Safety on Purpose

Compliance Eats Culture for Breakfast

• Joseph Garcia • Season 1 • Episode 1

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In our inaugural episode, we explore the difference between compliance-based safety and genuine safety culture. Moving beyond box-checking requires building trust, focusing on relationships, and creating environments where people follow safety practices because they believe in them, not because they're being watched.
 
 • The compliance zone feels safe but often misses what truly drives behavior
 • Safety culture is how people behave when no one is watching, not what's in the manual
 • Your culture is shaped more by what you tolerate than what you promote
 • The three pillars of safety culture: trust, accountability, and learning
 • Checkbox safety creates an illusion of control rather than genuine risk reduction
 • Trust is the foundation that turns safety rules into safety behaviors
 • Leaders build trust through psychological safety, consistency, and empathy
 • Culture always wins—when people make safe choices even without supervision
 
 Let's lead with purpose, build trust before checklists, and remember safety isn't something we enforce, it's something we live.

Hosted by: Joe Garcia, Safety Leader & Culture Advocate
New Episodes Every Other Tuesday
Safety on Purpose


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Speaker 1: 0:14

Welcome, welcome to the very first episode of Safety on Purpose. I can't even tell you how excited I am right now to finally be starting this journey. This has been a passion project for a long time coming, and now it's real. It's here, we're doing this, but here's what makes it even better I'm not doing it alone. You're here, You're listening, You're on this journey with me, and that means everything, Because this podcast isn't just about safety, it's about people, it's about leadership and it's about safety. It's about people, it's about leadership and it's about purpose, and together we're going to dive into real, raw and honest conversations that I truly believe will shift how we think about safety from the ground up. So buckle up, because this is going to be a meaningful ride. Let's get started.

Speaker 1: 1:15

The compliance comfort zone. For decades, compliance has been the foundation of safety programs, policies, procedures, audits, inspections and yes, the infamous checklists. And let's be clear compliance is important. It sets baselines, it's the legal and regulatory framework that protects both workers and the organizations we work for. But here's the problem Compliance alone doesn't inspire people, it doesn't build connections, it doesn't engage the human heart. A compliance-only culture focuses on rules. A safety culture focuses on relationships. When compliance becomes the ceiling instead of the floor, we miss out on what truly drives safe behavior culture.

Speaker 1: 2:04

So what is the compliance zone? The compliance zone is the comfortable, predictable space where organizations focus primarily on rules, regulations, procedures and checklists. It's where the goal is not getting in trouble. Success is defined by passing audits and avoiding citations. People follow the rules even when they don't understand why they exist. Safety becomes more about the appearance of control than about real risk reduction. It's a space that feels safe, but ironically, it may not be all that safe at all. So the problem with living in the compliance zone? Compliance, let's face it. It's necessary, but it's not sufficient. The compliance zone is reactive, not proactive. It treats people as liabilities to control, not assets to develop, and it values checking boxes over changing behavior.

Speaker 1: 3:03

In this zone, the deeper things get missed. Real risk goes unaddressed because the paperwork looks good. Workers don't speak up because they fear blame. Instead of feeling supported, Leaders chase lagging indicators and miss the early signs of culture erosion. You might pass the audit, but you miss the opportunity to build culture. So then, why do we get stuck in this compliance zone? Well, it's measurable. You can count how many trainings were completed or how many observations were done. It's familiar, it's how most of us were trained to view quote-unquote success and safety. It's defendable. It's if something goes wrong you can show the documentation and, most importantly, it's comfortable. Real culture work is messy. Compliance it feels clean. But growth doesn't happen in comfort zones and neither does transformation.

Speaker 1: 4:03

So let's look beyond the compliance zone. To move beyond compliance, we need to step into the commitment zone, where people understand why the rules exist. Leaders model safety, not just mandate it. Cultures become the driver, not the obstacle. Accountability is shared, not enforced. Safety is seen as shared responsibility, not just a policy to follow.

Speaker 1: 4:28

In this zone, People own safety because they believe in it, not because they're being watched. So the compliance zone keeps you out of trouble, but the commitment zone, that's where lives are changed. One protects the company, the other protects the people no-transcript. So safety culture isn't a policy, it's not a manual. It's not how many signs you hang up or how many rules are in place. Safety culture is how people behave when no one is watching. It's what your team believes, values and chooses when it comes to risk, responsibility and care for one another. It's not just saying what you say. You can have posters that say quote unquote safety first in every hallway. But if people are rushing through tasks, afraid to report issues or cutting corners because of pressure, then your real safety culture is something very different. Your culture is shaped more by what you tolerate than what you promote.

Speaker 1: 5:49

Safety culture truly lives in conversations the way supervisors respond to near misses, tone leaders use when someone makes a mistake, whether people feel safe speaking up even if it's uncomfortable, and how decisions are made when production and safety are in conflict. It's built by people, not just procedures. You can have all the safety systems in place, but without trust, belief and ownership they don't stick. Safety culture is the sum of your system and your stories. Systems are what's written. Stories are what people live. You actually need both. Safety culture is built over three pillars. Number one trust. People believe leadership means it when they say safety matters. Number two accountability Everyone takes ownership, not because they're afraid but because they care. Number three learning. Mistakes are investigated for insight, not blame. Feedback is welcome, not silenced. Let's talk about why this matters, Because culture drives behavior, Behavior drives outcome and outcome shapes lives. A healthy safety culture doesn't just reduce incidents. It creates teams where people feel valued, empowered and protected physically and psychologically.

Speaker 1: 7:17

Here's my final thought on safety culture. It isn't a department, it's a daily decision. It's every person, every level, every action shaping something that either protects or puts people at risk. So what story is your culture telling? The problem with the checkbox safety, so people are always talking about we're just checking that box, we're just making sure we get stuff done. What does that actually look like? So check the box safety, why it feels safe? But it isn't. At first glance, check the box safety looks like progress. Training check done. At first glance, check the box safety looks like progress. Training check done, PPE check issued, Toolbox talk check completed, Inspection forms check filed.

Speaker 1: 8:20

But here's the hard truth Just because a box is checked doesn't mean the job is safe. It means it looks safe on paper. And when safety becomes paperwork exercise instead of human priority, you've created the illusion of safety, not the reality of it, the illusion of control. Check the box safety creates the illusion that everyone is under control and it lulls leadership into false confidence. The form was signed, so the training must have landed. The audit passed, so the site must have been compliant. No injuries last month, so the team must have been safe.

Speaker 1: 8:56

But were the hazards really removed? Did the workers actually understand the training or just sit through it? Did anyone feel psychologically safe enough to raise a concern? If not, you didn't build safety, you built a wall of paper. So why does this happen? It's not unusual. It happens because paper is measurable. Culture is not. Forms create records, Conversations create change. Audits are easier than accountability and leaders are under pressure to prove something is working, whether it actually is or not. So we reach for what's fast, familiar and easy to report boxes. There's a hidden cost that comes with this check the box safety.

Speaker 1: 9:46

So when safety is reduced to a checklist, three major problems emerge. Number one disengagement. Workers see right through it. They know when the form matters more than the feedback. Over time they disengage. They stop speaking up, they go through the motions, Quote, unquote. Why report it? It'll never get done or nothing will ever change. Number two false success. When the only thing we measure is completion, we miss connection. You might check a quote unquote, completed training box, but never know that the person didn't understand a word. We train them. Is it enough if they didn't learn anything? And number three missed risk.

Speaker 1: 10:30

Boxes don't see nuances. They don't catch human factors, mental fatigue, rushed decisions or toxic leadership. They don't prevent shortcuts. They just document that rules exist. So what to do? Instead of from boxes to belief, we don't need to throw out checklists. We need to breathe life into them. Use them as tools, not the goal. Pair documentation with genuine dialogue. Don't just record safety Practice it. Focus on why behind the box, and ask what's missing here that a box won't catch, Because the real goal isn't completion, it's connection, comprehension and commitment. So checklists don't create culture. People do, and if we spend more time chasing signatures than building trust, we're not leading safety, we're just performing it.

Speaker 1: 11:44

Let's talk about building a culture of trust and how important that can be, Building a culture of trust, the foundation of everything that really matters when it comes to safety. If culture is the soil, trust is the water. You can plant all the right seeds, policies, training systems, but if you don't cultivate trust, nothing meaningful will grow. Trust is what turns safety rules into safety behaviors. Trust is what makes people speak up, show up and look out for one another. Without trust, everything becomes performance. With trust, people lean in, and even when it's difficult or hard. So what trust really means at work in a trusted culture, people believe you have my back. My voice really does matter. If I make a mistake, I'll be coached, not punished. I'm more than just a number or a compliance box or a compliance box. Trust isn't built in town halls or slogan. It's built in the thousand tiny moments where leadership chooses people over pressure. So we've talked about three pillars already.

Speaker 1: 12:52

Let's talk about three pillars of a trust-driven culture. Number one psychological safety. People feel safe to speak up, admit mistakes or raise concerns without fear of retaliation or judgment. If your team is quiet, it may not be because everything is fine. It might be because they don't feel safe being honest. Number two consistency.

Speaker 1: 13:15

Trust isn't just about good intentions. It's about consistent follow-through. Do leaders do what they say? Consistent follow-through. Do leaders do what they say? Are policies enforced fairly? Does accountability apply to everyone? Even leadership Consistency builds credibility. Without it, trust crumbles.

Speaker 1: 13:33

The last pillar number three empathy. Leaders who understand the pressures, emotions and challenges of their people build deep connection. Operational empathy means you don't just issue rules. You understand the real world conditions people face when trying to follow them. But what can a road trust? A blame-heavy culture, One-way communication, Leadership saying safety first but rewarding speed and output, punishing people for reporting issues and, finally, inconsistent enforcement of policies. These actions create fear and silence, no trust and transparency.

Speaker 1: 14:15

So how do we actively build a culture of trust? Be visible, accessible, not just during inspections or when something goes wrong. Ask more than you tell and actually listen. Respond. Don't react, especially when someone reports a mistake or a hazard. Give credit for safe behaviors, not just call outs for unsafe ones. Be vulnerable, Admit when leadership gets it wrong. The humility builds more trust than any safety campaign ever could. And remember trust is a two-way street. You don't get trust because you have a title. You earn it by how you show up every single day, and it flows both ways. Do you trust your people to make good decisions? Do they trust you have their best interest at heart? If the answer is yes, your culture is alive. If not, you've got a compliance program disguised as a culture. Final thought here Trust is the currency of culture. Without it, is the currency of culture. Without it, you're managing behavior. With it, you're empowering belief, and belief, not policy, is what turns safety into something people live instead of something they fear.

Speaker 1: 15:51

Let's talk about some practical takeaways we can take away from what we've talked about today. If you're a safety professional, a leader or anybody responsible for culture, here are your next steps. Audit your culture, not just your compliance. Ask your teams how safe they feel, not just what they know. Replace fear with trust. Create space for people to tell the truth about risks. Use compliance as a tool, not a goal. Checklists support culture. They don't replace it. Make safety personal. Remind your team that safety isn't about rules, it's about people. So let's wrap this up with a thought If your people are only following the rules because they have to, you have compliance, but if you're making safe choices, even when no one's watching, you have culture, and culture always wins. So let's lead with purpose, let's build trust before checklists, and let's remember safety isn't something we enforce, it's something we live. Thank you for listening to Safety on Purpose. I'm Joe Garcia and I'll see you in a couple weeks with another conversation that puts people at the heart of safety. Until then, stay safe and stay intentional.