A few years ago I stood in front of about 850 people on a construction site. They had been running a safety campaign they were proud of, and I was asked to say a few words. So I went with what felt honest.
“If you don’t have what you need to do your job the way you want, and it isn’t OK to ask, then the blame is on me. It’s my job to fix that. So, does anyone need anything?”
A man raised his hand. “I’ve worn out my shovel. I need a new one.” Before I could answer, a member of the safety team cut in: “You should’ve raised an observation!”
Two truths met in the open air. It felt like a conflict that shouldn’t exist.
Same shovel. Four different stories.
On that site, four realities were operating at once. Finance had a policy: damage your tool, you pay for a new one. Safety saw reporting as the path to safe work. Operations saw rules they couldn’t change, and adaptation as the way to deliver. And the worker? He saw social risk and personal expense, so silence felt safer than asking.
None of them were trying to create the problem. Together, their narratives did.
The real cost
The shovel cost more than metal. The worker sent every penny home to Nepal, food, school, essentials. Asking for a new tool could cost money. Challenging the process could create conflict. So he adapted. He stayed quiet.
I turned to leadership: “Can we get this man a new shovel, please?” The answer came from Finance, the same function whose policy had helped create the silence. “He can have two tomorrow.”
That was crucial, because the owner of that story could change what it meant to everyone else. The hug that followed wasn’t about the shovel. It was about having his story understood, someone, for once, taking responsibility.
How scripts get written
Policy becomes process, process becomes experience, and experience becomes an invisible script. A policy is created for one reason. A process is interpreted and adapted for another. Experience teaches people what comes next. Layer those stories together long enough and they become something nobody has written down, but everyone follows.
So Finance changed their policy, and Safety changed their question: “Do you have what you need, and can I help you get it?”
What invisible script might your people be living under? What might their version of “I don’t have what I need, and it isn’t OK to ask” sound like? Because once the script shifts, behaviour has somewhere new to go.