OSHA Voluntary Protection Program (VPP) Participants and Special Government Employee Customer Interviews

Guide for [First Name, Last Name] Interview

Name, Position, Company, Location

Interviewee ID: ANON000

Background

• Add anything that you think may be interesting to know about this person or the program

Customer interview agenda

Details about the interviews

• No group interviews; individual only

• Duration: One hour or less

• Recorded

Main points to cover - Program Participants

1. How do customers become aware of the program?

2. How do customers prepare to apply for the program?

3. How do customers prepare for recertification?

4. What do customers believe are the benefits of the program?

5. What barriers to customers encounter when interested in applying, applying to the program, recertification and self-evaluation?

Main points to cover - Special Government Employees

1. What are the barriers to volunteering for various program opportunities?

2. What are the benefits of being an SGE?

3. What are challenges faced during evaluation activities?

How to use this guide

Use the “main points to cover” above as a checklist. Make sure you cover the main points.

Beyond that, don’t worry about asking every question. More important questions are in bold to help you prioritize, but it’s no big deal if you miss a bold question.

The interview guide is not a script to follow. The questions are there to fall back on if the participant is not forthcoming with information. Let the conversation flow. It’s a good idea to familiarize the questions in this guide ahead of time so you’re ready with the questions that are most relevant to what the interviewee is saying without having to refer back to the guide as much.

Good general follow up moves to keep the conversation flowing and get more information:

• Can you tell me more about that?

• Can you give me an example of that?

• How did you feel when that happened?

• So you’re saying … Am I understanding that correctly?

• Why/why not?

• Can you share your screen and show me what you mean?

• Can you walk me through that?

Remember to reassure participants throughout that they are providing helpful information.

Introduction

Thank you for your time today. My name is [name]. The other people in this meeting are project team members who will be helping me capture notes from our conversation. ________ may chime in with a question from time to time, but mostly it will be you and I talking.

We’re working with the Department of Labor, specifically OSHA, to help understand the experience customers like you have applying for and participating in the VPP program. We’ll be looking at what’s working well, and where there are areas for improvement.

I work for the Federal Government, but I don’t work for OSHA or VPP. Participating in this interview or deciding not to won’t affect your status in VPP or business with OSHA in any way.

Additionally, a Federal agency may not conduct or sponsor, and a person is not required to respond to, nor shall a person be subject to a penalty for failure to comply with an information collection subject to the requirements of the Paperwork Reduction Act of 1995 unless the information collection has a currently valid OMB Control Number. The approved OMB Control Number for this interview is 1225-0093 and the expiration date is 2/29/2024. Without this approval, we could not conduct this interview. Public reporting for this interview is estimated to be approximately 60 minutes per response. All responses to this interview are voluntary. Send comments regarding this burden estimate or any other aspect of this interview, including suggestions for reducing this burden to DOL.

We will be anonymizing our notes. Nothing you say will be attributed to you or your organization. We really want you to be able to give us honest feedback. The purpose of recording is so we don’t have to take detailed notes and can focus on our conversation. So, is it okay with you if we record this?

Note to interviewer: If they say yes, begin recording now.

We expect this conversation to take approximately 60 minutes. We can take breaks at any time, if you feel the need. Additionally, if I ask a question you’re not comfortable answering, it’s fine to skip it.

Before we begin, do you have any questions I can answer about the project or our approach?

Customer questions

Warm up / Establish Rapport

1. Can you tell me a little about yourself and your role at work? What do you do day-to-day?

   1. What are the most challenging aspects of your job?

   2. What are the most rewarding aspects of your job?

Answer

VPP Participant Questions

2. How did you learn about OSHA’s VPP Program?

   1. If you learned about it from someone at work, do you know how that person learned about it?

   2. Why did you participate in the program?

Answer

3. How did your company prepare to apply to the VPP program?

   1. What was that process like? How long did it take? How many resources would you say you devoted to preparing to apply

   2. Did anyone from OSHA or VPPPA (Voluntary Protection Programs Participants’ Association) help your company with the process? How?

   3. What challenges did you experience when trying to prepare?

   4. How do you use other tools and methodologies like Lean Sigma to help develop a safety and health management system?

Answer

4. What did you expect going into the process of applying to the VPP Program?

   1. What was the actual application process like? How long did it take?

   2. Did anyone from OSHA help your company with the application process?

   3. How did you apply? (portal, email, etc)

   4. What challenges did you face during the application process?

   5. How did you get help to resolve those challenges?

Answer

5. What has been the process to maintain participation prior to a recertification?

   1. What are some of the activities that you conduct as a part of continuing to meet your health and safety goals and maintain participation in the program?

   2. What challenges do you face throughout the year?

   3. How does OSHA or VPPPA (Voluntary Protection Programs Participants’ Association) support those activities in between normal evaluation periods?

   4. What are reasons you remain an active participant in the program?

Answer

6. What's it like to prepare for and submit a reapproval?

   1. What are some of the activities that you conduct?

   2. What challenges do you face throughout this process?

   3. What works well?

   4. How does OSHA or VPPPA ( Voluntary Protection Programs Participants' Association) support activities when it is time to go through approval?

Answer

SGE Participant Questions

7. How did you learn about OSHA’s VPP Program?

   1. If you learned about it from someone at work, do they know how that person learned about it?

   2. What about the program made it feel participating as an SGE was worthwhile?

Answer

8. How do you support the program as an SGE?

   1. What are some reasons that you volunteer to participate?

   2. What are barriers to volunteering?

   3. What challenges did you experience when trying to learn about opportunities and reach out to volunteer?

   4. How often are you trained to support the various program activities? What’s that like?

Answer

9. How do you participate in evaluation activities?

   1. What is the process of conducting reviews, approval audits and recertification audits?

   2. What challenges do you face when doing any of these activities?

   3. When you need help or support, who do you reach out to?

   4. What works well?

   5. If you had a magic wand, what would you want to change about the program?

Answer