The health safety and environment function is moving from a box ticking exercise to a business critical culture change. In 2025 the strongest organisations are those that treat safety as a long term cultural capability rather than a set of rules to be enforced. This shift is driven by leaders who recognise that lasting improvement in safety performance depends on accountable leadership visible at every level, trusted two way communication with the frontline, and the use of real time data to prevent harm before it occurs.

This article explains what the shift from compliance to culture means in practical terms. It will unpack the core drivers, list proven actions leaders can take immediately, explain how metrics need to change, highlight common traps to avoid, and leave you with a ready to use checklist to start cultural change in your organisation today.

What does moving from compliance to culture mean?
Organisations focused on compliance measure success by audits permits and the absence of regulatory findings. Organisations focused on culture measure success by how people behave when no one is watching whether teams stop unsafe acts because they feel empowered and whether systems learn and improve before an accident happens. Culture is the set of shared values beliefs and daily habits that determine how safety decisions are made across the organisation. It is not a program to be deployed and then archived. It is an ongoing way of working that must be supported by policies competence measurement and leadership practices.

Why this matters now?
Multiple forces are converging to accelerate the culture shift. Technology is making predictive risk insights practical at scale. Increased attention to mental health and psychological safety is reframing wellbeing as a core component of occupational safety. Stakeholders expect integrated approaches that combine safety environment and quality rather than treating each as separate silos. These forces mean that organisations which invest early in culture will get safer faster and sustain improvement longer.

Five pillars that define a culture led approach to HSE

1. Leadership and accountability at all levels
   Leaders must translate safety commitments into observable behaviours and measurable commitments. This starts with clear expectations that are communicated consistently and followed by actions such as visible field time coaching and regular review of leading indicators. Senior leaders must be prepared to be seen and heard in operational areas and to demonstrate how safety decisions are prioritised alongside cost and schedule.

2. Behavioural safety and psychological safety
   Behavioural approaches remain central to converting rules into safe habits. At the same time organisations are now explicitly managing psychosocial risks that influence behaviour. Creating psychological safety means people can speak up about hazards near misses and wellbeing concerns without fear of blame. ISO 45003 gives practical guidance on how to manage psychosocial risks within an occupational health and safety management system and is now a core reference for organisations serious about integrating mental health and safety.

3. Data driven and predictive risk management
   The era of reactionary reporting is ending. Organisations that embed data capabilities are moving from looking backwards at incidents to predicting risk and preventing incidents. Predictive analytics can highlight work types locations or times where risk is rising so controls can be applied before harm occurs. This means investing in data hygiene integration of operational systems and the skills to interpret predictive outputs for practical interventions. 

4. Technology and wearable enabled safety
   Wearables IoT and video analytics are no longer pilot stage technologies only. They are being used to detect fatigue unsafe postures and near misses and to automate low value compliance tasks so safety professionals can focus on improvement work. Technology must be deployed as part of a human centred approach that respects privacy and is clearly linked to action so workers see tangible benefits from its use.

5. Integrated HSEQ not separated islands
   Quality environment and safety are increasingly integrated. Doing so reduces duplication increases clarity of responsibilities and ensures that risk controls consider all relevant outcomes. Contractor and supply chain integration is also essential because culture cannot be imposed only on direct employees. Organisations that align contract terms assurance processes and onboarding with culture objectives secure greater consistency across the workplace.

Measuring what matters leading indicators and outcome alignment
If culture is the focus then leading indicators must become the primary management signals. Examples of effective leading indicators include the quality of pre job planning the percentage of high risk tasks with executed controls near miss reporting rates timeliness of critical corrective actions and supervisor coaching frequency. Several industry reports emphasise the dramatic impact of well chosen leading indicators on safety performance and encourage organisations to widen the set of metrics they track to include supervisory competence and task specific safety processes.

Practical actions leaders can take right now

1. Define and communicate a short list of culture expectations
   Select three to five behaviours that matter most in your operations and make them the north star for performance conversations.

2. Replace punitive near miss treatment with a learning system
   Ensure near misses are captured analysed and fed back into controls and training while protecting reporters from blame.

3. Adopt ISO 45003 principles to manage psychosocial risk
   Include psychological risk screening in routine risk assessments and provide clear pathways for support and escalation.

4. Rebalance KPIs toward leading indicators
   Move reporting cadence to weekly for leading indicators and hold leaders to account on those measures in governance meetings.

5. Pilot predictive analytics on a focused problem
   Start small for example target a single plant or work type and use predictive models to identify precursors to incidents then measure the effect of interventions. 

6. Invest in supervisor capability not just online training
   Competence is validated by observation coaching and demonstrated outcomes. Use field coaching competency assessments and on the job mentoring.

7. Integrate contractors early
   Ensure contractors are evaluated for culture fit during procurement and tracked for performance not only for permits and records.

Common traps to avoid
Treating culture change as a communications campaign rather than a sustained leadership practice
Buying technology then leaving it to IT without a plan for adoption and continuous improvement
Over relying on technology to replace human judgment
Measuring only lagging metrics and then using them to justify cuts to prevention budgets
Designing mental health interventions without linking them to work design and workload controls

Short case examples without proprietary details
Example one
A manufacturing business reduced hand injuries by using predictive analytics to identify a cluster of tasks with frequent stop work reports. The company adjusted task sequences improved guarding and elevated supervisor coaching in those areas. The result was a measurable drop in minor injuries and reduced unplanned stoppages. 

Example two
A contractor network embedded psychological risk screening into induction and created a simple rapid response pathway for workers identified as at risk. This action reduced sick leave related to stress and increased near miss reporting because workers trusted the system and felt supported. 

Privacy and ethics considerations for technology and data
Technology introduces choices about what data is needed who owns it and how it will be used. Organisations must be transparent about the purpose of data collection obtain informed consent where appropriate and limit data retention to what is necessary for safety outcomes. Ethics must be considered from the design phase and continuously revisited as systems change.

A practical checklist to start the culture shift today

1. Publish three culture expectations and roll them out through leader led field visits

2. Replace a portion of lagging KPI review with a leading indicator deep dive each week

3. Pilot psychological risk assessment in one business unit and evaluate pathways for support

4. Run a focused predictive analytics pilot on a high risk task for three months

5. Implement supervisor coaching observations as a regular agenda item in team meetings

6. Audit contractor onboarding for culture alignment and corrective action completeness

7. Review privacy rules for wearables and ensure the policy is published and accessible to workers

Conclusion
Shifting from compliance to culture is not fast or easy but it is the most reliable route to sustainable safety improvement. The organisations that win in 2025 will be those that combine visible accountable leadership with practical behavioural programs robust wellbeing management and the smart use of data and technology. If you focus on changing what people do every day rather than only what they sign up to do on paper you will create an environment where safety becomes part of how work gets done.