Maturity model · 6 dimensions

Safety Culture Maturity.

The Safety Culture Maturity model measures how mature an organisation's safety culture is — not how people feel about safety, but how leadership, systems and behaviour actually operate. It scores six dimensions: Authentic Leadership, Control of Work, Learning & Development, Communication, Role of the HSE Function, and Workforce Engagement. Each is placed on a five-band ladder — Pathological, Reactive, Calculative, Proactive, Generative — building on Hudson's safety-culture maturity framework. Evidence comes from up to seven sources, triangulated: a 60-question perception survey across 10 categories, a site-observation log assessed against 17 elements, leader interviews, leadership discussion groups, facilitated discussion groups, document review, and stakeholder assessments. Unlike an engagement survey, scores rest on observed behaviour and documented practice, not sentiment alone.

6 dimensions7 methods9 maturity levels

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What the Safety Culture Maturity model measures

Authentic Leadership: The degree to which leaders demonstrate authentic commitment to safety through their vision, values, leadership styles, and understanding of incident causation.
Control of Work: How effectively work is planned, controlled, and risk-managed through procedures, controlling documents, and risk assessment processes.
Learning & Development: The organisation's approach to competence assurance, individual and organisational learning, and coaching and mentoring practices.
Communication: The level, quality, and meaningfulness of safety communication including channels used and care-related content in meetings.
Role of the HSE Function: The profile, capability, and effectiveness of the HSE function including audits, reviews, and event analysis and reporting.
Workforce Engagement: The degree of willing compliance, active caring, and meaningful participation in HSE including the ability to challenge.

How it's assessed

Stakeholder Assessments — Self-report questionnaires completed by stakeholders, scored using the Comprehensive Assessment config.
Perception Survey — 60-question perception survey across 10 categories
Site Observations — Site observation log assessed against 17 elements
Leader Interviews — Weighted average scores per dimension from leader interviews
Leadership Discussion Groups — Leadership discussion group — dimension scores from structured leadership sessions
Discussion Groups — Facilitated focus-group sessions with a cross-section of the organisation.
Document Review — Analysis of policies, procedures, and incident logs against model dimensions.

Results are reported against 9 maturity levels: Pathological, Nearing Reactive, Reactive, Mature Reactive, Calculative, Mature Calculative, Proactive, Mature Proactive, Generative.