To report or not to report: What happens when middle managers receive bad news about safety issues?

Abstract: Fascinated and often frustrated, it has often been that the flow of critical safety information is not as fluid and transparent as one would consider reasonable (Westhuizen & Stanz, 2017). This notional concept of ‘reporting’ has been researched and studied from many different industries and perspectives but has yet to answer, why individuals and groups lack the culture necessary to report what is wrong or not working related to safety. This case study aims to investigate part of this problem. Through gamification, focus groups and semi-structured interviews, middle managers supplied their perception and perspective of receiving bad news about safety. Collated and analysed, the results point in the direction of a shortcoming of trust, psychological safety, and the liabilities \ when safety is only measured by departmental or individual performance indicators of injuries and accidents.