Documentación de la Gestión de Seguridad e Higiene Ocupacional.

The RNLI is in many ways a highly unusual organization. Perhaps most significantly for this thesis, it is unusual because it relies on volunteers to work in a dangerous environment in order to achieve its goal of saving lives at sea. I have already made the point that empirical studies of voluntary organizations are extremely rare in the mainstream organizations studies literature. The thick volunteering identified at the RNLI, coupled with its dangerous nature, opens up a theoretical distinction as it makes for a particularly complicated dynamic in a previously undifferentiated category.

The RNLI is also distinctive because, apart from a few community-based lifeboats dotted around the coast of the UK and Ireland, the RNLI is the institutional field (DiMaggio and Powell, 1983; in the context of the RNLI specifically, this point has also been made by Wilson and Butler, 1983). The RNLI is internationally recognised as ‘providing one of the most effective and dependable search and rescue services in the world’ (RNLI International Development Publicity Material, 2012) and is widely accepted as the benchmark to which similar organizations in other countries aspire.

Although it is not the specific focus of this study, the crew on the water can be categorized as an extreme action team (Sundstrom et al., 1990). Klein et al. elaborate extreme action teams as ‘teams whose highly skilled members cooperate to perform urgent, unpredictable, interdependent, and highly consequential tasks while simultaneously coping with frequent changes in team composition and training their teams’ novice members’ (2006: 590). This absolutely speaks of the work of the RNLI. Klein et al.’s (2006) study is based on extreme action medical teams in an emergency trauma centre whose tasks, akin to those of RNLI crews, necessitate ‘swift coordination, reliable performance, adaptation and learning’ (Ibid, p.590). Of course there are obvious differences between Klein et al.’s research site and this – firstly, the members of the medical team are all paid staff, and secondly, their own lives are not put in danger by attempting to save the lives of others – what is at stake in the context of the RNLI is the interlinkage of thick, perilous volunteering. Nevertheless, the findings of that study revealed a shared leadership within the team, specifically ‘dynamic delegation of the active leadership role’ (p. 590). However, within the

RNLI crew whilst on a rescue mission there is no denying the influence of the single formal leader – the coxswain. Respondents’ accounts unanimously identified the coxswain as leader of the team whose authority is unquestionable. For example one participant voiced: ‘Once the boat is at sea the coxswain is the be-all and end-all really’ (George, Second Coxswain). This will be explored in greater detail in chapter five.

Also, because it is a voluntary organization, the RNLI is different to other emergency services as it is not an organ of the state or an expression of state power, nor, as I outlined in section 3.1 of this chapter, has it ever been so; it may be understood as an expression of communal moral purpose and need, which I will discuss at great length in chapter five. Other research empirically sited in dangerous working conditions such as Thornborrow and Brown’s recent analysis of identity and discipline in the British Parachute Regiment (2009), Desmond’s (2007) account of the US Forest Service and Weick’s (1993) interpretation of the tragic events at Mann Gulch all focus on state agencies whose employees are paid. Again, although it is not the specific focus of this thesis, the RNLI can be characterized as a high reliability organization (Weick et al., 1999). The five hallmarks of high reliability organizations are (1) preoccupation with failure, (2) reluctance to simplify interpretations, (3) sensitivity to operations, (4) commitment to resilience and (5) deference to experience. These are all characteristics which the RNLI exudes and actively seeks in its operations, locally and at HQ.

Research undertaken in empirical sites of dangerous working conditions is relatively rare in the organization studies and general management literature,

with some exceptions highlighted below. In (mainly) sociological literature, coalmining has been used to underpin many theories of loyalty, trust and solidarity implicit in dangerous-work settings (Parry, 2003) and care-work, paid and unpaid, been used to study violence in workplaces (e.g. Baines, 2004, 2006; Littlechild, 2005; Virkki, 2008; Baines and Cunningham, 2011). Police work (e.g. Van Maanen, 1980; Brewer, 1990; Tracy and Tracy, 1998; Dick and Cassell, 2004; Dick, 2005), the work of the armed forces (e.g. Thornbarrow and Brown, 2009) and fire-fighters (e.g. Weick 1993; Scott and Myers, 2005; Desmond, 2007, Colquitt et al., 2011) have all been used to empirically develop (some very major) concepts which aid organizational understanding. Lois’s (1999) excellent ethnographic study of the socialization of team members into a voluntary mountain rescue organization provides some fascinating insights into the co-production of team norms in dangerous settings, although it is very tightly focused on socialization processes and the tensions between individualism and collectivism, which is not a central research focus of the current study.

My substantive point here is that conceptualization of dangerous work is still very fragmented. For example, to some commentators dangerous work is framed in terms of the economics of wage compensation for dangerous duties (Dorman, 1996; Dorman and Hagstrom, 1998). Studies on dangerous work are so loosely connected that one can hardly speak of ‘a (body of) dangerous work literature’. Yet wouldn’t such a thing be interesting? No doubt this deficiency is embedded within larger issues within the organization studies field11 – the

11 _{As Grey (2009, 2010, 2012) citing many others (Mone and McKinlay, 1993; Weick, 1996;}

‘narrowness of its range’ (Grey, 2009: 313; cf. Rehn, 2008) coupled with (or caused by, depending on one’s point of view) demands from business schools for increased corporate relevance. This research breaks from the narrow corporate focus of current organization studies, attending to the fact that not all work takes place in the relative safety of the office.

It is clear that the working environment for volunteers is highly unusual. Due to the offshore nature of the work, there is very little back-up for the crew of a lifeboat if the rescue is very difficult and becomes a life-and-death situation. Crew self-conceptualize as being different from other emergency services such as the ambulance or fire brigade because they have very limited back-up. I asked a station volunteer ‘if you had to explain to somebody who had never heard of the RNLI, “who are the RNLI” what would you tell them?’ His response:

Well that’s hard [knocks at floor], that’s soft and wet [indicates to sea] when you get into trouble here it’s somebody else [that will help you], when you get into trouble out there it’s us. That’s it. (Luke, Crew Member)

Occasionally, volunteers are forced to deal with horrendous physical working conditions, such as hurricane force wind, waves and storms. In 2012, almost ten percent of launches were in winds of strong breeze up to and including violent storm (RNLI Operational Statistics Report, 2012:8)12. A strong breeze produces

al., 2011) recognizes, ‘something has gone badly wrong with the field of organization studies’ (2012: 5). I will return to this point in chapter seven.

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a wave height of three to four metres and a rough sea. Forty- one percent of lifeboat services in Ireland were performed in darkness in 2012 (RNLI Operational Statistics Report, 2012: 8), adding to the already dangerous and frightening setting. Sea-sickness and mental pressure can combine in potentially lethal ways as coxswain and crew toil to enact a successful rescue. Here, a coxswain explains how difficult the working conditions can be for those on the lifeboat, even those with considerable years of experience:

I mean everyone on the boat gets sick, even me. And I’ve been working on boats for twenty-six years now. You die. You wish you were dragged off the face of the earth some days. (Daragh, Coxswain)

A second coxswain speaks of the ordeal and hardship, mentally and physically, as a result of these working conditions:

If you are going out in difficult conditions in high waves and high seas and it’s dark, that’s the sort of things that will really test guys because you can’t see what’s coming at you and you are getting thrown around the place. (George, Second Coxswain)

Below is a striking example of the difficult and at times harrowing and tragic situations, physical and psychological, which face volunteer crew:

A woman went over the side of the ship off one of the ferries early this year, and we actually spotted her in the water, she was dead, she was in the water three or four hours, and I went over the side, clipped on and the first thing that came to my mind was I better not let her go, I just put my arm around her and we got her in. But the main thing was just don’t let her go, don’t lose her…bring her home. Don’t let her go. (Mick, Second Mechanic)

The difficult working conditions also arise in part when/because the lifeboat is responding to accidents. The sequence of events which has lead to an accident can leave the casualties in a state of chaos, with loss of habituated action patterns and structure, which triggers confusion and contributes to further mishap. The crew, whilst continually mutually sensemaking (Weick, 1988, 1993, 1995; Weick et al., 2005) under pressure (Cornelissen, 2012) must also provide structure and sense for their casualties, many of whom are suffering from shock or are otherwise disabled to assist in their own rescue. Volunteers must also take responsibility for managing their own skills and recognising their own abilities in order to avoid the disastrous ‘rescuer-turned-victim scenario’ (Lois, 1999: 126). In sum, the conditions experienced by coxswain and crew explained here are, undeniably, highly unusual in organizations and organizational research.

‘In dreams begin responsibility’ (W.B. Yeats 1865-1939)