DOING IT RIGHT THEN, NOW AND IN THE FUTURE
We’re currently working on even more improvements and adding new initiatives as part of our ‘Doing It Right’ health and safety cultural change programme, but as they won’t be finalised until the New Year, we can’t share the exciting details just yet. However, we can say that our approach to the health safety and wellbeing of our team and the public has brought numerous positive outcomes and here we give you an overview of activity and results.
We are committed to supporting our team – all employees and subcontract partners – through three clear pillars of safety excellence and teaching people to create different behaviours in themselves and, crucially, to act as a conscience to others; they are Minimum Standards, Motivation and Measurement of Outcomes.
MINIMUM STANDARDS STRENGTHENED WITH VISUAL REQUIREMENTS
Our subcontractor minimum standards for health and safety are updated every year collaboratively with input from site teams and our supply chain. Our aims are to ensure that:
- Projects managers’ expectations are communicated to individuals
- Site-specific hazards are communicated effectively
- All competency and certifications are checked
- All health and safety protocols are explained and followed
- Everyone pledges to Winvic’s Doing It Right culture
As part of ongoing progress, we launched sector-specific visual standards documents which document good practices on our sites. The ‘What Good Looks Like' shows baseline requirements through images to drive consistency and act as a catalyst for the development of innovative ideas that move our sites forward to higher levels. Effective training is also an essential component to achieving minimum standards across our sites, and we understood the tremendous potential of our BIM CAVEs and Virtual Reality (VR) technology. They were pivotal in us developing an innovative and engaging health and safety training programme comprising immersive VR training sessions on three focus topic areas – Slips, Trips and Falls, Service Strikes and Falling Objects – also tailored to specific job roles, skill levels, and learning objectives. Site specific and risk information is followed by a real-life scenario, the catastrophic events and consequences, which leave an impactful and lasting final thought.
We were delighted to be a finalist for the Best Use of AR/VR in a Construction Project Award and the Best Health & Safety Innovation Award at the Building Innovation Awards in October and the Digital Innovation in Health, Safety and Wellbeing Award at the Digital Construction Awards in July - a fantastic acknowledgement of our team’s work.
MOTIVATION Subcontractor safety performance league board launched
Our goal is to ensure our workforce is keeping the Doing It Right mindset at the forefront of their minds, prioritising healthy, safety, quality and the environment. We have an app for team members to easily report their safety observations on and we share the live data with leaders and managers of our supply chain partners; they can view information about their operatives on site in the form of observations ’caused by’ their operatives as well as general inspection scores and stop operation notices. This helps us to hold people accountable for negative safety behaviours, but the data we obtain also allows us to publicly recognise subcontractors who are Doing It Right, every quarter through Doing It Right Certificates of Excellence. Subcontractors are praised based on various criteria including, quality of work observations, General Inspection scores and positive feedback through the app and from our operations teams.
BI-ANNUAL ‘DOING IT RIGHT’ CAMPAIGNS
Every six months we focus communications on a reoccurring health and safety challenge to motivate improvement. For example, data throughout one quarter showed an increase in bad observations regarding Access and Egress. We then created a campaign with the strapline ‘Don’t Take A Shortcut on Your Safety’ and reminded team members through toolbox talks and on-site signage to always take safest route not the quickest when on site. At the end of the quarter, bad observations associated with Access and Egress had reduced by 5 per cent.
We’ve also:
- Worked collaboratively with our employees and suppliers since day one to obtain feedback and suggestions on focus topics and communications.
- Continued to review progress against the programme objectives through our Doing It Right Working Group, made up of representatives from all levels of the business, which also helps to set campaign topics.
- Rolled out a Subcontractor Safety Performance League Board in the industrial sector to create opportunities for discussions on-site while also creating a healthy competitive atmosphere to further improve everyday behaviours.
- Implemented daily black hat briefings with Winvic site teams and supply chain partners on our sites, which include the discussion of site-specific hazards and forward planning.
- Recognised health and safety and customer experience excellence through awards, which we award to two project sites each year.
- Held forums with the senior leadership of our supply chain and invited motivational guest speakers to deliver impactful messages around the life changing consequences of bad practice
- Distributed internal and subcontractor quarterly Doing It Right newsletters to showcase successes and advise.
- Shouted about successes – some of which you’ll find below – on static and digital signage on sites and in an explainer video with our three sector heads.
MEASUREMENT OF OUTCOMES FROM AFR REDUCTION TO AN INCREASE IN GOOD OBSERVATIONS
Accurate measurement is crucial if we are to uplift behavioural standards across the entire business and build on the solid platform of our past to ensure a safe and successful future.
- In the first 2 years we reduced our Accident Frequency Rate (AFR) by 71 per cent
- In the second year of Doing It Right we reduced our minor injuries rate by 20 per cent
- We now have 25 Mental Health First Aiders across the business trained by Mental Health First Aid England
- We have seen the overall balance of ‘good’ to ‘bad’ app observations improve and this currently stands at a 60/40 split, indicating a positive cultural change as a result of Doing It Right
- Over 30,000 ‘good’ and ‘bad’ observations have been reported using our app between May 2020 and October 2023
Our modern approach to behavioural based safety is a continuous pursuit, with appraisals and ongoing coaching central to an open-ended schedule. However, we hope you’ll visit our website or social channels in the New Year to catch up with the latest Doing It Right statistics and our updated plans.
Ian Goodhead, HSEQ Director
“Our Subcontractor Minimum Standards document has ensured consistency of Winvic’s Health and Safety expectations throughout our supply chain and across our sites. Our collaborative approach allows us to support our subcontractors and find solutions for any obstacle’s they may find in meeting our standards. When it comes to health and safety, we have seen a positive impact of our Doing It Right culture change programme, we have reduced our already outstanding accident frequency rate, our minor injuries rate has improved, and we continue to raise the bar for health and safety excellence.”