Governing with Health and Safety in Mind: Favorable Conditions for Board OHS Discussions in Swedish Municipal Contexts

The roles of MOCs and municipal committees in a Swedish municipality

A Swedish municipality is a local government entity that is commonly organized in several administrations and MOCs. The administrations and MOCs specialize in various public services, such as education, social services, elderly care, urban planning, rescue services, and energy and water management. Each administration and MOC is governed by a board with politically appointed members. The board for an administration is called a ‘committee’. An MOC is a limited company, and its board’s role is to represent the owner—the municipality. As with any limited company, an MOC board shoulders the responsibility for governing the business in line with the owner’s interests. In a private limited company, this interest is normally financial value creation, whereas in an MOC, the profit motive is replaced with the motive of public benefit (SFS 2017:725) even though an MOC is allowed to make a profit. The key tasks for boards in limited companies are to establish a strategic direction, set standards and objectives for operations, oversee internal controls, and hold management accountable. A board is also responsible for top management’s organizational priorities and the organization’s legal compliance. According to the Swedish Work Environment Act (SFS 1977:1160), these key tasks also include OHS. In a limited company with at least 25 employees, the employees have the right to have representatives on the board (SFS 1987:1245), which is not the case for municipal committees. Although an MOC board enacts its influence through the CEO, the equivalent role in relation to municipal committees is that of the administrative director. The municipal committee in each administration breaks down the overall goals and allocates the financial resources established by the municipal council. A municipal committee is also responsible for the value that its administration provides in terms of service to the municipal residents. In municipalities, the board with the ultimate OHS responsibility is the municipality council; however, in this study, the focus is on the boards closest to the operations—the MOC boards and municipal committees—to whom the OHS responsibility for the operative employees is normally delegated.

The board and OHS

Research on boards’ influence on OHS is still new (Ebbevi et al. 2021), which reflects the fact that OHS in many organizations has traditionally been viewed as an operational concern (Boardman & Lyon 2006). Common OHS activities for boards of companies with more than 250 employees are to annually review OHS policies, set objectives for health and safety, and use OHS audit reports (Wright et al. 2003). It has been suggested that the board’s role is not to initiate or drive safety efforts but, rather, to ensure managerial accountability for them (Locke & Cross 2009). However, there is an increasing trend toward stricter sustainability reporting requirements, including working conditions (e.g., the European Union’s Corporate Sustainability Reporting Directive), which has previously been shown to be a driving force for board engagement (Lornudd et al. 2020). The existing empirical data suggest that board engagement does indeed have a positive association with organizational safety outcomes (Bunn et al. 2001; Joss et al. 2017; Schrover 2008; Thompson & Tan 2016; Ebbevi et al. 2021), which lends support to the rationale for increasing the requirements placed on boards. In addition, some studies indicate that the quality of OHS in an organization is related to its overall financial performance. For example, Strömberg et al. (2017) showed that suboptimal OHS has major indirect costs in terms of productivity loss. On a more positive note, listed companies with a high level of employee well-being (e.g., less stress at work) have been found to outperform standard benchmarks in the stock market (De Neve et al. 2023). These studies indicate that the quality of OHS may be related to an organization’s long-term value creation, which is at the core of a board’s responsibilities. Hinsz et al. (1997) conceptualized a board as an information-processing group, and in conformity with this, a massive amount of research has focused on the significance of information for a board’s effectiveness. For the present study, we identify two relevant streams of research. One is the significance of the board’s competencies for its effectiveness (Coulson-Thomas 2021; Ruigrok et al. 2007). This research suggests that individual directors’ competence can impact the kind of information being shared and discussed. However, the extent to which this applies to OHS is still unknown. The second stream of research concerns the quality of information from the operations for a board’s effectiveness (Ainsley 2019; Brennan et al. 2016; Roy et al. 2017). To our knowledge, no previous study has investigated how the quality of OHS information provided to a board is related to the prevalence of OHS discussions. The existing literature on both streams of research is summarized below.

Influence of board member competence on board discussions

Empirical research has demonstrated that boards have the capacity to significantly influence various organizational processes and outcomes (Korac-Kakabadse et al. 2001; Stiles 2001). The existing literature has mainly concentrated on the relationship between board characteristics and organizational performance. One of these characteristics is board members’ competence. For instance, the presence of legal experts on a board has been linked to improved environmental performance in external investment indices (De Villiers et al. 2011), boards that include medically trained members have been shown to positively affect clinical quality in hospitals (Veronesi et al. 2013), and members’ experience serving on multiple boards has been associated with firm growth (Kor & Sundaramurthy 2009). One way to understand such relationships is that competence impacts what subject is discussed, how, and, ultimately, the decisions made. Bezemer et al.’s (2014) observational study found that the interests, expertise, and skills of individual board members had a significant impact on their participation in specific agenda item discussions. Thus, when a board member experienced a lack of interest, expertise, or skill, participation in this agenda item decreased. In accordance with this, Lornudd et al. (2020) reported that in large private companies, board member OHS competence was perceived as vital for boards’ OHS engagement. Director OHS competence has been identified as one of seven principles for best OHS board practice (Boardman & Lyon 2006), which further demonstrates the importance of such competence. However, whether OHS competence is perceived as a facilitating condition for OHS discussions in the municipality context remains to be investigated.

Importance of overcoming information asymmetry in board OHS discussions

Information asymmetry occurs when some actors have more information than others, leading to an information advantage (Akerlof et al. 2001). Although the concept originated in economic sciences, it has also been applied in management research—for example, in corporate governance with a focus on organizational behavior (e.g., Boivie et al. 2016). In a review of management research on information asymmetry, Bergh et al. (2019) outlined three groups of antecedent conditions that may lead to information asymmetry. One group is strategic and behavioral barriers to sharing information—that is, actors hiding information for the strategic benefit of themselves or their businesses. In line with this, Lornudd et al. (2021) indicated that boards in the private construction and manufacturing sectors are aware of this antecedent condition and therefore actively encourage risk reporting by employees. The extent to which overcoming this group of antecedent conditions is related to boards in municipalities and their perception of facilitating conditions for discussing OHS remains to be investigated.

A second kind of antecedent condition to information asymmetry is structural and reduces actors’ access to or possibility of disseminating information. The structural distance between the board and the management creates a gap, which may cause the board to have reduced access to information about the organization compared to managers running daily operations. The management, for their part, may have a challenge disseminating relevant information to the board. The board members in a municipal context are usually local residents, which may shorten the information paths to the employees. Whether boards in a municipality context perceive such a structural gap in relation to OHS is unknown. A third antecedent condition that may lead to information asymmetry is unobservable or uncertain factors in work processes—for example, a complex service that is difficult to capture and measure. In relation to OHS, one potential translation of this antecedent condition may be the challenge of measuring causal links between variables such as work environment, engagement, turnover rates, service quality, and value creation. These causal relationships are often multifactorial and delayed over time, sometimes for years (Arbetsmiljöverket 2023). This obstructs insight into the impact of OHS on organizational outcomes, which, for a board, may be relevant to its willingness to invest time in discussing OHS.

In summary, based on the view of a board as an information-processing group (Hinsz et al. 1997), director competence and information provision may be deemed valuable perspectives for elucidating facilitating conditions for board OHS discussions. To better understand the perspectives of boards in a municipality context, the aim of the study is to investigate vice chairs’ and chairs’ perceptions of the conditions that facilitate OHS discussions in the boardroom. Furthermore, we address the following research questions:

Setting

Sweden is divided into 290 local government entities known as municipalities. These municipalities are funded primarily through taxes, fees for specific services, and government subsidies. They possess significant autonomy and taxation power and employ approximately 1.2 million people (Statistics Sweden 2024). MOCs have emerged as significant contributors to the Swedish economy. They serve as vital revenue streams for municipalities, especially in major urban centers (Swedish Government’s Official Reports 2015). In 2021, 1,854 companies, most of which were owned by municipalities, employed around 62,000 people. This accounts for slightly over 6.5% of all individuals employed across Sweden’s 290 municipalities (Bergh & Erlingsson 2024). The primary domain in which Swedish MOCs are active is public housing and real estate, constituting 43% of all MOCs. This is followed by technical activities, such as electricity, gas, heating, cooling, water, and sewage, which make up 25% of all MOCs. Companies in health and social care constitute 0.6% of municipality-owned companies, according to the employer organization Sobona (Personal communication, November 2021). In Sweden, municipalities and MOCs operate under public law (Swedish Local Government Act), while MOCs are also governed by private law (Swedish Companies Act) (Bergh & Erlingsson 2023).

Participants

The study involved chairs and vice-chairs on MOC or municipal committees in Swedish municipalities. It is part of a larger research project that aims to compare MOC boards and municipal committees as well as municipal committees in technical and social administrations. Thus, all participants were either responsible for technical or caring services and were elected as vice-chairs or chairs on MOC or municipal committees. Both full-time and part-time politicians were represented in the sample. The aim of the recruitment strategy was to ensure diverse representation of municipalities of different sizes across various geographical areas of Sweden. To achieve this, a random stratified sampling method was employed based on the classification of Swedish municipalities provided by the Swedish Association of Local Authorities and Regions (2023), which categorizes municipalities into three groups: large cities and municipalities near large cities, medium-sized towns and municipalities near medium-sized towns, and smaller towns/urban areas and rural municipalities. From each of these municipal group classifications, four municipalities, along with their corresponding MOCs, were randomly selected, totaling 12 municipalities. In total, there were 34 participants (Table 1). The respondents had to be at least 18 years old and proficient in Swedish (speaking, reading, and understanding).

Data collection

Data collection commenced in autumn 2022 and concluded in spring 2023. A semi-structured interview guide featuring open-ended questions was used to align with the study’s objectives. Initially, the interview questions were intentionally broad and open-ended to mitigate the influence of the researchers’ assumptions and theories. The interview guide was employed flexibly, allowing for probes and sub-questions based on the information received. The participants were encouraged to provide factual and personal responses rather than political ones. The interview guide underwent testing with an advisory board comprising employers and representatives from municipal sector unions and the Swedish Work Environment Authority. Two pilot interviews were conducted (not included in the analysis), resulting in minor adjustments. Potential participants were identified from municipality websites, contacted via email, and provided with study information. If they agreed to participate or requested further details, additional information was provided via email or phone. Upon agreement to participate, the participants were scheduled for individual video meetings (via Teams), preceded by verbal information before the interview. Two interviews were conducted face-to-face. All interviews were digitally audio recorded and lasted between 40 and 90 minutes.

Data analysis

The study was conducted from a contextualist and interpretivist epistemological position (Braun & Clarke 2022), viewing OHS governance as socially constructed through the meanings and experiences of municipal committee and MOC board vice-chairs and chairs. The participants’ accounts were understood as shaped both by individual perspectives and broader organizational, political, and legislative contexts. This perspective informed both data collection and analysis, emphasizing rich, nuanced accounts over single, ‘objective’ descriptions.

We employed a template approach to thematic analysis (King 2004; 2012; Braun & Clarke 2022), supported by QSR NVivo software. NVivo was used to store, organize, and retrieve coded data systematically, enabling transparency and traceability. All interpretive decisions, including code definition, merging, and theme development, were made by us in the research team. We began the process by extracting the dataset relevant to this sub-study from the broader project. We first read the same three transcripts, focusing on the overarching concept of ‘facilitators of and barriers to OHS governance’. We compared and discussed interpretations to ensure a shared understanding of the data’s scope, not to enforce mechanical coding uniformity. This collaborative phase reflected our interpretivist stance and entailed using discussion to enrich analysis through diverse disciplinary perspectives (psychology, work environment studies, and public administration). The initial coding template applied a priori categories—individual, group, and organizational system levels—derived from the existing OHS governance literature (e.g., King 2004; Nielsen et al. 2017). These served as organizing ‘parent nodes’ in NVivo, structuring the analysis without constraining the emergence of new ideas. Within each system level, inductive subcoding was used to identify patterns in the data. Through iterative reading and rereading, these subcodes were developed into themes capturing shared meanings and interpretive stories. Themes were refined through repeated merging and splitting (e.g., recognizing that ‘conducting field visits’ and ‘dialogue with trade unions’ reflected the broader theme of ‘active OHS information gathering’). The term ‘theme’ is used throughout to refer to these final analytic constructs. The analysis continued until all the authors agreed that the themes provided a coherent and comprehensive response to the research questions.

Ethics

The study was approved by the Swedish Ethical Review Authority (Reference number 2022-01778-01). All the participants gave informed consent, including for digital recordings. We assured the participants of confidentiality and that they had the right to withdraw from the study without providing a reason. The research procedures strictly followed the ethical guidelines for human research laid out in the Declaration of Helsinki (World Medical Association 2013).

Facilitating conditions at the individual level for board OHS discussion

Facilitating conditions at the group level for board OHS discussion

Facilitating conditions of the organization for board OHS discussion

Practical implications

The finding that the individual (vice-)chair’s interest is so influential for OHS to be discussed on the board implies that the governance structure, such as stipulated practices and processes for a board, allows for a large degree of individual freedom. From this, it follows that various municipal administrations and companies within the same municipality may have different ‘tones from the top’. A recent study suggests that one of the board’s roles is to set the agenda for the organization’s priorities (Lornudd et al. 2021). If a board focuses on OHS, the civil servants of the administration or the MOC’s managers are likely to do so as well. A board’s requests, inquiries, and follow-ups receive more attention in the organization than matters that are neither requested nor followed up. Moreover, as members of municipal committees or MOC boards, politicians play a symbolic key role in conveying decisions, values, and norms to both managers and employees (Härenstam et al. 2024). The significance of having a chair that encourages OHS discussions in the boardroom is thus extended to the whole organization. Based on the volume of research correlating OHS to well-being (Bakker et al. 2023; Barnay 2016), our results indicate an individual-dependent reality that underscores the significance of building an organizational context that also supports OHS at the board level. The MOC board and municipal committee members are elected officials, many of whom are part-time politicians. Like other employees, they fulfill their mission within the boundaries set by the organizational context. Intensifying the municipal OHS governance structure and providing extended board OHS training may be one way to support and underline the employer’s responsibility toward OHS and decrease the dependence on the (vice-)chair’s individual interest.

Methodological limitations

Despite the contributions outlined above, the study has some limitations. One of these is the selection of participants. To adjust for biases, we used stratified sampling based on municipality size and geographical location and randomized a list of municipalities within each stratum. Among the municipality (vice-)chairs we invited, several declined to participate for unknown reasons. It can be assumed that the study attracted vice-chairs and chairs with an interest in OHS, which had an impact on the results. It could also be argued that a highly interested group is well-positioned to reflect on the topic and provide rich data.

A second limitation in qualitative inquiry is the risk of social desirability—that is, respondents presenting answers that are more socially acceptable than their true opinions. Politicians—the majority of our respondents—are generally unafraid to express their opinions. However, politics is also very much about convincing people of the positive side of their views, and politicians can be media trained. To mitigate the risk of social desirability, we took several measures. In addition to guaranteeing strict confidentiality for both respondents and their municipalities, we adopted a curious and nonjudgmental approach in the interviews. The interviews were also conducted by researchers with degrees in psychology and experience in conducting interviews, including with politicians. Our perception is that most respondents were comfortable enough to speak their minds, which is supported by the fact that they offered several less flattering examples of OHS in their organizations. Several respondents expressed insights into personal knowledge gaps during the interviews, and examples of discrediting other political parties were scarce, which suggests that they did not use the interview as an opportunity to talk about politics.

The transferability of the findings within Sweden was strengthened by our sampling method, which included multiple municipalities of different sizes located all across Sweden. However, it should be noted that the participants were limited to vice-chairs or chairs. Thus, it is their voices that constitute the data. The relationship between municipal committees and their administrations varies significantly across municipalities in terms of how closely politicians are connected to operations. These variations were not captured in this study. Moreover, the relevance of our findings from an international perspective is more difficult to assess. Governance structures in the public sector differ between countries. Yet, the significance of a participative leadership style, psychological safety, and the mitigation of information asymmetry for board governance has been supported in a multitude of international studies, which speaks to the relevance of the results of this study for board OHS governance across settings. Future research could investigate strategies to enhance the quality and transparency of OHS information shared with boards, with particular attention paid to mitigating the effects of window dressing and overly aggregated metrics. Another avenue for future research could involve conducting longitudinal studies to assess the impact of boards that prioritize OHS discussions on organizational outcomes, such as employee health, productivity, and overall performance.