Occupational Safety Culture in Devki Steel Mills Limited in Athi River, Machakos County, Kenya

Workers in Devki are exposed to several occupational hazards resulting in an average of three workers going on sick leave monthly. The management sought to reduce these incidences using a leading indicator through Safety Culture. Determining the safety culture was the main study objective. Independent variables were artefacts, espoused values and basic assumptions. The study made use of an analytical cross sectional design. The study population was 800 permanent employees from which a sample of 260 respondents was selected through the stratified sampling technique. The study used an interviewer administered questionnaire and observation checklist to collect primary data. The data was analysed with aid of the SPSS software. Results were interpreted using a safety culture assessment tool provided by Worksafe. The tool categorised a score that lies between 0% and 49% as Poor, 50% and 74% as Average and above 75% as Good. Artefacts scored 76%. The aspired values scored 42.9% and Basic Assumptions scored 39.3%. Management commitment to safety had the highest correlation to safety culture at 51.2%. The study concluded that: 1) The artefacts were installed for regulatory compliance; 2) A lot of the stated values were not practiced; 3) Workers’ attitude towards safety was improving but a lot more should be done in the areas of resource allocation to safety programs. From the first three objectives, the Worksafe NSW Tool ranked the organisation as having an Average safety culture with a mean score of 52.7%; 4) From Pearson’s correlation, the most important attribute in building a good safety culture was Management commitment and injury management was the least important. The study recommends that: 1) The organisation incorporates use of care based artefacts; 2) Workers opinions on safety matters are sought, 3) The company should provide safety training; 4) The management should proactively promote safety.