Do early-life natural disaster experiences shape safer workplaces?

Data mapping the records of more than 500 CEOs, Canadian researchers have considered whether childhood experiences of natural disasters led to safer U.S. workplaces.

As in Australia, workplace safety is a major issue for employers and workers in the United States, with important social and economic implications. According to the U.S. Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) and the U.S. National Safety Council figures, there were more than 2.6 million workplace injuries in 2023, costing some $176 billion and 103 million workdays.

To consider whether experiencing a natural disaster in childhood can shape how business leaders approach workplace safety decades later, a Concordia University-led study (doi: 10.1111/eufm.70036) mapped the records of more than 500 CEOs. They did this by identifying large US companies listed on the S&P 1500 index between 2002 and 2011, then used an executive tracking database to identify CEOs.

Publicly available biographical details about each one — usually from corporate websites, news articles, public records and online databases — was then collected, this data including birth year, birthplace and the counties where the CEOs lived during their formative years (between ages five and 15).

To allow the team to identify who had lived through such events, collected information on the CEOs was merged with a database of US county-level natural disasters that occurred when the CEOs were at formative ages. Then, data from OSHA was used to examine company injury data, which helped identify safety outcomes, as well as companies run by CEOs with and without early disaster exposure.

What the researchers found was that CEOs who have lived through events like major earthquakes, floods or hurricanes early in life run firms that prioritise safer workplaces. Their companies report fewer work-related injuries and illnesses than similar ones run by executives who have not lived through those types of events, according to mandatory disclosure statistics supplied to OSHA.

And the work-related injuries in firms run by CEOs who experienced natural disasters during their formative years were significantly fewer — by almost 24%. That consistency was maintained — even after controlling for firm size, industry, financial pressure and union strength, plus CEO workplace authority, gender and age — meant that the findings were robust. The results are even starker in firms with powerful CEOs and in industries with weaker union influence and higher earning pressure, the researchers found.

“We can read these results as saying that less powerful CEOs will back down from pressure from their boards when they are confronted with arguments that better workplace safety entails higher costs and lower profits,” said paper co-author Michel Magnan, Distinguished University Research Professor in the Department of Accountancy at the John Molson School of Business.

Michel Magnan. Image: Concordia University

“But if you are a powerful CEO and you strongly believe that workplace safety is important, and that it is a value-creator in the long term, you’ll charge ahead anyway. You’ll have the leeway to make things happen.”

Disaster exposure early in life does not necessarily make someone a better CEO, Magnan acknowledged. But the research does reveal how events in an executive’s past may influence their behaviour, which can be relevant to boards, investors and policymakers as they address worker safety, especially in high-risk industries.

Top image credit: iStock.com/chaiyapruek2520. Stock image used is for illustrative purposes only.