COMPARATIVE ANALYSIS OF CONSTRUCTION ENGINEERING SAFETY CLIMATE AND SAFETY MANAGEMENT SYSTEM IN CHENNAI, INDIA

There is no iota of doubt that the existence of an appropriate and comprehensive construction safety management system is very much necessary for improving and maintaining the safety culture at construction job sites. Safety management system is broadly related to safety policies, procedures and processes and these are managed by strategic, tactical and operational level employees respectively at organizational level. As the safety management system represents competency of the organization in the sphere of safety, it is very much important to have competent and committed employees to execute it to achieve the desired results without any compromise to safety. The safety culture influences the perceptions, attitude and beliefs of the work force in the organization in its work environment. Construction safety climate is an index of prevailing safety culture of an organization. The objective is to examine the relationship between the construction safety climate and safety management systems prevailing in Chennai city, India. The research methodology adopted is crosssectional one and two different survey questionnaires related to safety management system and safety climate (Attitudes and perceptions) were deployed to get the responses from management and supervisory employees at construction jobsites. Factor analyses were carried out for both the surveys and statistically analyzed the results. The Pearson correlation analysis for the interrelationships between the safety climate and safety management system dimensions reveals positive and significant patterns of relationships. In addition to the strategic and technical skills, the personnel skills are required for the managers which are acquired through the planned and systematic training identification needs to ensure the safe and conducive work environment.