Chasing Squirrels: Are Safety Professionals Focused on Serious Injury Prevention or Getting Distracted?
- Michael Matthew
- May 1
- 3 min read
Introduction: The Squirrel Syndrome in Safety
In the Disney animated film Up, a talking dog named Dug is constantly distracted, yelling “Squirrel!” mid-sentence and darting off in another direction. It’s funny because it’s true — dogs are easily distracted by squirrels.
But what happens when safety professionals act the same way?
In workplace safety management, “chasing squirrels” has become a metaphor for the tendency to pursue low-impact distractions while neglecting the real sources of harm. It's a question more business leaders are starting to ask:
Are we truly focused on preventing serious injuries and fatalities — or are we chasing squirrels?
What Does "Chasing Squirrels" Look Like in Safety?
In a high-functioning safety culture, effort is proportional to risk. But in many organizations, safety teams spend an outsized amount of time on issues that look important but don’t meaningfully reduce the likelihood of serious harm.
Common Examples:
Over-investigating minor incidents: Weeks spent analyzing a bruise or near-miss with no serious potential, while hazards that could lead to fatalities go unexamined.
Compliance obsession: Prioritizing perfect documentation and audit scores, even when the actual risk exposure in the field remains high.
Initiative fatigue: Running multiple overlapping safety campaigns, posters, slogans, and training sessions that distract rather than clarify.
Chasing "zero": Pushing for zero recordable injuries without asking whether critical controls for life-altering hazards are actually working.
Chasing "Shining Objects": Perpetually distracted by what's new or what could be next in safety. Attending numerous conferences - changing programs and strategies continuously in the hope of finding the "holy grail of injury prevention".
These distractions create a false sense of security and dilute attention from where it matters most.
Understanding the Shift: From Compliance to Critical Risk Management
The last decade has brought growing awareness of the need to differentiate between low-consequence events and high-potential events.
Research from organizations like the Campbell Institute, DEKRA, and Energy Safety Canada shows that:
Serious Injury and Fatality (SIF) events often have different root causes than minor incidents.
Efforts that reduce Total Recordable Incident Rates (TRIR) don't necessarily reduce fatality rates.
Many SIFs occur in organizations with "world-class" TRIR performance.
This challenges traditional thinking that "all incidents are preventable" or that "reducing frequency reduces severity." That thinking may still apply to slips and trips — but not to line-of-fire, high-energy, or confined space hazards.
The Real Work: Focusing on SIF Prevention
A serious approach to SIF prevention means shifting focus from volume to severity potential. Here's how top-performing safety teams stay on target:
1. Risk-Based Prioritization
Use a matrix or decision-tree to distinguish between:
Low-consequence / high-frequency hazards (e.g., paper cuts, office ergonomics)
High-consequence / low-frequency hazards (e.g., working at heights, energized equipment, trench collapse)
Only one of those can kill someone — which gets your primary attention?
2. Identifying SIF Potential Near Misses
A fall into soft dirt and a fall next to rebar might have the same outcome (no injury), but radically different potential.
Learn from the could have been — not just what was.
3. Critical Control Verification
Implement and audit controls that prevent catastrophic outcomes, like:
Isolation and lockout/tagout (LOTO)
Gas detection
Fall protection systems
Vehicle interaction protocols
And go beyond paper: Are they being used? Are they effective? Are workers empowered to speak up if they fail or should be improved?
4. Field-Level Engagement
Top safety professionals spend time in the field, learning how work is really done.
Questions to ask:
What makes your job hard or risky?
Where do you feel unsafe?
What are you afraid to tell me?
Those conversations reveal real risks — not the ones captured in spreadsheets.
The Metrics Trap: Are You Measuring What Matters?
Organizations still rely heavily on lagging indicators like TRIR, DART, or Lost Time Incidents. But these can hide serious exposures. A project can go months with zero recordables while workers are routinely exposed to unguarded pinch points, energy sources, or fall risks.
A better question:
What are the most likely ways someone could die or be seriously injured at this site — and how do we know our controls are working?
Culture, Courage, and Clarity
Chasing squirrels is easy. It feels productive. It’s visible. But it rarely saves lives.
Leading safety requires:
Cultural maturity to move past compliance theater.
Courage to say no to distractions and yes to the uncomfortable truth.
Clarity of purpose: Prevent serious injuries. Save lives. Period.
Final Thought: Focus Like a Laser, Not a Flashlight
As a safety leader, you are constantly pulled in multiple directions. But you owe it to your team to stay focused on what matters most.
Don’t chase squirrels. Chase risk. Chase the truth. Chase the lives you can save.
Michael Matthew Workplace Safety Consultant | Risk Leader | SIF Prevention Advocate
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