Worth Reading

Career Development

101 Ways To Make Yourself Indispensable at Work

By Carol A. Silvis. Published by Course Technology PTR, 2009.

Reading this book reminded me of the reason I began writing career development books. Early in my career, I was driven. I wanted to demonstrate that I was worth hiring and keeping, especially when layoffs began. Many of the topics in this book I have either written about or alluded to in my own books, albeit in much shorter form. If you want a quick read during a business trip, 101 Ways to Make Yourself Indispensable at Work fits the bill.

As today’s workplace continues to evolve, becoming more mobile and individualized, it sometimes feels like we are all playing Survivor—we are all hoping that we don’t get “voted off the island.” What can we do to make sure we have done everything possible to stay gainfully employed? Clearly, employers are looking for savvy professionals with a can-do attitude, determination and motivation to meet their needs. Coupled with tighter job markets, employees are required to have a plan for continual career accomplishments.

Silvis’s book is a series of short vignettes addressing ways to make yourself indispensable. In the opening, she lists all 101 for easy reference. Nine chapters categorize the tips, each with a succinct, important message:

• Chapter 1: Surpass the Competition
• Chapter 2: Make a Good Impression
• Chapter 3: Develop Work Savvy
• Chapter 4: Build Positive Work Habits
• Chapter 5: Skills and Education
• Chapter 6: Foster People Skills
• Chapter 7: Expand Your Leadership Skills
• Chapter 8: Strategies for Success
• Chapter 9: Have a Plan

Except for a couple of chapters, the table of contents could almost serve as a mini-book in itself. This is similar to Larry Winget’s book on change in the workplace, Shut Up! Stop Whining! Get a Life! Who needs a book after reading a title like that? Understanding that, let’s highlight a few chapters.

Chapter 1: Surpass the Competition. Sounds pretty self-explanatory. Regardless, here are a few pointers:

• Gain a competitive edge. In a tough economy, you need a competitive edge to keep your job and earn a promotion. If you’re not getting the results you’d like from your job, consider your output. Do you stand out among others in a positive way? Do you need to make changes in your behavior, work habits or productivity to become outstanding? This boils down to a combination of self-examination and determining what you can do to take the company to the next level. This often requires taking professional risks, such as trying unproven programs or doing something never done before without knowing the possible results. Safety professionals often stumble here. We design programs to eliminate risk, so we are often averse to risk taking. This chapter implies that we should take a measured risk that has a bounded result.
• Be self-reliant. Self-reliant employees free up the boss so s/he can tend to other matters. This goes hand-in-hand with my own management philosophy, “The key to management is not managing.” Once you’re trained, know your duties and how to complete them with minimal supervision. Trust your own judgment and skills. “Having the ability to work independently sets you up for promotions by demonstrating your self-reliance and confidence,” Silvis writes. This seems simple, but it’s not. I’ve encountered employees of all ages who, when faced with obstacles, stop and ask for instructions. If this is you, you need to read Peter Kyne’s book on self-motivation, The Go Getter.

Chapter 4: Build Positive Work Habits. Here, 16 tips comprise the message. Among them:

• Give a good day’s work. While at work, do your work and give it full attention and effort. Complete assigned tasks with efficiency, accuracy and expediency. Compare your productivity to that of others who perform similar jobs. Do you accomplish more than they do? Are you as accurate? There will be days you feel tired, irritable or bored. The professional moves past these feelings to continue performing at his/her best. I’ve interviewed candidates who say they will forfeit their lunch hour to update their Facebook account. These candidates never make it past the interview. In fact, I will terminate the interview. Why? We are hiring employees to work, not update Facebook. If they are willing to forfeit their lunch hour, what are they doing when I’m not watching?
• Do not complain. Enthusiasm is contagious, and so is complaining. If you have a legitimate problem or complaint, try to propose a solution. Search for the positive aspect of each situation. A sign in my office exemplifies this concept: “Wag more, bark less.” Also, remember that it never gets better than the interview. If the candidate complains during the interview, s/he will complain once hired. Hire a noncomplainer instead. Another point about complaining: during economic downturns, fear of layoffs or company closings can place undue stress on employees concerned about keeping their jobs. Negative comments and complaints only heighten anxiety and worsen the situation. So, it is important to maintain a positive, upbeat attitude.

Chapter 9: Have a Plan. Tips include:

• Set personal goals. Set achievable goals immediately. Winning the lottery is not a long-term retirement goal. Planning your career over the next 5 years is a long-term goal. Start with what you want to accomplish in your life. Follow it with the motivation behind these goals. Without clearly defined goals, your path of success will be uncertain. Set short-term goals that start immediately through the first year or two; set long-term goals that cover from 5 years through your lifetime. Set the bar higher than where you are now and surpass what you have already achieved. When you set personal goals that work toward increasing job satisfaction and advancement, be sure they align with your career aspirations.
• Be aware of office politics. I just delivered a 1-day seminar for ASSE on the politics of safety. The seminar addressed understanding your workplace, your own styles, peer’s styles and your boss’ style. I discussed how to manage and survive politics in the corporate world. This chapter is a primer on office politics. As we all know, politics is ubiquitous. Anywhere people gather, politics will come into play, which is especially true of the workplace. It is the way people interact. “Many people try to avoid ‘playing office politics,’ but it is nearly impossible to do it, because they are dealing with people,” Silvis writes. There are good and bad sides to office politics. To stay on the good side, be sincere, honest, reliable, helpful and agreeable. These approaches should keep you out of trouble.

An added bonus, exercises and self-evaluation forms throughout the book promote critical thinking and self-evaluation, stimulate creativity and identify areas where improvement will enhance your career success.

With this book, you will inevitably see your own work behaviors reflected, both good and bad. When you are finished reading this book, you’ll be refreshed with a renewed perspective on the workplace and your role in it. The book is a great read for both novice and veteran workers. Challenging times or not, it emphasizes the workplace agreement to be compensated for an honest day’s work.

While no one in the workplace is ever truly indispensable, I believe 101 Ways will go a long way in helping you gain valuable skills to make you a successful and value-add employee.

Mark Hansen, P.E., CSP
Irving, TX

The Safety Professionals Handbook 2nd Edition

Edited by Joel Haight, Ph.D., P.E. Published by ASSE, 2012.

ASSE has published the second edition of The Safety Professionals Handbook. The two-volume resource has been updated and expanded with two new chapters: Sustainability and the SH&E Professional; and Best Practices in Industrial Hygiene. Updated topics include:

• environmental and engineering management systems;
• information management systems;
• substance abuse prevention and workers’ compensation;
• the aging workforce;
• OSHA training requirements;
• OSHA Outreach Training Program;
• new approaches and updated regulatory requirements.

For information, visit www.asse.org/cartpage.php?link=4429.

Policy Making Science & Skepticism

• “Burden of Proof: Should Evidence Determine Policy?” By Richard Wilson. Published in New Humanist, Vol. 127(1), 2012.
• “Science, Scientism & Anti-Science in the Age of Preposterism.” By Susan Haack. Published in Skeptical Inquirer, 1997, 37-42.

The teaser sentence for Wilson’s article is, “A growing number of activists are calling for science to play a larger role in policy. But will it work?” Haack tops her article with a bedeviling taunt that begs for some skepticism about reports of inquiry itself: “We are in danger of losing our grip on the concepts of truth, evidence, objectivity, disinterested inquiry. The preposterous environment in which academic work is presently conducted is inhospitable to genuine inquiry, hospitable to the sham and the fake.” A great deal of the information that influences policy either starts in the universities or is commissioned by the politicians from the universities or consultants who were trained in the universities. In policy matters, the presence and influence of the universities is ubiquitous.

The difficulties are not new. Wilson zeroes in on some of the more egregious examples of less than forthright legislators’ statements. His examples are from the English Parliament, but there is no reason to doubt for a moment that the folks in Washington, DC, are any different from the British version.

The culprits were identified more than 100 years ago by scientist and philosopher C.S. Peirce. Haack reports that Peirce “distinguished genuine inquiry from ‘sham reasoning,’ pseudo-inquiry aimed not at finding the truth, but at making a case for some conclusion immovably believed in advance.” The two special categories of pseudo-inquirers are “the sham” and “the fake.” The sham reasoner wants to make the case for some preconceived immovably held conviction. The fake is more self-serving. The fake wants to advance him/herself by making a case for some proposition, the truth to which s/he is indifferent.

Haack’s article establishes a useful background for an easier understanding of Wilson’s article. It is possible to see the bottom in shallow water from a wooden row boat. A glass-bottomed boat makes the viewing easier and the details more vivid. Haack’s article is the glass-bottomed boat for Wilson’s article about evidence in policy making.

Wilson begins his story on evidence by mentioning a 1992 article in Journal of the American Medical Association about “evidence-based medicine.” One comment on the online edition of Wilson’s article points out that Archie Cochrane lectured on the subject in the 1970s and the “shoulders of giants” on which he stood goes back to some randomized controlled trials in agriculture in the 1930s. A pitfall of claiming a date for an idea is that often there is an earlier statement of the idea that has been lost; someone rediscovers it and can sharp-shoot the more recent claim.

Only about 150 words into the article, Wilson kicks up the first dust: The government commissioned a study on reducing violence in prostitution. One spokesperson in the House of Commons raised concerns that the government’s data on the problem were not yet published. Thus, the data had not been adequately scrutinized. The Home Office Minister responded, “We are looking at publishing the evidence, but in the end, you pick the evidence which backs your argument.” Sounds like a sham argument to me. This is not an example of “evidence-based policy making.” Instead it is egregious “policy-based evidence making.” It is curious how science gets morphed.

Wilson generates a simple question, which, posed at the right time by the right person, can improve political/regulatory policy. “Where and what is your evidence?” Who asks the question can make a difference. A major difficulty for the citizenry is the limited resources available to evaluate the actions of politicians on a timely basis. The press, when it acts persistently and responsibly, is a powerful agency for action, be it for acceleration or restraint. But the press is vulnerable to the same bias and needs to be reminded to state its evidence.

Carl Metzgar, CSP, ARM
Winston-Salem, NC

A Basic Guide to RCRA

Understanding Solid & Hazardous Waste Management, 2nd edition

By Salvatore Caccavale, CPEA. Published by ASSE, 2012.

ASSE has published the electronic format of A Basic Guide to RCRA: Understanding Solid and Hazardous Waste Management, 2nd edition, by Salvatore Caccavale. The book provides a concise overview of the storage, labeling and shipping requirements for hazardous waste as required by EPA. It helps SH&E professionals better understand how RCRA regulations work, and offers advice on effectively complying with these regulations.

Among the updates to the original 1998 edition:

• more completed forms and labels to enable SH&E professionals to better determine what is required on containers during storage and prior to shipping;
• a new section on Class 1 Injection Wells, typically for low-concentration waste;
• a new section on grounding and bonding of containers with flammable chemicals;
• learning objectives and summaries for each chapter;
• more regulatory references explained in a more concise and organized format;
• updated information on the shipping of hazardous waste and manifests.

A Basic Guide to RCRA is available for use in MobiPocket and ePub formats for use on Kindle, Nook, iPad and other e-readers, and is priced at $14.95. Orders can be placed by visiting the ASSE Publications page, with an order number of 4434prc for MobiPocket, and 4434epub for ePub. For more information, visit www.asse.org/publications.

Air Filtration In-Field Test Methods & Reference Standards For High Efficiency Air Filtration Equipment

By Robert C. Brandys, Ph.D., MPH, P.E., CSP, CIH, and Gail Brandys, M.S., CSP, CIEC. Published by Occupational & Environmental Health Consulting Services Inc., 2011.

Bob and Gail Brandys have recently developed a standard for portable high efficiency air filtration (PHEAF) equipment. The standard was developed to address consistent particulate leakage from these devices based on the findings of studies performed over several decades by various researchers. PHEAF equipment includes vertical and horizontal portable air filtration devices (AFD), movable vacuums, handheld vacuums and other filtered suction equipment that is equipped with a high efficiency particulate air filter. This type of equipment is used for cleaning surfaces, removing dust, dirt, mold, asbestos, lead and other undesirable particulate environmental contaminants.

The standard defines protocols to document that PHEAF equipment does not release significant levels of particulates or odors into the work environment or exhaust discharge areas. Historical research has demonstrated that the filter media itself can fail. However, even when efficient filter media is used, the PHEAF device as a whole (filter and filter housing together) fails at a staggering rate. The authors have carefully researched and demonstrated that there are multiple methods available for demonstrating the effectiveness of PHEAF equipment in the field under real-world conditions. These methods are relatively quick and inexpensive ways to ensure and document the proper elimination of hazardous agents.

More than 200 references support the standard’s three in-field testing methods to ensure and document the effectiveness of PHEAF equipment. The authors specifically make a point that the term effectiveness is used to describe the PHEAF equipment testing classes instead of the term efficiency. This clarification is made to distinguish testing of the entire device for its operational effectiveness from efficiency testing of just the high efficiency particulate air (HEPA) filter. The PHEAF standard contains five classifications of HEPA equipment ranging from 90% to 99.999% effectiveness. Uses of this standard would apply to various PHEAF devices such as those used to clean mold in the healthcare industry to protect immune-compromised individuals, remove asbestos contamination with vacuums on abatement projects, and perform lead-paint debris cleaning during residential paint disturbance.

The authors find that leakage of PHEAF equipment is believed to have originated from various sources including penetration of airborne particles through damaged and undamaged filter media, through gaps between the filter and filter housing, and from particulates shredding off of the filter media itself. They identify multiple reasons for the inefficiency of PHEAF devices, such as filters rated for only one particle size (instead of multiple particle sizes), devices tested at one flow rate but operated at much higher flow rates, improper manufacturing of filter media and filter housing, and filter media degradation over time. It is for these and other reasons that the authors emphasize the importance of periodically testing PHEAF equipment in the environment and operation conditions for which it is intended to be used.

The in-field testing methods defined in the text provide step-by-step protocols for testing HEPA and/or ultra-low penetration air (ULPA) filtered equipment using an aerosol challenge method, laser particle counter or condensation particle counter. The first several chapters cite significant historical literature and research which demonstrate that testing of HEPA filters and HEPA-filtered equipment has been a necessary and prudent practice since their development in the early 1940s. The book summarizes more than 50 years of research and testing of HEPA filters and systems by the nuclear power, weapons, electronics, pharmaceutical, healthcare and aerospace industries.

However, the authors note that the development of the asbestos and lead-based paint abatement industries in the 1980s, and the more recent mold remediation industries, has resulted in the widespread use of HEPA-filtered equipment by nontechnical or insufficiently trained personnel. This has resulted in the use of PHEAF equipment with inadequate, improper testing methods to assess the equipment’s effectiveness. The text provides readers with an extremely detailed account of what is already known about the testing, validation and certification of HEPA filter efficiency and testing of PHEAF device effectiveness as a whole. The book’s writing style is nontechnical, and easily understood by SH&E practitioners. The authors discuss state-of-the-art air testing and evaluation of HEPA- and ULPA-filtered PHEAF devices for the emerging use of nano-sized particles.

This book is a must-read for those who use PHEAF devices to protect workers and the public from the harmful agents they are trying to control.

Jeffery C. Camplin
Rosemont, IL

Head Injury Biomechanics

Edited by Jeffrey A. Pike. Published by SAE International, 2011.

SAE International has published a three-volume set, Head Injury Biomechanics, designed to aid those studying head injury from a broad range of causes, including transportation, falls, sports, personal violence and blast-related. Available individually or as a set, each of the three volumes includes a new chapter that ties together the various aspects of anatomy, injury and injury mechanisms, followed by technical papers selected from published literature. A common bibliography includes more than 250 resources.

Volume 1, Skull Fracture, focuses on head impact injuries and features 13 technical papers. These publications are primarily related to head impact and the resulting injury to the outside of the head—skin, bones of the skull and sensory organs.

Volume 2, The Brain, features 13 technical papers primarily related to injuries to the brain, its surrounding membranes and its blood supply.

Volume 3, Mitigation, covers the application of protective strategies to various injury scenarios, such as passenger vehicles, sports and blast injuries, or to a particular demographic group, such as children or seniors. This volume features 14 technical papers.

For more information visit http://books.sae.org/book-pt-152.set.