in the workforce and workplace. In L. E. Tetrick, G. G. Fisher, M. T. Ford, & J. C. Quick (Eds.), Handbook of occupational health psychology (3rd ed., pp. 361–383). American Psychological Association. https://doi.org/10.1037/0000331-018

Spicer RS, Miller TR, Smith GS. Worker substance use, workplace problems and the risk of occupational injury: a matched case-control study. J Stud Alcohol. 2003 Jul;64(4):570-8. doi: 10.15288/jsa.2003.64.570. PMID: 12921200.

Bufquin, D., Park, J.-Y., Back, R. M., de Souza Meira, J. V., & Hight, S. K. (2021). Employee work status, mental health, substance use, and career turnover intentions: An examination of restaurant employees during COVID-19. International Journal of Hospitality Management, 93, N.PAG. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ijhm.2020.102764

Van Hasselt, M., Keyes, V., Bray, J., & Miller, T. (2015). Prescription drug abuse and workplace absenteeism: Evidence from the 2008-2012 National Survey on Drug Use and Health. Journal of Workplace Behavioral Health, 30, 379-392. DOI: 10.1080/15555240.2015.1047499.

U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, 2020

U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, 2021

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Simon Goncharenko, PhD, CSP, CSHO is the Director of Implementation at Veriforce, LLC, member of the Veriforce Strategic Advisory Board, avid researcher, and an engaging speaker. Having been born and raised in Eastern Europe, Simon’s 30 years of professional experience have seen him lead teams on three continents and in various industries, including oil and gas, construction, and data center sectors. His most recent employment prior to Veriforce was with Meta Platforms, Inc. former Facebook, where he supported the EHS on the construction of AI hyperscale data centers. Dr. Goncharenko has authored or contributed to the creation of over 80 articles and six books, the latest of which, Save Lives: Pushing Boundaries in Human Factors, provides ideas for human-centric operations and processes that will improve safety and organizational performance, while increasing employee engagement and job satisfaction. The companion training to the book, entitled Save Lives Global Human & Organizational Factors©, the world’s first and only human factors program designed specifically for the operators, builders, and contractors of mission critical facilities, has been widely popular with hundreds of participants around the globe. Simon is an animated and engaging professor and Master Trainer, charismatic keynote speaker, and podcaster of the Save Lives Global Podcast.

One of the important but often overlooked traits of a good leader is consistency.  There is absolutely no faster way of confusing and disheartening an employee than to place him/her* under a fickle and inconsistent supervisor.  I know, I’ve been there. 

Of the many areas in which it is important for you, as a supervisor striving to be a leader, to be consistent, the following three are perhaps most crucial.  First, a good supervisor strives to be consistent in his communication.  As a new supervisor or when you have new employees placed under your supervision, face to face interaction is of utmost importance.  So, try to balance your electronic communication with personal interaction, at least initially.  It will set the tone and earn the trust of those you supervise. 

 Second, a supervisor who desires to be a real leader will want to be consistent in his expectations.  Lay them out clearly.  Write them down, if you need to.  Whatever you do, don’t be a supervisor that is impossible to please because eventually those reporting to you will quit trying. 

 Third, supervisors that are good leaders understand the importance of consistent application of the discipline process.  Though this may not be your favorite part, you have to understand that disciplining an employee comes with the territory.  When it comes to disciplining, if I may offer just one advice, it would be this – conduct it in a private setting.  We’ve all been an unwilling party to a disciplining process gone bad, when either an uncouth parent or uninformed supervisor engages in a public display of humiliation, somehow thinking that they’ve just accomplished something.  In reality, they have instead embarrassed the one they chastised with no real change in behavior (who can focus on figuring out what behaviors to change when all they can think about is how to make themselves instantly invisible), evidenced their own incompetence, and forcibly entangled innocent bystanders in their mess.  You don’t want to humiliate an employee but to try and influence change when an employee fails to meet performance standards. The key to effective discipline is understanding that the focus of it is not to seek a revenge but to influence future performance.  You obviously will want to make sure that you know your company policy regarding how to handle discipline cases, including progressive discipline and escalated situations.

Picture yourself in the middle of a safety-related presentation when the company owner barges in interrupting your training and with loud and profane protestations pulls one of the participants out.  His explicit message to you and all in the room is simple – “we’re too busy for this …. (let your imagination fill in the blank) right now.  We’ll do this safety stuff when we have free time.”  

With these words, he walks out and leaves you to deal with the aftermath, which includes the following issues (this list is by far not exhaustive):

1. Clear communication of the attitude of total disregard for safety from the top management;
2. Personal humiliation;
3. Devaluation of your efforts, which effectively undermines your authority and any attempts to build a positive safety climate – the very things which you were hired to do in the first place.

 We could spend time here focusing on whether these types of things really still happen today or on why an organization would shoot itself in the foot by undermining the same safety program which is responsible for the majority of its new contracts, etc.  Instead of all this, however, we WILL FOCUS on figuring out the WAY FORWARD in hostile safety environment.  What are the best things you can do when you want to do the right thing but find yourself crippled by your surrounding circumstances?

 First, you do the right thing as a safety professional and document everything in the process.  I know I’m not revealing anything new or profound here, but sometimes we all need to be reminded of the simple basic steps.  Keep copies of written communication, follow up verbal communications with restatement emails, which allows them to be documented, etc.  Some battles are simply not worth fighting as long as you have documented your intent/recommendation to do the right thing.

Second, continue to communicate with the top management of your organization.  Seize the right moments and be prepared at all times to state your case accurately, concisely, and convincingly.  Sooner or later, you will get through and changes will come, even if ever so slightly.

 Third, do not forget the simple fact that there are two ways to bring about the organizational change: top down and bottom up.  So, irrespective of your success or failure with top management, educate and empower every employee, from the lowest levels, on the personal value of safety.  Help them see that safety is not one more program that they must follow, but a way of life that can help them achieve the goals that they have and keep them alive.  In promoting change from the bottom up, your job will be to motivate the employees to see safety as their moral obligation, the right choice.  You will need to use your powers of persuasion to help these men and women who just need to provide for their families see that bending safety rules to accommodate production may enable them to keep their jobs in the short run but could cost them their lives or freedom in the long haul.  They will need to understand that when one or two of them decide to buck the system in an organization that does not value safety, they may get fired.  But if safe work attitude gains sufficient momentum, change will take place because it is impractical to fire the entire workforce at once. 

 Will this catch on overnight?  It may, but in most cases, it will be a gradual process.  It will take some convincing and it will depend on the individual choices of every single employee.  The truth is it may even cost you your job, but in the end you will know that you did what you could to fulfill the mandate of your vocation, rather than just clocked in and out.

Today’s Challenges in the Utility Industry 

First things first, what are today’s challenges for utility companies? The simple answer is that there are many of them and they are quite complex and multi-faceted. On the one hand, utility providers today must deal with a long list of external pressures and requirements. Among them are things like:   

1. Contending with having to paint within very strict lines established by the global, federal, state, and local regulations,  
2. Responding to often unpredictable conditions arising from natural disasters and extreme weather,  
3. Facing soaring power consumption amidst electrical vehicle and data center market growth, just to name a few,  
4. Navigating within aging and often crumbling infrastructure,  
5. Meeting increasingly aggressive decarbonization and energy transition goals, 
6. Attending to stressed-out consumers who are squeezed by the current economic conditions,  
7. Negotiating often unfriendly media and social media climate, 
8. Attracting investments amid uncertainty brought about by the demise of the Chevron Doctrine, etc. 

On the other hand, there are also internal issues that utility providers, like any other company today, must negotiate strategically to succeed. Among the internal issues are: 

1. Poorly trained personnel,  
2. Cultural, language, and communication barriers,  
3. Lack of proper qualifications,  
4. Psychosocial factors, including mental well-being, 
5. Intergenerational struggles, etc. 

To all the above could be added the financial pressures of remaining soluble and profitable, without which there is no future. And this list only scratches the surface.  

So, the goal of this presentation, then, is to unpack the challenges and identify simple principles, that will result in a sustainably safer tomorrow for the utility providers and happy and fulfilling jobs for the workers in this industry. 

Regulatory Challenges 

Take painting within the strict lines of regulatory and corporate requirements for example. Global organizations and treaties, like the World Economic Forum, United Nations, World Health Organization, Paris Accord, and others have set out specific requirements and guidelines, which may or may not be enforceable within various geographies around the world. On a national level, the United States serves as a good example of the multi-faceted web of regulations for utility providers. Here in the U.S., utilities are regulated by both the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission, and state and municipal public service commissions, all of which exist to ensure that consumers have access to reliable, safe, and secure energy at a reasonable cost. In addition to that, many of the utility companies, the municipalities that own them, or their holding companies have committed them to the Environmental Social Governance requirements, which can take a lot of time and energy, to speak nothing of additional resources. 

Weather Challenges 

Weather has always been unpredictable and even the best of planning and preparations can still be quickly exhausted by either a significant storm, like Hurricanes Andrew or Katrina, Typhoon Tip or Haiyan, or by a series of smaller events happening almost in tandem with one another. This was witnessed in Houston just this year when Beryl, which struck the Texas coast as merely a Category 1 hurricane on the morning of July 8th ended up causing the death of at least 36 people and leaving almost 3 million residents without power for close to two weeks amidst the sweltering summer heat. The reason for this unprecedented devastation by a relatively minor storm was that it was the third storm to strike the nation’s fourth-largest city in less than two months. Since repair crews will often perform the quickest possible fixes to bring the power back on, after which they could work on the longer term more permanent fixes, in this case, there was no time for them to complete the permanent fixes, which left Houston area exposed to significant impact.  

Increased Demand Challenges 

The world’s growth in demand for electricity, for example, in 2024 and 2025 and beyond is forecast to be among the highest levels in the past two decades, according to the International Energy Agency. Two of the biggest drivers for this load growth are data centers and electric vehicles.  

The continued expansion of the Internet of Things and AI is fueling a tremendous uptick in data center development and construction. According to the American Public Power Association, the combined expansion of traditional and AI data centers, along with chip foundries, will increase demand cumulatively by 177 terawatt-hours from 2023 to 2030, reaching a total of 307 TWh.  

Electric vehicles will emerge as the second major catalyst for power demand growth in the US and around the world up to 2030. As an example, in 2023, electricity consumption in the U. S. transportation sector totaled 18.3 TWh. By 2030, this figure is projected to soar to 131 TWh. Between data centers and EVs, there is close to 300 TWh projected increase in U.S. electricity demand by 2030. 

Likewise, the end-use electricity demand in Canada is growing by as much as 35% between 2005 and 2050. To meet this tremendous increase in demand, all of Western Europe except for Germany is accelerating nuclear power programs. For the utility industry to continue on it current path, capacity planning must become more advanced and more specific to help distribution utilities anticipate system upgrades that will be needed for future waves of electrification and capacity constraints (Figure 1). 

Figure 1: Illustrative 24-hour electrical load curve in 2024, 2030, 2050 (US DOE). 

Infrastructure Challenges 

The growth in demand above is especially challenging, given the present state of the utility infrastructure. Experts say that U.S. infrastructure is both dangerously overstretched and lagging that of its economic competitors, particularly China. While there has been a significant amount of upgrade projects completed in the past decade in certain parts of the United States, there is still much work to be done, as the average age of the transmission infrastructure in the U.S. is 40 years and, in the UK, dating back to World War 2. The estimated cost of transmission modernization in the United States ranges from $1.5 to 2 trillion by 2030, and this is on the low end. 

Decarbonization Challenges 

Then there is the push for energy transition. A growing group of U.S. electric companies has committed to cut carbon emissions by 80% by 2030. In fact, at present 23 U.S. states, as well as the District of Columbia and Puerto Rico have adopted some form of 100% clean energy goals (Figure 2). Yet at the same time, most stakeholders are under-prepared for the enormous investment that meeting these decarbonization goals will require. 

Figure 2: 100% Clean Energy States (Clean Energy States Alliance) 

Meeting decarbonization goals means the United States needs anywhere from 1.3 to 2.9 times the current transmission capacity, according to the National Renewable Energy Laboratory estimate. How so? Here is an example that perfectly illustrates this dilemma. Nearly 60% of New York state’s demand comes from New York City. This demand was until recently largely met by fossil-fuel plants in and around the city. As those are replaced by hydroelectric plants, wind farms, and solar plants, the power supply moves further away from the source of demand, putting more pressure on the transmission system to shuttle volumes of electricity it was never built to handle, thus the reason for increasing transmission capacity. And the U.S. is not alone in the need to upgrade its infrastructure for the sake of energy transition. Germany had to upgrade its capital spend predictions to €61bn between now and 2030, which is almost double of its initial estimate of €33bn from 2017.  

The challenge of Attending to Consumers Squeezed by the Economy 

The state of the economy and the price increases on everything from groceries to gasoline, to housing, and insurance are making it more difficult for the average consumer to afford something as basic as their utility bills. This presents a challenge for the providers in balancing their own profit and loss statements while finding creative ways to help their customers stay afloat. This challenge is further exacerbated by the media and the social media’s often less than fair coverage of the utility providers who are often pitted against the consumers and painted in a negative light. And now, the recent Supreme Court Chevron decision is also going to potentially impact investor willingness to participate in the electrical transmission industry. 

While this paper has gone to great lengths to establish the extensive nature of the external pressures and challenges faced by the utility providers, some may wonder why this was necessary and how it is relevant to the topic at hand. The fact of the matter is that a purely cursory overview of the external challenges may result in a lack of appreciation for the tremendous amount of pressure that these challenges add to the internal issues. Because at the end of the day those individuals who comprise the workforce within the industry are the very same frazzled people who are impacted by the weight of the external challenges.  

Workforce Training Issues 

A significant variation in the training standards from state to state and from company to company means that not all utility workers are equally trained. Some are not willing to put in the three to four years of fieldwork that it takes to become a fully qualified lineman able to work directly on electrical equipment. And others may need to be retrained from the previously wrong ways in which they were brought up.  

Cultural Barriers 

Wars, conflicts, and migration influxes have contributed to the increasingly diverse workforce around the world. Taking the U.S. as an example, with a recent significant influx of people from all over the world into the country, language, and communication barriers are becoming more of an issue daily. Greater globalization of the workforce means that interpersonal challenges are much deeper than just language and communication. Cultural values and norms must be considered, such as what constitutes right and wrong or good work vs “good enough” work, among other things. Having grown up outside of the U.S., this author personally experienced many of the things referenced above. These challenges necessitate consistent efforts on the part of the employer to ensure clarity.  

Employee Qualification Standards 

Fitness, drug and alcohol, education, certifications, and other employee qualifications must be met and managed to enter the utility industry ranks. Many of these qualifications must be renewed and otherwise upheld from year to year. When access to high-risk environments must be controlled based on these qualifications, and this access must be managed for not only employees but also contractors and subcontractors, keeping up with all of this could quickly and easily become unmanageable. The good news is that there are suppliers whose whole job is to qualify, verify, and track these data points for their clients.  

Psychosocial Issues 

Various psychosocial challenges can limit and greatly impair utility workers’ ability to focus and perform their work effectively and safely. Among these are anxiety and depression, eating disorders, and psychotic disorders. The psychotic disorders are particularly interesting as many of them are caused by cannabis use, which is greatly on the rise today, both in the U.S. and many other countries around the globe. Astute employers will ensure the presence of the appropriate policies and protocols to both control drug and alcohol usage within their jurisdictions and offer assistance options to those who need them. 

Intergenerational Challenges 

We are experiencing the first occurrence in work history when five different generations may be found in the workplace at the same time, all the way from the Silent Generation to Gen Z. This is especially critical as each generation has a distinctly different set of values, communication styles, approach to work and much more. If tackled with the right tools, the intergenerational aspect can be a significant asset for an organization, but it can also present tremendous challenges if it is viewed as a tug-of-war. 

Practical Solutions for the Utilities 

What steps must be taken to overcome the challenges and construct the foundation for sustainably safer tomorrow in utilities? 

On the governmental level, be it national governments, state or regional legislators, or municipalities, here are a few recommendations: 

• Exercise care so as not to produce conflicting regulations, much like in the case of the loosening of the marijuana restrictions while continuing to test for its presence. 

• Consider what unintended consequences your new regulations will have on those under your jurisdiction, as in increased cheating on drug tests due to the prevalence of some drugs created by relaxation in enforcement. 

On the corporate level, there are no shortcuts to achieving the right culture. A two-pronged approach should be considered:  

• Tackling the company culture. The culture of safer thinking begins with the executive office and must be integrated into every level of your organization, from communication to company functions to values, to mission, to expenditures, to rewards and recognition, to planning and scheduling, and everything else in between. The culture of safer work is arrived at by creating systems that make it difficult for incidents to occur, make it impossible for those incidents to kill or hurt someone, and make it easy for everyone to do their daily jobs. While building a safer culture may take time and consistent and considerable effort, the benefits of doing so cannot be overestimated, ranging from employee satisfaction, higher engagement, increased productivity, decreased absenteeism, increased profits, and happier clients. In short, as someone once said, you can buy your employees’ hands and backs, but you must win their hearts and minds. The right culture does that. 

• Obtaining/providing the right tools for your workers. Obtaining the right tools is equally important. There is nothing more frustrating and demoralizing than your personnel wanting to do the right thing because of the progress you are making in culture building yet being unable to do it because of the lack of tools. Of the many tools to be considered, how you manage your supply chain risk must not be overlooked. Find the right solution and you will find peace of mind related to operator qualifications, tracking and administering drug and alcohol requirements, contractor management, contractor communication, staying on top of training and qualifications, insurance agreements, and such. You will also gain immediate relief in risk management and mitigation, streamlined communication, documentation and compliance tracking, emergency preparedness, and data-driven decision-making. 

On the individual utility worker level, your employees need to remember and be reminded on a consistent basis about the connection between their work and home lives. A worker has one body. 

• What you do to it at home will most certainly impact your ability to perform effectively, efficiently, and safely at work.  

• What you do to it at work will have a tremendous impact on your ability to be there for your loved ones, to participate in and share their important milestones, and so much more at home.  

So, how should your employees treat their bodies to do their part towards a sustainably safer tomorrow for the utility industry? Pay attention to things like your stress level, your work-life balance, your nutrition, your alcohol intake, your choice to partake or not to partake in recreational drugs, your mental state, your spiritual state, and your sleep habits. Though there is often a temptation to feel invincible, our bodies will only respond by how we treat them. This is true with any other tool or equipment you use in your daily activities, and it is true of your body as well. 

Take sleep, for example. Is your average number of sleep hours within the recommended range for your age (for adults 18-64 years, it should be 7-9 hours)? If not, you place yourself in a higher risk category for developing several medical conditions, including inflammation, stroke, heart attacks, Parkinson’s, Alzheimer’s, and anxiety and depression. Additionally, your productivity is going to decrease, as will your ability to focus, concentrate, and maintain your emotions under control.  

Then you also place yourself and those working with you at a higher risk for workplace injuries and death. This paper’s scope does not allow an in-depth discussion of all the significant incidents that resulted from sleep deprivation, like the Three Mile Island Nuclear Disaster, the Space Shuttle Challenger explosion, the Chernobyl Nuclear Plant devastation, or Exxon Valdez spill. Suffice it to say that the list of incidents is long and quite convincing. While no one in their right mind would want to add their employer’s name to the list, many if not most of us knowingly take many steps that all but bring us to that edge almost daily. 

Summary and Key Takeaways 

In conclusion, utilities, unlike many other industries, are facing unique and complex challenges today. These cannot be ignored, for they will not go away in this manner. These challenges are comprised of external pressures from outside utility providers, such as regulatory environments, infrastructure conditions, and decarbonization goals. The challenges faced by the utility industry must be tackled head-on wisely and methodically. 

At the same time, on the other hand, some of the internal personnel and culture issues that are faced by utility providers today are no different from any other industry. Every employer must overcome problems with sufficient training, clear communication, and intergenerational challenges. Those who are fervently planting the seeds of building the right culture and investing in their personnel via the right contractor management tools will reap the benefits of a sustainably safer tomorrow.  

Sources Cited: 

2024 Outlook – The Future of the Energy & Utilities Industry. December 2023. West Monroe. Available from go.westmonroe.com/l/166592/2023-12-08/5kzgkr/166592/1702064791uIhEFwdP/West_Monroe_2024_Energy_and_Utilities_Outlook.pdf 

2024 Power and Utilities Industry Outlook. Jim Thomson, Kate Hardin, and Suzanna Sanborn. December 4, 2023. Deloitte Research Center for Energy & Industrials. Available from https://www2.deloitte.com/us/en/insights/industry/power-and-utilities/power-and-utilities-industry-outlook.html  

Data Centers, EV Expansion Create Around 300 TWh Increase in U.S. Electricity Demand by 2030. Paul Ciampoli. July 1, 2024. American Public Power Association. Available from https://www.publicpower.org/periodical/article/data-centers-ev-expansion-create-around-300-twh-increase-us-electricity-demand-2030#:~:text=The%20US%20residential%20sector%20is,as%20heating%2C%20cooling%20and%20cooking. 

Global Electricity Demand Set to Rise Strongly This Year and Next, Reflecting its Expanding Role in Energy Systems Around the World. July 19, 2024. International Energy Agency. Available from https://www.iea.org/news/global-electricity-demand-set-to-rise-strongly-this-year-and-next-reflecting-its-expanding-role-in-energy-systems-around-the-world  

The State of U.S. Infrastructure. James McBride, Noah Berman and Anshu Siripurapu. September 20, 2023. Council on Foreign Relations. Available from https://www.cfr.org/backgrounder/state-us-infrastructure 

Why ESG is Important in the Utility Industry. Blog on hsi.com. Available from https://hsi.com/blog/esg-important-in-utility-industry 

The United States Supreme Court’s landmark decision on June 28, 2024 to overturn a 40-year-old precedent that allowed federal government a significant leeway in the interpretation of congressional statutes has been condemned and praised by various groups and individuals around the world. Articles and social media posts have been provided with various opinions on what this ruling will do to the current regulations and how it will impact future activities by a number of federal agencies, like OSHA, EPA, SEC, PHMSA, NMFS, and others.

What everyone really wants to know among other things is whether this change in legal approach going to help or hurt the employers and employees alike. In this short piece, we will understand the decision, review Chief Justice Roberts’ clarification, and consider the broader implications for the employers and the employees.

What is the Chevron Doctrine?

It all stemmed from a narrow question of fishery management law: whether the National Marine Fisheries Service’s requirement that certain vessels pay for federal observers onboard their boats was consistent with the Magnuson-Stevens Act. But the root issue of the case was whether the court administrating the case should defer to a federal agency’s interpretation or whether it should decide it on its own (Chevron U.S.A. Inc. v. Natural Resources Defense Council, Inc., 467 U. S. 837 (1984)). In that case the court deferred to NMFS in its decision. This became known as the Chevron doctrine and this methodology has been used in adjudicating more than 18,000 court cases and arriving at more than 3,000 administrative decisions for the past 40 years. In courts the judicial branch deferred to “permissible” agency interpretations of the statutes those agencies administer – even when a reviewing court read the statute differently.

What ended up happening then was that each case was resolved in favor of the government challenges. So, the bottom line was that if an employer wanted to challenge the government, the government generally won under the Chevron doctrine.

What Does the June 28th Decision do to the Previous 18,000 Cases Citing Chevron?

Chief Justice Roberts indicated that the court’s decision would not require earlier cases that relied on Chevron to be overturned. Roberts wrote, “Mere reliance on Chevron cannot constitute a ‘special justification’ for overruling a decision upholding agency action, because to say a precedent relied on Chevron is, at best, just an argument that the precedent was wrongly decided – which is not enough, standing along, to overrule the case.”

Will the Overturn Help or Hurt Employers and Employees?

For those who believe that the government will always have the employer’s or employees’ best interests in mind, the recent Supreme Court decision is damaging. It may mean lengthier rule-making processes, more legal challenges from the employers, and less ability for the federal agencies to dictate the executive branch’s dogma or each new administration’s philosophy for all.

One of the underlying ideas behind the camp that believes this Supreme Court’s decision will hurt the employees is the conviction that the average employer is intent on mistreating and abusing their employees to the extent allowable by law. And there is no doubt that some employers may indeed act that way. But most do not. Why? Because employees always have the option to vote with their feet, leaving truly terrible employers the moment they have a chance for a better job. So, common sense says that burdensome, stringent, and creative interpretations or inventions of the various agencies are simply not necessary to reign in bad employers, as their abusive practices generally result in their own demise.

Additionally, those employers that will chose to litigate against an agency will still have to establish principally that an agency action was arbitrary and capricious, abused discretion, or violated law to prevail on a challenge to an agency adjudication or rulemaking. In other words, courts will no longer defer to an agency’s interpretation of a statute but those challenging it will still have a relatively high burden of proof.

However, for those that believe in limited government, the overturn of the Chevron deference is a restoration of the balance between the three separate and independent branches of government: legislative, executive, and judicial. The executive branch of the government, and federal agencies in particular, will no longer be able to utilize arbitrary or capricious methods in interpreting the law. This limitation of the federal government, according to this view, can only help the employers and employees alike.

Those in this camp simply cite some recent examples of the federal agencies’ arbitrary over-reach, which resulted in hurting instead of helping both employers and employees. One such case is the Securities and Exchange Commission’s ESG rule requiring registrants to disclose information that can and has been widely politicized and weaponized against employers, resulting in lost contracts, difficulties obtaining loans and lines of credit, reputational damages, etc. This rule was actively resisted by the majority of American industries and employers due to its burdensome requirements overtaxing businesses still struggling to recover from COVID-19.

Another example of an agency over-reach was OSHA’s 2021 COVID-19 Vaccine Mandate, based on poorly researched data, which intended to force up to 80 million American workers to choose between their jobs and experimental shots. This emergency standard had to be blocked by the Supreme Court.

All in all, while it may still be too early to know the full extent of the Supreme Court’s Chevron ruling, this article established that the crux of the answer on its effect upon the US employers and employees alike really is based on one’s perspective on the role of the federal government in our everyday lives.

Many, if not most, of us regularly use screens in our workplace and personal lives, whether it is for word processing, rounds and readings, building management systems, reports and presentations, or just chilling in front of a TV. This list goes on.

There are many hazards associated with constant screen usage. For example, according to a recent study from the University of Toledo, exposure to blue light from electronic devices may destroy cells in the retina and accelerate the onset of blindness. Researchers discovered that emissions of blue light cause retinal molecules, which sense light and send signals to the brain, to produce toxic chemical molecules in photoreceptor cells that help the eye to see. The ensuing chemical reactions kill photoreceptors. The result is macular degeneration, an incurable eye disease that can trigger blindness, typically beginning in a person’s 50s or 60s.

Among other areas that are affected by too much screen use are:

•     Sleep: Studies link heavy computer and mobile phone use to more sleep disturbances. University of Gothenburg psychologist Sara Thomée, one study’s lead researcher, says the blue light from digital devices suppresses the sleep-promoting hormone melatonin, keeping us from having restful sleep.
•     Addiction and Reward Seeking: Dopamine, the “feel-good hormone,” is part of the brain’s pleasure and reward circuits. Playing video games turns on similar brain regions as those linked to cravings for drugs and gambling. Ditto for social media — every time we see a new post or get a reaction to ours, it’s like a hit of brain candy.
•     Weight: Even two hours of TV a day can increase the risk of weight gain, diabetes, and heart disease in adults. Conversely, computer use doesn’t seem to have as strong of a link. There are probably several factors to blame, including less active time, less sleep, and seeing more ads for unhealthy foods.
•     Overall Health: Most of the time when we’re on our screens, we’re sitting down. Sitting for hours at a time boosts the risk of obesity, heart disease, type 2 diabetes, and some types of cancer. One study found that spending more than four hours a day in front of a computer or TV more than doubles your likelihood of dying or being hospitalized for heart disease — and exercise won’t reduce the risk.

Managing Screen Time

For those of us who have children at home, this topic is quite significant because most of us have witnessed our kids being glued to screens at some point or another. “On the scale between candy and crack cocaine, it’s closer to crack cocaine,” said Chris Anderson, a former editor at Wired and the founder of GeekDad.com. Research shows that kids who spend too much time staring at screens are more likely to suffer from obesity in adult years and are at greater risk of 12 deadly cancers. There’s also the issue of self-confidence development, when more time is spent in front of the screen watching someone else’s experiences then exploring and creating their own stories.

What are some of the ways of successfully managing our screen time? Try the following:

•     Blue light blocking screen for your computer or glasses: This is an inexpensive way to mitigate the effects of having to stare at a screen for work all day long.
•     Follow the 20-20-20 rule: For every 20 minutes, take a 20-second break to focus on something 20 feet away. While you’re at it, stretch out your arms, legs, and neck.
•     Take standing breaks: Instead of emailing a question to your office mate, walk to her cubicle and ask her in person. Take the stairs when possible, or consider a sit-stand desk if that’s an option.
•     Adjust your station: If working on your computer is causing eye strain or neck pain, make sure it’s set up right. Your screen should be about an arm’s length away, and the top of the screen about 2 or 3 inches above eye level. Your arms should hang down from your shoulders and your elbows bend at about 100 degrees when your hands are on the keyboard. If you have an ergonomics expert at work, ask for a consult.
•     Don’t let yourself get distracted: Turn off the notifications on most of your apps — if you hear something ringing, it should be worthy of your attention (like a call or text), not just someone re-pinning your picture on Pinterest. At work, try to schedule uninterrupted time to think and plan — most emails can wait an hour.
•     Power down at night: Avoid tuning into digital devices for at least a half hour before bedtime, suggests the National Sleep Foundation. Bonus points for banning devices from the bedroom entirely so you’re not tempted to check them late at night or first thing when you wake up. If you can’t do that, at least silence your notifications.
•     Set boundaries for your kids – and enforce them: An hour a day after the homework is done is a good place to start. Stick to those limits. After a few times, your child will learn that whether she pleads or throws a tantrum, no means no.

OSHA’s electrical safety standards at 29 CFR 1910.333 generally require employers to de-energize and lockout electrical supply to a circuit before work can be performed nearby. 

However, the OSHA standard includes an exception to de-energization if doing so is “infeasible due to equipment design or operational limitations” or if de-energizing introduces additional or increased hazards.

Data center operators have long relied on this exception to perform work inside live electrical panels, because shutting down the entire panel will take down all equipment powered from that source, often including critical hardware hosting critical business operations. It needs to be clear, however, that the infeasibility exemption was never intended to cover situations of financial impact or inconvenience. 

Some data centers have attempted to make an argument from the perspective of interrupting “continuous industrial process.” In one of its letters of interpretation, however, OSHA clarified that the term “continuous industrial process” was derived from its use in the National Electrical Code (NEC).

In the NEC “continuous industrial process” is used in the context of situations where the orderly shut down of integrated processes and equipment would introduce additional or increased hazards. Therefore, to qualify for the exception found in Note 2 of §1910.333(a)(1), the employer must, on a case-by-case basis, determine if the orderly shutdown of the related equipment (including the panel) and processes would introduce additional or increased hazards. If so, then the employer may perform the work using the electrical safe work practices found in §§1910.331-1910.335, including, but not limited to, insulated tools, shields, barrier, and personal protective equipment. If the orderly shutdown of the related equipment and processes would not introduce additional or increased hazards, but merely alter or interrupt production, then the de-energization of the equipment would be considered feasible, and the exception found in Note 2 of §1910.333(a)(1) would not apply.

1. Arrest it before it gets ugly – step in, get in between, don’t hold back – un-confronted conflict festers and only gets worse, IT NEVER RESOLVES ITSELF.
2. There are two sides to every conflict – it takes two to tango – hear out both sides.
3. Be decisive but keep in mind that you are not inerrant – you can make wrong conclusions – so proceed humbly, ready to adjust your perceptions when new information becomes available.
4. Stay cool and neutral – don’t visibly side with one person or another until you’ve had a chance to consider both sides. There is no easier way to discredit yourself than to be perceived as partial by those under your oversight. 
5. Trust your instincts – Don’t dismiss your gut feelings. If you get the sense that someone isn’t being honest or that something isn’t adding up, you may be picking up on a mismatch between verbal and nonverbal cues. That probably has to do with the fact that our brain takes in over a 1,000 different bits of information per second, but we’re cognitively aware of only 80 of them, so TRUST YOUR INSTINCTS.
6. Say little / do a lot – be a (wo)man of your word – if you say you are going to do something, do it. Otherwise don’t say it at all. It’s better not to say stuff at all, then to say it and not do it. If your employees know that you are all talk, they won’t trust you, and, as a leader, you’re only as good as the people under you. If your people trust you, they’ll do anything for you. There will be a team spirit. Tasks will get completed and deadlines will be met – well, safely, and on time. And guess who is going to look good to the upper management because of it? You. 
7. Be willing to give your people the benefit of the doubt – Oh, you know ‘ol so and so, he’s always doing this and that…, CUT THAT OUT!
8. Confront, don’t evade – be respectful, polite, but direct. People appreciate that much more than you realize. Some of my best friends in life ended up being those people whom I confronted when the situation called for it.
9. Be consistent – follow the rules without regard for who is involved, be it management, senior employees, seasoned employees, etc.
10. Learn from every conflict – when you see the same guy having conflict with several different people in your outfit, there’s the reason for it. He’s not going to be always the victim. Maybe he’s the quiet instigator. 
11. Practice what you preach – let your actions reflect your words.
12. Do what you know is right & don’t worry about pleasing everyone – you will never be able to get everyone to like you at all times. So don’t lose any sleep over that. As long as you try your hardest to do what is right, that’s all that is asked of you. 

 Oh, and 1 more thing – both the research and personal experience shows that if you consistently apply the above principles at your workplace, you will earn the respect of your people.