| dc.description.abstract | To reduce operating costs and to enhance competitiveness, it is a business strategy of many Taiwanese companies to set up low-end, labor intensive operations in Mainland China while maintaining minimum operation bases in Taiwan. The same or similar management systems and practices are applied to companies on both sides of the Taiwan Strait. Because of the differences in safety awareness and experience in management systems, it is highly valuable as far as occupational health and safety management is concerned to assess employees’ perception on safety and to modify the implementation strategy accordingly.
This study utilizes questionnaires to evaluate employees’ perceptions on safety culture and to analyze the differences in safety culture of the factories on both sides of the Taiwan Strait of a case study company. The safety culture dimensions covered in the survey include management commitment, training, communication, working environment, rules and enforcement, management system, supervision, knowledge, reward and motivation and health promotion. There were four factories, two on each side of the Strait, involved in this study. The 60-item questionnaire was distributed to 100 first-line operators of each factory. The survey was self-administered by the participating employees. Standard statistical methods were used to analyze the data.
The results reveal the fact that employees with higher education and seniority put more emphasis on safety culture despite of the inherent differences in custom and social background between the Taiwanese and Chinese employees. It is surprising to discover that Chinese employees of the case study company fare better than their Taiwanese counterparts in most of the dimensions in the questionnaire. Recommendations from the participants of this study include improvement in engineering control systems, enhancement of safety training, implementation of near miss investigation and reward for reporting of near misses, improved communication between management and employees, more involvement of employees in safety and health issues, active promotion of occupational health and safety, and enhanced consultation of the medical staff of the factories. These recommendations provide the case study company a sound basis for continual improvement in occupational health and safety management.
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