The degree of slowness is directionally proportional to the intensity of memory. The degree of speed is directionally proportional to the intensity of forgetting.” ― Milan Kundera, Slowness Every industry uses speed as a measurement to quantify productivity. That productivity, whether gallons or railcar loads, is a tangible result that translates into revenue for a company. Speed [...]
“I wish we had more safety training.” — No one. Ever. Have you ever had a coworker respond, “You are so lucky,” when you told them that you had some mandatory safety training coming up? No? When it comes to safety training, isn’t the word “mandatory” redundant? Have you ever attended or even been offered [...]
“Our very lives depend on the ethics of strangers, and most of us are always strangers to other people.” — Bill Moyers One definition of ethics is “the moral principles that govern a person’s behavior.” Which means that engineering ethics would be “the moral principles that govern a person’s behavior while performing engineering.” Most of [...]
“Because most suicides do not happen at work, many employers do not consider depression or suicide an industry problem or occupational hazard.” — Stu Kemppairnen When we were younger, my wife really enjoyed napping in the afternoon. I didn’t get it. There was so much to do, how could anyone take prime “getting things done” [...]
“Running toward danger is foolhardy. But so is closing your eyes to it. Many perils become less dangerous once you understand their potential hazards.” — Brandon Mull On Thursday, April 29, at about 2:30 pm, neighbors reported several explosions at the Manor Chemical Company in Affton, Missouri, a suburb on the southwest side of St. [...]
“Perfection of planned layout is only achieved by institutions on the point of collapse.” -C. Northcote Parkinson Must be an Easy Way Out Every time you enter a concert venue or a movie theater, there is instruction on finding the exits so you know where to go in case of emergency. The same can [...]
“To err is human, to forgive, divine.” — Alexander Pope I was in a PHA once where the lone operator on the PHA team finally grew weary of the discussion of operator error. “Why is it that when you engineers make a mistake, you call it design error, but when I make a mistake, you [...]
“Politicized public health policy strays too far from sober assessment of scientific facts and runs the risk of constituting naked political advocacy.” — Daniel Goldberg In the wake of the Covid-19 pandemic and what many would argue has been an abysmal response to that catastrophe, there has been much said about the politicization of public [...]
“Squeezing a balloon in one place makes it expand in another.” — Bernd Debusmann Finally. 2020, the worst year in living memory for most of us, is over. 2021 promises to be much, much better. Let’s make it a year when workplace safety gets better as well. To do that, though, we can’t just keep [...]
“A relationship, I think, is like a shark. You know? It has to constantly move forward or it dies. And I think what we got on our hands is dead shark.” — Woody Allen, in Annie Hall The Bureau of Labor Statistics releases their workplace fatality statistics in December for the previous year. So, here [...]
