The new Chief Executive for the Institution of Occupational Safety and Health has been announced.
Bev Messinger, picture by Shaun Fellows / Shine Pix
Bev Messinger, senior director – business improvement at Ofwat, economic regulator of the water sector in England and Wales, will take up the position of CEO in October this year.
A fellow of the Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development, Ms Messinger has also previously held positions as the acting CEO of Coventry City Council, corporate director of customer and workforce services and head of human resources at Coventry City Council.
On her LinkedIn profile, Ms Messinger states a strong interest in the voluntary sector, made evident in her role as a trustee of Keyring, a national charity for adults with learning disabilities.
One of the first tasks the new IOSH CEO will be given will be to guide the professional body through its adoption of a new five-year strategy.
In a statement, IOSH said Ms Messinger had “demonstrated considerable financial and management experience as well as corporate leadership and governance in complex stakeholder environments”.
Bill Gunyon, the IOSH Chair of the Board of Trustees, said: “I’m delighted that we’ve been able to appoint someone of Bev’s calibre. The panel was greatly impressed by her and I’m extremely confident that she will be an excellent chief executive, perfectly suited to taking IOSH on the next stage of its journey.”
Of her appointment, Ms Messinger said: “Having managed health and safety across different workplace settings, I know at first-hand how IOSH and its members make a difference to the wellbeing of people at work.
“I am delighted to be joining the IOSH team and look forward to working with staff and members to deliver our next five-year strategy and achieve the goal of a healthy workplace for everyone, every day.”
Heather Beach, brand director – OSH at UBM, incorporating SHP, Safety & Health Expo, Facilities Show and Barbour EHS, said: “I’m delighted to hear of Bev Messinger’s appointment as the new CEO of IOSH. Her strong background in delivering organisational transformation will no doubt put her in good stead for adopting and delivering IOSH’s new five year strategy.
“UBM has enjoyed a close working relationship with IOSH for many years and I look forward to seeing how we can continue to work together to promote the messages of the health and safety profession.”
Karen McDonnell, IOSH President and head of RoSPA Scotland said: “I welcome the announcement that Bev Messinger will become the new IOSH chief executive. She comes with a fantastic track record. This represents the next big step for the development of IOSH in wider health and safety networks across the globe, which will help to build our influence and strengthen our connections with our stakeholders.”
Teresa Budworth, CEO, NEBOSH, said: “I am delighted that IOSH has appointed a new chief executive with such a strong background. I’m sure Bev will build on the sterling work that Cyril Barrett has put in during his tenure to bring together the organisations within the health and safety arena to pursue our common goals of protecting people from risks to their safety and health. I look forward to working with her.”
Alan Murray, CEO of the British Safety Industry Federation (BSIF) said: “On behalf of the British Safety Industry Federation, I would like to congratulate Bev Messinger on her recent appointment as the new CEO of IOSH. With Ms Messinger’s extensive industry experience and previous work in delivering cultural change in both national and local government, we look forward to working with her in identifying new synergies across our organisations. One of the BSIF’s main goals is to establish the public perception of Safety and Health as a positive force for good and we will continue to work with other organisations at increasing the appreciation of the industry and the discipline at all levels.”
Ms Messinger will join IOSH on 3 October this year, succeeding interim chief executive Cyril Barratt, who took up the post on a temporary basis after Jan Chmiel, former CEO at IEMA, left the organisation after just two and a half years.
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Congratulations and welcome Ms Messinger.
Now then, does your new start and fresh broom implementing the “all new and improved five year plan” also include addressing the primary human factors surrounding declining well-being, performance and productivity over the working life cycle leading to significant risk of developing work related non-communicable diseases ???
The hazards of stress / fatigue & fatigue / stress presenting in “adaptation exhaustion” once the well meaning attempts at coping, tolerating and persevering with exposure or over-exposure to a stressor manifesting initially in some mildly debilitating symptoms of ill-health like CVS (Computer Vision Syndrome) then, driven by fight-flight response to increasing level of performance anxiety including sleep deprivation, then, if left unmitigated, prompting a more serious stress related organic response in either physical and/or emotional deterioration.
Predictably leading to perceivably harmless self-medication of their distressing symptoms from comfort eating or other eating disorders soon accompanied by ant-acids & analgesics to unintentional yet, self-abusive consumption of other substances, if not solely, alcohol prior to, or in parallel with, the threat of seriously declining health, thrombosis (VTE – DVT), diabetes, liver disease, stroke, heart attack, cancer etc.etc.
Of course, we have the working time directive in an attempt to sustain working life span nevertheless, without managing a basic set of “given” working / environmental condition recognising that human resources naturally become fatigued after 90 minutes of continuous and/or intensive activity (depending on fitness + or – 30 mins) and need a mental and/or physical break or they WILL develop a repetitive injury over time.
In the case of DSE user operators, where the eye muscles are continually active anyway, Screen Fatigue is already an acknowledged occupational hazard that requires no more than 20 minutes between off-screen breaks along with an hourly physical break from seated immobility. In addition, for Dyslexic or functionally illiterate DSE operators (with a spoken reading rate below 180 words per minute) they may need a break every five to ten minutes if their screen ergonomics have not been re-calibrated or customised for their ease of visually ‘accessing text’ on a standard sub-optimal white background.
As the, now historical, 2012 New EU MSD Directive has been lost in the annuls of time and the ISO45001 has been delayed until next year the fundamental of human performance are still up to the enlightened amongst us who have some knowledge of Sports Psychology to apply some common sense to the recovery, conservation and restoration of the “given conditions” in which the human organism potentially thrives and perform well.
Has Bev Messinger any formal H&S qualifications?
In response to Nigel we all know about the trillion or so different aspects encompassing Health &Safety.
All that is needed is for everybody to take ownership of it and ensure that it is properly managed which is every ones responsibility not just leaving it up to the recognised bodies and job professionals to wave the flag. Get in there and create the waves and solutions yourself. Knocking up management to do what they are supposed to do.
To Len
Having a qualification in H&S does not necessarily give any one the necessary skills or ability to change things.
Whats needed is determination in getting things that need changing changed and being able to show by example how things can be changed for the better, just by getting involved and pressurising those with a reluctance to make improvements.
I have had some of the most effective people working for me where H&S was concerned and they did not have a level one cert in H&S. But changed both the system and peoples perception of safety just by being there on the ground.