John has over 15 years’ experience within construction and speaks about where to start when creating a health and safety strategy within an organisation, mentioning the importance of setting clear objectives beforehand.
He also talks about keeping things simple, by not attempting to do too much too fast. Set out what you want to achieve first and make small changes to help reach that objective. One of the key objectives with any strategy, is ensuring buy-in from senior management, which can be a daunting prospect. John advises how best to get the influencers on board and how communication is key when getting your message across.
“I use the term evangelical a lot. You’ve got to spread the word. That’s the way you communicate your strategy. You get everybody involved, everybody part of it, and everybody understanding it.”
Playing to your strengths and utilising the skills of others when possible is another key to success, according to John. “As Safety practitioners, we’re good, but we’re not good at everything. And we can’t be expected to do everything. You’ve got to get people involved to help you communicate, you’ve got to go and find the real experts.” These might be from within the organisation, or external, but “the more people, the better”, he says.
John sums up by speaking about ensuring you have a strong brand identity and provides some tips on how to measure how successful your strategy is working.
Irwin & Colton are a specialist Health and Safety recruitment company, based in the South East of England and recruit across the UK. They recruit all roles in the health and safety industry from Health and Safety Advisor, through to Health and Safety Director positions.
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