Drawing on insights from business leaders and contemporary educational theory, we propose that effective safety professionals require both technical expertise and sophisticated narrative capabilities. The findings suggest significant implications for safety education and professional development, challenging institutions to reconsider how they prepare safety practitioners for increasingly complex organizational environments. Rather than perpetuating false dichotomies between hard and soft skills, we argue for an educational approach that develops both technical and narrative capabilities in an integrated manner, particularly crucial for safety change management where success depends on both procedural competence and compelling storytelling.

 

Discussion Points:

• (00:00) Introduction - Should safety education focus on hard or soft skills?
• (01:04) Background - Safety Science Innovation Lab and higher education context
• (02:27) Hard vs Soft Skills - Discussing the limitations of this categorization
• (05:08) Storycraft Report - Overview and methodology of the Oxford study
• (15:00) Understanding Narrative - Definitions and importance in business
• (18:15) Three Core Business Purposes of Narrative: Communicating business values, persuasion and influence, driving and managing change
• (26:06) Five Essential Narrative Skills Framework: Narrative communication, empathy and perspective taking, critical analysis, creativity and imagination, digital skills
• (36:00) Who Needs Narrative Skills - Integration of STEM and humanities in education
• (40:35) Three Key Takeaways - Value of tertiary education, importance of narrative skills in safety, managing change
• The answer to our question: Should safety education focus on hard skills or soft skills? If you didn’t like the question, I think you will like the answer, which is: We should stop dividing the world into hard skills and soft skills, or into STEM and into humanities. Just teach everyone both.
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Quotes:

“There are different skill categories, but they’re mostly about specific skills versus transferable skills.” - Drew

“One of the things that Griffith [University] was specifically set up for is based on the idea that education is important for social mobility.” - Drew

“A narrative in business is the communication of a business activity or idea…it’s the ability to tell your story or your direction.”- David

“if a business can convey some narrative or strategic vision about who they are and what they’re doing, they’re going to get much more useful work out of their employees.” - Drew

Resources:

Storycraft: the importance of narrative and narrative skills in business

The Safety of Work Podcast

The Safety of Work on LinkedIn

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