Embracing Differences

Many organisations declare safety as one of the values in the vision and mission statements. Can safety be a value?When fallible humans conduct high risk operations, there is no certainty that people will not get injured. When people do get injured we have failed to live by our values.In this video, instead of making an argument, we will use a personal story to illustrate why safety cannot be a value.This is Embracing Differences and I am Nippin Anand (PhD), a former ship captain and an anthropologist.

This podcast is based on the work of the American Anthropologist Ernest Becker's perennial thesis - 'the denial of death'. In this podcast, Professor Sheldon Solomon explains how death anxiety, which is unique to the human species, leads to a quest for meaning, self-esteem and cultural worldviews. Solomon explains why it is so important for us take an interdisciplinary approach to understanding culture and why we must synthesise the wisdom of ages and sages and combine it with science if we truly want to make sense of human behaviour.

YouTube link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ecYC_Y1UnE8

In less than 12 hours, President Trump blamed that DEI was behind the Washington mid-air collision. How did Trump connect so many dots at the speed of light and establish what went wrong with such conviction? And why do so many buy into this DEI ideology as the cause of the accident? In this podcast, I suggest that the president is using fear of death to heighten public anxiety, create a divide and spread hatred in the society. 

We will discuss: Why do humans fear death? How do we react and how do we relate with others when we are confronted with death? How does this explain President Trump’s reaction to Washington midair collision?

Myth busting i.e. viewing a myth as a false story, is a political ideology. It is not science. Myth busting creates differences and it spreads hatred in the society. In a culturally diverse society, understanding myth busting is our pathway to cultural intelligence and improving our relationships with others. In this podcast, I will explain what is a myth and why myth busting should concern the risk and safety industry and our society at large. What are the dangers of myth busting and how we can avoid falling into this trap. 

We will discuss: What is a myth? A short story of a myth. What is the power of a myth? What is myth busting? Why myth busting is an ideology (not science)? Why myth busting should concern us?

Modern science is busy bursting myths but is that the right approach? In this visual story, we will discuss why myths are not false stories and how understanding myths can reveal patterns in our narratives? We think we are scientific and evidence-based but when faced with an existential or moral crisis every culture turns to its own myths for meaning. For this, we will compare between Eastern and Western mythospheres (collection of myths, symbols and rituals). Knowledge of different cultures and their myths can reveal new patterns in our stories, widen our perspectives and improve our decision making, leadership skills and risk management.

In October this year, I travelled to Canada for work and on the first night of arrival, while still jet lagged and sleepless, I was searching the internet to read about the culture of First Nations peoples of Canada. There I came across a series of 6 videos between the international expert in humanitarian law, Professor Kathleen Mahoney and the former National Chief of the Assembly of First Nations, Larry Philip Fontaine facilitated by the Canadian TV Journalist Lisa LaFlamme.
It was an extremely rich discussion where one could learn so much about the history and culture of Canada and a telling story of #culturechange.
A couple of weeks ago I was fortunate to have both Kathleen and Phil on my podcast #embracingdifferences. I was humbled that both of them gave me their time to share their stories which I can now share within my own community.
You may think what has the risk and safety industry got to do with the history of the Indigenous people and to this I say give it a listen. It’s a great lesson for anyone interested in understanding culture and how to successfully create culture change.

What happens when someone by-passes an alarm, turns the wrong valve on the manifold, ignores a barrier, or leaves a winch lever unattended.

In 2012 the passenger ship Costa Concordia sank off the coast of Italy, resulting in the death of 32 people. Amongst other things, the captain was criticised for his casual attitude towards formulating the ship’s voyage plan, sailing 0.5 miles too close to the coast, and ‘disregarding to properly consider the distance from the coast’. The captain was sentenced to 16 years in the prison. While the rest of the world (including leading experts in the industry) criticised the captain for navigating the safe too close to the islands. even five years after the accident when I met the captain in his hometown he maintained that this was a normal practice in the cruise industry. It was a powerful insight into the culture of the cruise industry. In this episode, we will discuss why culture is so often misunderstood within the risk and safety industry using this story. 1) what are normal practices and why do we need to understand them? 2) where are we today with our understanding of ‘normal practices’? 3) how a high-risk manoeuvre became a normal practice in the cruise industry? 4) what safety sciences won’t tell us about normal practices? 5) how can we uncover ‘normal practices’ within our organisations? Each of these questions will be addressed through stories and experiences that we can all relate with. This is the second in a series of episodes based on my recent book, ‘Are We Learning from Accidents?’. A previous video in this episode was focused on why people don't speak up. The next few episodes will focus on: 1) collective sensemaking in a crisis, 2) the power of scapegoating (blame), 3) 3) how do human beings learn, unlearn, relearn and make decisions. You can read a sample of my book here: https://nippinanand.com/ Read more about our work here: https://novellus.solutions/ and check out our future workshops here: https://novellus.solutions/events/

In January 2012, the Costa Concordia went aground and capsized off the coast of Italy. One of the most disturbing aspects of this accident was that a group of competent officers and an experienced captain on the bridge were not able to detect that the ship was heading straight into the rocks.

In this podcast, I will present the power of framing using the story of the Costa Concordia accident. I interviewed the captain before he was sentenced to prison, and I was surprised by how the captain responded to my open-ended questions during the course of our interview and how it led me to a completely different view of the accident and learning than the one presented in the public domain. I have also recently written a book on this accident – Are We Learning from Accidents?

We will focus on the following questions: 1. Why was the Costa Concordia accident framed as a problem of ‘speaking up’ and the failure of ‘bridge resource management’? 2. What are the parallels between concepts such as ‘psychological safety’, ‘crew resource management’, ‘non-technical skills’ and ‘soft skills’? 3. Why do these concepts appeal so much to the risk and safety industry? 4. What are the alternative frameworks to think about ‘speaking up’? 5. And importantly, why we should never underestimate the power of framing?

This is the first in a series of videos based on my recent book, ‘Are We Learning from Accidents?’. In the next few weeks, I will post more videos on a range of topics including 1) normalisation of risk, 2) collective sensemaking in a crisis, 3) understanding safety culture, 4) the power of scapegoating (blame), 5) what is learning, and 6) how do human beings learn, unlearn, relearn and make decisions.

You can read a sample of my book and it is available for purchase at: https://nippinanand.com/

Welcome to Mindfulness, Self-Awareness, and Risk, the podcast where we explore the intersection of human experience and risk management. I'm your host, Nippin Anand, and I'm excited to have Rosa Antonia Carrillo to embark on this journey with us.

If you ask operational leaders and organizations about risk management, you'll likely hear about control, hazards, and audits. But what about caring, mindfulness, or self-awareness? What about the importance of friendship and tapping into our unconscious? Surprisingly, these are the very concepts that are now at the forefront of risk management.

This podcast dives into the world of mindfulness and its profound impact on risk reduction. In healthcare, research demonstrates the positive effects of mindfulness on both patient care and practitioner well-being. It's sparked a conversation about embodiment – the crucial synergy between our unconscious and conscious minds—a synergy can only happen when both are aware of each other. Mindfulness  enriches our world when we learn to make the unconscious conscious.

We'll also be exploring the concept of "weak signals," a term coined by Karl Weick to describe the subtle anomalies in organizations that can hint at serious underlying issues. Mindfulness can enhance our ability to detect these weak signals, as well as improve our listening and empathy skills. After all, we can see and hear more when we're not consumed by our own thoughts.

And finally, we'll delve into the power of friendship and the importance of relationships. Gallup research has shown that having a friend at work is a key indicator of high performance. Connectedness is essential for well-being and performance. A true friend can help us bring our unconscious thoughts to light, leading to better decision-making and risk mitigation. This is key to organizations that struggle to bring the tacit, implicit to the surface so that problems can be addressed in a timely manner.

Join us as we explore these timely ideas for tackling risk in an uncertain world. On this podcast, we'll uncover how mindfulness, self-awareness, and human connection can revolutionize the way we approach risk management.

Our hope is that this conversation will help you stay present, stay connected, and stay safe.