Revisiting Heinrich’s Impact on Safety

In this episode, Mary Conquest speaks with Carsten Busch - the "Indiana Jones of Safety", who has over 25 years of experience in HSEQ Management. and is a tutor in the Lund University human factors and system safety program.

Carsten is also a Safety historian and has extensively researched and written about the work of Herbert William Heinrich - and shares his finding with us in this fascinating interview.

Heinrich is considered by many to be the founder of modern Safety practice, but has become a polarizing figure in today’s safety discourse.

Carsten believes Heinrich’s work and legacy should be reappraised, and he helps Safety professionals understand what he actually wrote - rather than basing their knowledge on hearsay.

One of Carsten’s main concerns is that New View Safety authors aren’t applying their own principles when they criticize Heinrich and could be positioning his work to reinforce their own approaches.

Context is key and you’ll discover what Heinrich actually said, who his primary audience was (not Safety professionals!), and the surprising role insurance companies played in enhancing Workplace Safety in the 1930s.

Carsten’s book investigating Heinrich:

Preventing Industrial Accidents: Reappraising H. W. Heinrich

Recommended additional reading from Heinrich’s time:
Men and machines: Amazon.com: Chase, Stuart

Find out more about Carsten’s work:

Home (mindtherisk.com)

Carsten on LinkedIn:

Carsten Busch | LinkedIn

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