We’ve worked with over 1200 new companies over the past two years and seen first hand the great work our clients are striving to achieve by doing the right thing – taking steps to look after their most important assets - people.

One of the key paradigm shifts we are seeing in the market is the breaking down of the traditional two-yearly ‘warrant of fitness’ approach to making sure things are going the way you want them to. In this old paradigm, for many companies, it would mean a desire to pass a government accreditation (like the former ACC WSMP program) or get a contractor pre-qualification ‘tick’ for a further few years.

What many have realised is that effective health, safety and well being isn’t about ‘gearing up for an external audit’ (read: updating policies and procedures!)… it’s about making sure people are healthy and safe every day, ensuring a good risk-based safety management system is in place and being executed by workers equipped with the right skills and knowledge they need. It's about embedding an ongoing dialogue and work culture so that self-aware, positive behaviour is lived and breathed in the normal course of executing great work.

Having a live feedback loop to support continuous improvement is a key ingredient to remaining agile and moving a company further along the health and safety maturity curve. Regularly remeasuring and refocussing on the emerging issues that are most critical to each company in its unique operating context will ensure deeper, sustainable wins are achieved. If this is executed, where external audits are needed along the way, it should simply be a matter of sharing authentic data/visibility that demonstrates the great work being done.

5 tips for using Safe365 to support an agile approach:

1. Set up quarterly review workshops (60-90 mins) to review progress made against previous action plans – shorter ‘action’ periods will keep things moving rather than things getting lost
2. Ensure Safe365 ratings are updated on the platform as improvements are made – aim for at least one thing each month!
3. Use the Safe365 report centre to run monthly reports that provide key people in the business with regular visibility of how the company is tracking.
4. Upload evidence onto the Safe365 ‘files’ area to support the rating level you have selected. This helps provide verification of the element and enhances assurance to key people in your company.
5. Share your dashboard with the team – the strong visuals will rapidly grow awareness across the team and further enable great safety conversations to occur regularly.

To join the growing number of companies wanting use greater visibility of their health, safety and well-being capability and compliance status to take an agile approach to continuous improvement, start a free trial on Safe365 today.