View Full Version : Are you risk averse ?
fizzwheel
10-12-08, 09:48 AM
Maybe its me, I'm starting to loose the will to live with the risk averse society I find myself living in.
Some recent examples
1. Signs put up at work warning that the water out the hot tap maybe "hot"
2. More signs put up at work, detailing in great depth how Office Christmas decoations should be deployed. I mean do we really need a whole page of AR instructions being printed out and stuck up saying where to put tinsel etc etc
3. People worrying about how "the roads are icey" and coming in to work late or in a state of panic about getting home again.
4. My current head of dept, wont let any changes go through on our system at the moment without a battle, because "stuff might go wrong"
I find myself getting exasperated by it all, Life has a certain amount of risk in anything that you do, you can't avoid it. The only way of avoiding it is to do nothing and that seems what people are seemingly happy to do.
Its driving me nuts. I dont want to live in a world where I'm wrapped in cotto wool, just because somebody somewhere has decided that sticking a bit of tinsel up and having a few christmas tree lights on is "Risky and might cause somebody harm"
FFS
/rant mode off
Fizz i know how you feel my whole working day is risk assessed
There was a programme on the other day about Helat and Safety, the fun police, i believe it was called. I watched about 2 minutes of it before i started shouting loudly at the TV calling then naffin stupid, then turning over. Its beyond a joke.
As for your IT thing Fizz, L&G have a change freeze for 4 week over christmas starting tomorrow!
ukgooner
10-12-08, 10:06 AM
Our change freeze started on Monday, and lasts until mid January, although we can get some "Emergency" changes through if we get the appropriate level of sign-off, I can totally understand this as it could be very costly if we had an outage of our systems during this period.
However I totally agree regarding the other pointless HSE political correctness that goes on, absolutely ridiculous half the time.
People should use common sense, but I guess there is a shortage of that about!!
I'm not adverse to risk, I quite enjoy it sometimes.
It's occasionally required in IT too, there are times when things need to be done by the book, and times when things need to be done, regardless of regulation, rules, etc.
If you need to stand on a desk to reach a projector, its really quite safe most of the time. If you need to rackmount that 1u server and no one else is around is it going to cause issues... Or if you need to restart a system daemon with no one noticing and no downtime... ;)
You have to be sensible about these things, unfortunately a lot of people are not. Now, im not entirely sure if this is because they dont understand proper risk management (read, common sense), or they are scared and want to cover their own ****, or are just taken in by the whole health and safety peoples belittling of poeple doing what people do.
I read about another case in the metro this morning, a lollypop man was ordered to remove tinsel from his sign, due to a complaint. (http://www.metro.co.uk/news/article.html?Lollipop_man_in_tears_over_tinsel_ban&in_article_id=437925&in_page_id=34)
Dan
Kilted Ginger
10-12-08, 10:11 AM
Cardboard coffee cups "Warning! Contents may be hot"
They had bloody well better be.
... things need to be done, regardless of regulation, rules, etc.
If you need to stand on a desk to reach a projector, its really quite safe most of the time. If you need to rackmount that 1u server and no one else is around is it going to cause issues... Or if you need to restart a system daemon with no one noticing and no downtime... ;)
Damn you Sudoxe, this is the final straw! I need your gun and your badge. You're a good cop, but you need to learn to play it by the book!
i think its astonishing the human race has survived this long. we need people to make us aware of the risks involved in day to day life. why it was only yesterday i stood up too quickly and went a little bit dizzy, i had to check myself lest i fell over. and i could have been carrying a flask or anything. a baby even. were there any signs warning me? nope.
so shut ya traps all of you and embrace these do gooders and safety nazis, give them a hug, they're humans too. dont squeeze too hard, you may break a rib of theirs
Damn you Sudoxe, this is the final straw! I need your gun and your badge. You're a good cop, but you need to learn to play it by the book!
You think im joking...i'm sure they have a full policy & risk assessment on changing light bulbs here, they have one on everything else...
fizzwheel
10-12-08, 10:14 AM
As for your IT thing Fizz, L&G have a change freeze for 4 week over christmas starting tomorrow!
We dont have a change freeze at the moment, I'd understand if we did. I put a change in, and it got rejected, because "You might break something"
Its broken now, It needs fixing, if we dont fix it, Its going to hold up a project thats already 3 months late even more.
Its driving me nuts !!!
We have a sign in the toilet telling us to flush it. Really.
Ceri JC
10-12-08, 10:52 AM
I agree it's exceptionally irritating, but it's not entirely people's fault. We're evolved to identify and fairly accurately categorise things that are immediate and clearly dangerous. Say, running across a motorway blindfolded, or winding up a rottweiler. Unfortunately, most of the most likely to occur and most severe in consequence risks we encounter in modern life tend to be far from immediate and far too abstract for people to accurately guage them. Factor in the media whipping up the "outrage factor" (how shocked we are by certain things, causing us to give them too much weight as risks) and risk assessors who have a vested interest (their percieved continued usefulness and consequently, employment) in exaggerating risks and it's not hard to see why joe public gets it so spectacularly wrong.
I can strongly recommend this book:
http://www.amazon.co.uk/How-Live-Dangerously-Should-Worrying/dp/0230712215
Very easy, quick light reading, very important message. I realise singing its praises on a bike forum is preaching to the converted, but it contains some useful stats to help rationalise risk when trying to convince overly risk-adverse people of their stupidity. Buy it, read it, circulate amongst your friends, debate it down the pub. :)
We have a sign in the toilet telling us to flush it. Really.
We have 7 in ours telling us to wash our hands. Thats 7 per toilet room. We have at least 10 in the building.
I like the warning signs on the bus bars...DANGER: High Voltage. I would bloody well hope so too.
or in the datacenters: WARNING: AUTOMATIC GAS RELEASE AREA....
We had a e-mail last we telling people to wash there hands when using the loo... As there had been complaints about people just walking straight out, we use hand scanners to get into the office, so eeewwwh! Filthy beggers.
or in the datacenters: WARNING: AUTOMATIC GAS RELEASE AREA....
To be fair, that's just when you're in there ;)
Paul the 6th
10-12-08, 11:13 AM
This packet of dry roast peanuts may contain nuts.
Listening to the radio this morning, there was an interview with a guy who was talking about our schools being "Nut Free" (as in peanuts, I'm sure our schools are full of nut-cases)
He made the point that it was a totally out of proportion response to a very small problem, 159 people last year (in the US) died in total due to reactions to any sort of food allergy. He also pointed out that 100 people died from bee stings, so should we ban bees??
Evil black and yellow strippy devils.
Paul the 6th
10-12-08, 11:30 AM
bee's are alright, it's wasps which are the real mother f**kers...
I didn't know wasps did that... are they up for a bit of incest too?
missyburd
10-12-08, 11:37 AM
This packet of dry roast peanuts may contain nuts.
+1. Or this milk may contain milk: Nooooo really? :rolleyes:
I think you just have to ignore them, after all there are eejits about. We have to put notes up for one of my particularly dumb housemates "Flush bog", "Turn shower light off", "Clean plughole after use" etc. Yet he still doesn't do it! Is it the rebel that comes out in people when they read a sign reminding them to do something they automatically do the opposite? Perhaps this is the case in the workplace?
Gazza77
10-12-08, 11:38 AM
Maybe its me, I'm starting to loose the will to live with the risk averse society I find myself living in.
Some recent examples
1. Signs put up at work warning that the water out the hot tap maybe "hot"
2. More signs put up at work, detailing in great depth how Office Christmas decoations should be deployed. I mean do we really need a whole page of AR instructions being printed out and stuck up saying where to put tinsel etc etc
3. People worrying about how "the roads are icey" and coming in to work late or in a state of panic about getting home again.
4. My current head of dept, wont let any changes go through on our system at the moment without a battle, because "stuff might go wrong"
I find myself getting exasperated by it all, Life has a certain amount of risk in anything that you do, you can't avoid it. The only way of avoiding it is to do nothing and that seems what people are seemingly happy to do.
Its driving me nuts. I dont want to live in a world where I'm wrapped in cotto wool, just because somebody somewhere has decided that sticking a bit of tinsel up and having a few christmas tree lights on is "Risky and might cause somebody harm"
FFS
/rant mode off
I'd suggest that all this is actually nothing to do with risk aversion, rather that it is a reflection on today's litigation obsessed society. As "accidents" don't exist anymore as someone else has to be to blame, then the only way to cover your **** is to ensure that you have warned everyone of every potential hazzard, no matter how stupid that may seem.
As rediculous as putting a warning on a hot tap warning that water may be hot, you can be sure that someone somewhere has already sucessfully sued for damages due to allegedly burning themselves.
Its driving me nuts !!!
WARNING the Last Sentence may CONTAIN NUTS...
;)
Keep smiling...
I'd suggest that all this is actually nothing to do with risk aversion, rather that it is a reflection on today's litigation obsessed society. As "accidents" don't exist anymore as someone else has to be to blame, then the only way to cover your **** is to ensure that you have warned everyone of every potential hazzard, no matter how stupid that may seem.
As rediculous as putting a warning on a hot tap warning that water may be hot, you can be sure that someone somewhere has already sucessfully sued for damages due to allegedly burning themselves.Agreed. Im sure this all started years ago in the US when some dopey doris shoved her wet dog in the microwave to dry him off and prompty cooked him! She then sued Sharp, iirc, for millions!
As for the hot coffee story, a woman successfuly sued the golden arches for her own stupidity of spilling a coffee over herself and as the cup didnt say 'Contents may be hot' she won!! So, blame the Americans, they started it.
You then get peeople who are disabled through negligence of some kind and get peanuts in comparrison.
madness
10-12-08, 12:20 PM
Am I risk averse?
I ride a motorcycle, what do you think! ;)
Is life without some sort of risk living or just an existance?
custard
10-12-08, 12:29 PM
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/health/7773210.stm
evacuated a bus because of a nut...
the coffee cup thing goes back to the states and the urban legend of the woman that scalded herself on coffee and then sued them.
Some are sensible. Like for example, on Macdonalds apple pies, the carton says that the filling will be very hot. This is because it's largely sugar and sugar gets a lot hotter than water, so the filling can be at over 100C - enough to cause a very serious burn to your mouth. If you weren't warned, then there is a potential claim.
But then people take things to ridiculous extremes to protect themselves. Another example - the instruction manual for my bike tells me that if I ride with underinflated tyres or if I don't look after the chain this will cause a loss of motorcycle control and could cause serious injury or death. Well I never did.
missyburd
10-12-08, 12:37 PM
Some are sensible. Like for example, on Macdonalds apple pies, the carton says that the filling will be very hot. This is because it's largely sugar and sugar gets a lot hotter than water, so the filling can be at over 100C - enough to cause a very serious burn to your mouth. If you weren't warned, then there is a potential claim.
How about a warning outside Macdonalds saying "Enter at own risk" or "If you frequent this fast food restaurant more that 3 times a week you will run the risk of becoming obese" ? That would be useful too I should think :p
SoulKiss
10-12-08, 12:56 PM
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/health/7773210.stm
evacuated a bus because of a nut...
the coffee cup thing goes back to the states and the urban legend of the woman that scalded herself on coffee and then sued them.
Its not an Urban Legend - its a true story.
Basically Dumb woman gets coffee from McDonalds drive-thru (where in the US there is usually a sticker pointing out that the menu is available in Braille), puts the hot cup between her legs - instead of a cup-holder or whatever.
Drink then spills, she then sues.
Its not an Urban Legend - its a true story.
Basically Dumb woman gets coffee from McDonalds drive-thru (where in the US there is usually a sticker pointing out that the menu is available in Braille), puts the hot cup between her legs - instead of a cup-holder or whatever.
Drink then spills, she then sues.:lol: Reminds me of when i was sitting in the back of my then girlfirneds car and her and her mum in the front. The GF asked 'Why are there dimples on the back of the steering wheel?' 'Oh, thats for when blind people drive' her mum answered straight faced and truthfuly. I was rolling round the back in fits of laughter.
H&S and risk assesments are ruining lives all over the place.
My daughters school called off sports day as the grass might be a bit wet and the kids may trip..........honestly.
Here they expect you to risk assess and write method statements for everything, but the moment that something which could genuinely be dangerous is going on H&S are nowhere to be seen......funny that.
We had our H&S manager recently ask us to set up an automated reminder for one member of staff, reminding them to go for a break every 30 mins......I told her in no uncertain terms that I wouldn't be doing that. So they are just interviewing for the new Break and Lunchtime Management post.
yorkie_chris
10-12-08, 04:47 PM
When I did my work experience a few years ago I had a couple of tellings off from the H+S bod who used to wander about like a little hitler having a go. Me being stubborn and unpaid, got a b0llocking for not wearing an fireproof apron when welding, I told him to bugger off. Boss came out, said what's problem... looked at the welds and went "carry on" hehe.
Later on in the week, H+S dude actually tried to do some work, sharpening a drillbit on pedastal grinder, he dug it in and it spat it back out and took a chunk of his ear off.
He wasn't too happy and screamed quite a bit, but I found it funny as f##k.
Dangerous Dave
10-12-08, 04:51 PM
I couldn't work if I stuck to all the H&S laws/guidelines.
I think it is going a bit OTT now, or is Britain really getting stupider?
Ceri JC
10-12-08, 04:56 PM
The "hot coffee" (ho ho, reminds me of another famous legal case ;)) case isn't quite as stupid as the tabloid/populist simplification of the story would have you believe. The specifics would take ages to detail, but the long and short of it is that McDonalds (and many other places) make it vastly hotter than it needs to be to save a few $s on energy consumption and the consequence is several people are very badly burnt each year (on average, 7 men a year lose at least one testicle as a direct result of this, IIRC), completely unnecessarily. We're not talking about minor scalding, but rather proper 2nd/3rd degree burns. Often the victims are in drive throughs and hence lower down than the person serving them and the burn isn't in any way due to ****-wittedness on their part.
What the lawyers in that case really wanted was them to be banned from heating it up so much, but instead the concession they made was a fat paypout (and it was a hell of a lot more than the $20,000 medical bills the woman concerned originally asked for) and that they'd display warnings that it was hot.
BBadger
10-12-08, 05:01 PM
Ok not only stupid, but since when have you ever seen a sign saying " caution hot toffe " i mean really. Since when has toffe been served sizzling hot ?? My collage is stupid.
missyburd
10-12-08, 05:04 PM
My collage is stupid.
Don't put yourself down like that, I expect you've worked very hard at it!
ok, coat, going :-D
custard
10-12-08, 05:09 PM
Don't put yourself down like that, I expect you've worked very hard at it!
ok, coat, going :-D
no its true, lacks painted pasta.:-D
fizzwheel
10-12-08, 05:22 PM
or is Britain really getting stupider?
I dont think its this. I think alot of it is the "if theres blame theres a claim" culture. Also I think as a nation in general we've stopped taking reponsibility for our own actions. So when stuff goes wrong you blame somebody else rather than thining "that was my fault / that was an accident"
I've watched our company over the past 3 years steadily get more health and safety like, I got told off for standing on the very steady desk to hang a flag above my desk, instead I had to get the portable stairs from the other floor and use that, apart from it doesn't reach far enough in as the desk is in the way so you end up leaning over the stairs. Crazy.
This reminds me of a wallpaper/e-mail that went round the work place...
http://packphour.files.wordpress.com/2007/12/common-sense.jpg
gettin2dizzy
10-12-08, 06:24 PM
It's all pointless anyway.
I worked for a very large company that you would know of, that was HSE mad. A serious accident happened one day and the company tried to blame it completely on the employee! The accident only happened because of the pressure he was put under! HSE fined the company in the end, regardless of the 'steps' put in place. I also lost any trust in them, and left.
I was working with some guys in a BP office the other week. No joke, the host had to walk us around the office pointing out the various risks and how to deal with them. It culminated with a short 'course' on how to properly use the stairs!
There were instruction posters at the top and bottom describing exactly how to use the handrails and staircases safely. I jest not.
For god sake.We are all crawling around on the surface of a dirty great rock,that is flying round space at a zillion mph.We are held there by "MAGIC",and bombarded by millions of rocks everyday.
Tomorrow the sun may explode,gravity may fail and the sky may fall in
But dont worry because some one will put up a sign
Flamin_Squirrel
10-12-08, 09:33 PM
I couldn't work if I stuck to all the H&S laws/guidelines.
I think it is going a bit OTT now, or is Britain really getting stupider?
Yes it's getting dumber by the minute. I suggest watching a film called 'Idiocracy'. It's a gigantic **** take, but much truth said in jest.
As for doing your job, how long before you're not permitted to take firearms into battle because they're dangerous I wonder - only harsh language. But only after 9pm.
ArtyLady
10-12-08, 10:21 PM
For god sake.We are all crawling around on the surface of a dirty great rock,that is flying round space at a zillion mph.We are held there by "MAGIC",and bombarded by millions of rocks everyday.
Tomorrow the sun may explode,gravity may fail and the sky may fall in
But dont worry because some one will put up a sign
So true! :lol:
northwind
11-12-08, 12:51 AM
"See Lisa, because of daddy they now have a warning". Thing is, almost all of these things come about because somebody, somewhere really has maimed themselves while, y'know, balancing 3 footstools on top of each other so they can pull the iron off the high cupboards by its wire, or whatever... So I think we all get what some people deserve.
I do the health and safety assessments for my office :mrgreen: Only way I could avoid being banned from using a stapler in case I blinded myself, or something. it's funny just how much of this stuff just comes from individual idiots. For instance, "You can't have lights on that christmas tree, because of health and safety", we were told last year (never "because it's a hazard" or "it might cause a fire", just "because of health and safety" as if that means anything).
Of course it's total nonsense, the company has some restrictions on christmas tree placing because they can obscure CCTV and security lines of sight, and because cables can be a trip hazard etc, but the rules are actually totally common sense and easily followed and dealt with. But still the building's full of idiots trying to ban the things, not because of the actual health and safety rules but just because some people like to ban things. That's what's really at the bottom of it I think, it's a way for people right at the bottom to take a bit of power.
Basically Dumb woman gets coffee from McDonalds drive-thru
CeriJC is spot on- she didn't win because she spilled hot coffee on herself, she won because it was served ridiculously and dangerously hot. MacDonalds even proved their own negligence adn perjured themselves in multiple ways during their attempt to defend themselves. She would have suffered a severe injury if she'd drunk it too. Soulkiss actually believes the urban myth it seems, rather than the facts of the case. Check it out: http://www.lectlaw.com/files/cur78.htm
Alpinestarhero
11-12-08, 10:09 AM
Fizz, I understand. Working in a chem lab there is alot of risk - we do what we can to reduce it, but we have to keep on working regardless. I would be really pi55ed if there where signs apearing telling us such and such solvent is flammable, when we already know.
Its almost as if some people people assume other people don't have common sense (although I know some people appear they dont!). Its patronising.
My fav of a recent 'Audit' was 'You have too much flamable material you need to reduce it' I questioned it, they said, I have too much paper. Its a fecking print room, ffs
Gazza77
11-12-08, 10:38 AM
I do the health and safety assessments for my office :mrgreen: Only way I could avoid being banned from using a stapler in case I blinded myself, or something. it's funny just how much of this stuff just comes from individual idiots. For instance, "You can't have lights on that christmas tree, because of health and safety", we were told last year (never "because it's a hazard" or "it might cause a fire", just "because of health and safety" as if that means anything).
I do them in our offices too, and they're due now. I just lurve all that paperwork and inspecting, just to make sure no-one falls over their own feet. :rolleyes:
Ceri JC
11-12-08, 10:54 AM
Funniest example of intrusive H&S was where I worked as a gardener/labourer. There was a valve to do with the water line which was in a field that needed to be checked/adjusted once a month to keep the fountains etc. working at the correct rate. The field was used to keep sheep in and had only one entrance/exit which was on the opposite side to where we approached from. To access this entrance/exit by road would involve driving about 1.5 miles. It was far quicker to hop over the fence, walk to the valve and lift the heavy metal cover (ironically, put there for safety reasons, to stop kids/sheep falling into the hole and hurting themselves). Check it and put the cover back. We were all strong, healthy blokes who knew how to move/carry things correctly (we did after all work as labourers and picking up/moving things were part of our job). You could just about move the cover on your own, but it was pushing your luck, so we'd always do it in a pair. The whole thing took about 15 minutes, including the walk to and from the shed. There was never any history injury relating to this particular job.
Annual health and safety audit, some woman in a suit who looks like she'd never been near a spade in her life, never mind moved a tonne of soil by hand in a morning, turns up, trys to move the cover single-handedly and decrees that henceforth, we can't move the cover by hand. She insists we buy a ridiculous contraption (at the taxpayer's expense) like an engine chain lift you'd use in a garage on massive engines. There is no vehicle on site that you could safely load this thing into, so driving it to the site is a no-no. It can't be left in the field and has to be stored in the shed. This thing is on castors, but surprise surprise, castors don't work very well on mud/grass. We end up having to literally drag this thing (which incidentally weighs about 2/3rds as much as the cover) the half kilometer over the mud to use it, we trip over the "legs", we fall on the pointy bits, when we get it to the wall, we have to lift it over the wall. When we do finally use it, it sinks into the soft mud and is in danger of falling over. Second time out with it, someone put their back out trying to lift it over the wall. Solution? Chain lift lives in a corner of the tool shed and the official story when H&S man/woman comes is that it's used to lift the cover to the valve. What actually happens in practice is what we'd always done, prior to the meddling ****-wit's visit. :D
Dangerous Dave
11-12-08, 12:38 PM
I dont think its this. I think alot of it is the "if theres blame theres a claim" culture. Also I think as a nation in general we've stopped taking reponsibility for our own actions. So when stuff goes wrong you blame somebody else rather than thining "that was my fault / that was an accident"
Very true, with have Americanised.
As for doing your job, how long before you're not permitted to take firearms into battle because they're dangerous I wonder - only harsh language. But only after 9pm.
Would make it easier and more fun too.
yorkie_chris
11-12-08, 01:45 PM
Brings new meaning to the lock, stock quote... "armed... armed with what" "oh I don't know, bad breath, colourful language, feather dusters. Guns you tit!" :-D
vBulletin® , Copyright ©2000-2025, Jelsoft Enterprises Ltd.