This commitment from the top management is crucial to the success of any program, especially safety. Employees that observe managers disregarding or not reporting safety violations, create an environment where safety will be disregarded at all levels. In 1996, health and safety concerns were raised at one of Alcoa’s Mexican faculties. O’Neill himself visited the plant to observe these conditions, and although these concerns could not be validated a number of incidents and subsequent actions were not reported by local mangers to corporate headquarters. Despite the facility manager’s stellar record of increased sales and profitability and high marks for quality and customer satisfaction, O’Neill fired the manager (Lawrence & Weber, 2011). This commitment to employee safety is unprecedented and shows top managements commitment to safety. Alcoa placed many ethical safeguards in place to ensure the company’s effort to create a strong ethical culture was upheld. They implemented a global ethics and compliance program, which included basic elements of the U.S. Federal Sentencing Guidelines and Sarbanes-Oxley Act. An ethics and compliance officer was hired, that reported directly to the CEO and board of directors (Lawrence & Weber, 2011). Time and money was spent training all employees on their global code of conduct and continuation training in ethics and compliance.
Core Safety Training
2017 Alcoa Sustainability Report Gold Supplier -Supply Chain Management Alcoa among the top 5 percent of companies in non-ferrous industry -EcoVadis, sustainability rating agency. By changing the safety habits, O'Neill improved several processes in the organization. When he retired, 13 years later, Alcoa's annual net income was five times higher than when he started.