We have projects from San Diego to Oregon to Baltimore and Miami and everywhere in between. So across the country, my department, the safety department, we currently have 25 safety professionals spread out across the US. And we'll be at or above 30 by the end of 2024.
TONY MILITELLO: Great thanks, Jon. How about you, Eric?
ERIC WINDERS: Yeah, Eric Winders, PCL. I'm Jon's right-hand man down out here on the East Coast out of our Tampa office. Been out here for about four years, but I've been with PCL stepping on almost 14 years now. Out here in the East Coast, I head up a lot of the water treatment plant projects that Jon was referring to and then also a lot of smaller rehabs of moveable bridges. And we do some of that work out here as well in the East Coast.
TONY MILITELLO: Yeah, great. Again, certainly super important work. And it really helps, as you mentioned, Jon, our country, United States, and other countries abroad really provide that critical life support and public utilities and the things that help keep those countries and communities thriving. So, Jon, in the broadest terms, how important is safety to your organization?
JON VANASDLEN: At PCL, we put the highest value of health and safety of each individual who steps foot on our projects, including our own employees, subcontractors, owners, engineers, and including the public. Simply, if we can't perform the work safely, we're not going to attempt to perform it at all. There's nothing that we can build that's worth anyone getting hurt on our projects.
TONY MILITELLO: That's great. I mean, that's really good to hear. And that's certainly something that I've seen throughout the years, is when I've dealt with or had been on PCL projects, I can certainly see and feel that palpable sense from, again, your employees, all the way down from the most senior leaders to the craft workers, that there's that safety culture in your organization.
Let's get maybe down a little-- increase the magnification a little bit and talk about at the program level. What are some programs that you have in place for reducing operational risk?
ERIC WINDERS: Yeah, that's a really good question. I can take that one. To piggyback off of what Jon said at first, we know where our strengths and weaknesses are. So we don't chase a lot of work that we feel we cannot perform safely. We're a pretty big company with a lot of experience. So that usually isn't a lot. We can perform a lot of things safely. But we do know where our strengths and weaknesses are.
A couple of things that we do focus on and programs we've implemented over the last couple of years is our life-saving absolutes, which PCL has implemented seven different life-saving absolutes that we focus on first when we do hazard ID and control. These seven life-saving absolutes that we focus on is fall protection, rigging, lockout/tagout, road vehicles, human and equipment interface, controlled access zones, and excavations. So those are the seven life-saving absolutes that we focus on first for all of our high-risk activities to ensure that people are working safely. That's our proactive side on the program.
The reactive side is looking at our SIF events. So SIF is our serious injury and fatality events. We classify those as SIF actual, so an actual event that caused a serious injury fatality, or also a SIFP, so a potential, so a near miss that had the potential for a serious injury or fatality. So on those, that's our reactive look. We want to make sure that we're learning from any of those SIF events. So that's kind of our proactive and reactive programs that we use to focus on a lot of our high-risk activities that could possibly cause serious injuries and fatalities.
TONY MILITELLO: Yeah. Thanks, Eric. And that is fairly commonplace, at least the seven absolutes or, again, whatever the number might be. Certainly, that is something that really is leading the industry is companies that focus on those types of things, be it- again, the number is immaterial, but really having a set number of absolutes that are very critical and that you see as, certainly, life saving or potentially life-altering hazards.
Can you talk a little bit about- I'm going to stay on that question for a second. Can you talk a little bit about how you communicate that to the workforce? You've got a transient workforce. There's some stability, but there's some rotation of craft workers. How do you make sure that those individuals know that that is PCL's seven absolutes?
ERIC WINDERS: So we have life-saving absolutes posters posted everywhere. We discuss the seven life-saving absolutes at our weekly HSC field meetings. And then our three-stepped approach to hazard and control focuses mainly on those life-saving absolutes, first and foremost. And all those employees are involved in that three-step process for hazard ID and control.
The very first of that is the CHA, our construction hazard assessment. That's kind of that 10,000 foot view level of all the different hazards on the project for the life of the project. Then you step down. We go to our JHAs, our job hazard analysis. All the employees are involved in the development of those and the training to those, which we focused on all levels of hazards when we look in those job hazard analysis. But we focus mainly, first off, on those life-saving absolutes.
And then the third step down is our PSI, which is our pre-job safety instruction. That's, at that very moment, very task specific, where employees will fill that out for anything, even just pushing a broom to clean up. That's kind of our three-step process to hazard ID and control. And all the employees are involved with that. Again, they focus mainly on the life-saving absolutes first before they move on to the more minor issues, if you will.
One of the things that we encourage them to talk about in those PSIs and to do throughout the day is our 20-20-20 initiative, which every 20 minutes, take 20 seconds, look 20 feet around you. Make sure nothing's changed. Make sure a barricade hasn't came down. Make sure somebody hasn't wandered into your area that shouldn't be in there. All those things are encouraged and discussed with all levels of our employees on PCL projects.
TONY MILITELLO: Yeah, that is absolutely fabulous. Again, the one thing, in addition to all the things that you mentioned, whether that be the three-step process, the one thing that just kept resounding to me, which I've found to be imperative, is employee engagement, employee involvement. I lost track of the number of times that you mentioned employee engagement and employee involvement, employee participation. That really makes it drive that message home to them so that they know not only that the supervision and safety managers and, again, leadership are looking out for their interests but that they have some ownership in their own self-protection. So that really is fantastic. Thanks, Eric.
So moving on a little bit, there certainly is always a thirst or an insatiable appetite for what companies are doing with regards to technology and innovation and how those contribute to your safety and risk management work. Can you talk a little bit about what might be one or two things that you're doing in the technology or innovation space to make risk reductions or kind of risk management decisions?
JON VANASDLEN: So safety is really in the field. So we always ask ourselves, how can we help the people in the field build better and work safer? The quote, "work smart, not hard," it's something that my dad ingrained in me a long time ago. So I always try to use that to improve our processes and make it so the work is actually performed at a higher safety level and as well at a higher quality level.
Here at PCL, we encourage our people to challenge the process and bring innovative ideas, because if someone's trying to solve a problem over on Eric's side of the country in Florida, there's probably or likely someone over here trying to solve that same problem. So kind of like what Eric said, we communicate very efficiently and effectively. And we want to make sure we keep those open lines of communication, especially since we're so spread out.
We have an expansive library of training programs. We develop a lot of our training in house. We have the resources to do that. And our training is available to all employees on the devices that they use each and every day. And we continually update that.
TONY MILITELLO: Yeah. Thanks, Jon. Eric was talking a little bit before about employee engagement, employee involvement. To the extent that you involve them in the decision-making process for job hazard analyses or site-specific safety plans or site-specific task hazard analyses or how they can protect themselves, they are more likely, has been my experience, to contribute on the innovation side, right?
And that's exactly where you want them, right? They feel comfortable speaking up. They feel comfortable saying, hey, I've got this idea. We were going through this task hazard analysis or job hazard analysis. And the way that we were thinking of doing the work is not necessarily the safest, right? It's not necessarily the smartest way to work. There's a smarter way to work so that we're not working as hard.
And again, that's spectacular that you have the company culture where the employees feel comfortable speaking up. And again, they're going to be the biggest source of your innovations. And again, whether it's leveraging technology or some other solution set, their voice and the ability for them to speak up or the ability for leadership to hear their voice is exceptional.
Let's switch for a second. We've gone we took it from the high level and scoped it all the way down to the craft worker. Let's go back up a little bit and talk about leadership support. Can you talk a little bit about how leadership supports the safety programs and the safety mindset at PCL?
ERIC WINDERS: Yeah, leadership is really paramount to having their support to drive down that safety culture. We are an industry leader, I feel, in the safety realm. And that has everything to do with our leadership support. We could have the best safety professionals in the world, and I feel that we do. But honestly, that wouldn't mean a whole lot if we didn't have all the support we have from all levels of management, all the way up to the CEO. We can only do so much if we didn't have that backing. The fact that we have that backing and support makes us more effective. So the fact that we have that honestly makes my job and Jon's job a whole lot easier. I can tell you that.
TONY MILITELLO: Can you give, Eric, some tangible example or a recent example that comes to mind of a senior leader within your organization really going out and maybe it looks like it's above and beyond, or maybe it's out of their way, but something that they did very tangible that helped you out.
ERIC WINDERS: Well, I can tell you that all of our upper management is involved in all of our incident investigations, number one. But trying to think about something recently that happened out here in Florida- here's a good example. Our area manager and I were talking about how we had reached one year without a recordable injury for our civil southeast operations. I told him that I was going to go around to the about nine different states that we cover and visit the projects and thank them for what they did.
And my area manager said, you know what? I'm coming along with you. And he piggybacked and canceled things in his busy schedule to fly around the East Coast with me and visit all these projects and thank everyone for working safely. I don't know if a lot of companies that would do that, especially when you get that high up in upper management. But that's very commonplace, I would say, here in PCL.
TONY MILITELLO: That's great, Eric. Yeah, again, when people can put the face to the name, that is super helpful, again, recognize who they're doing that work for and recognizing that there's a pride and a sense of ownership from the senior leadership, again, to really give that direct, immediate feedback to say, thank you. It's really something that has been helpful in my career, both on the receiving end and on the delivery end as well.
In terms of safety, where do you think your organization stands out? What's something unique about your organization that really puts you head and shoulders above the competition?
ERIC WINDERS: I truly believe that it's our craft safety workshops that we hold. So all of our projects have at least one- if the project's larger, sometimes multiple- craft safety workshop sessions that we do. They're a very informal meeting. It's all of the hourly employees that are invited to this meeting, PCL and subcontractor.
The management for that project- superintendents, project managers- they're not actually allowed in that meeting. It's a safety professional, such as myself, and then an area manager and operations manager, a district manager. They're the ones who lead it. And we don't want site management there because we want the employees to feel as free as possible to open up about any issues that they might have.
I said before these are really informal meetings. We have some bullet points we want to cover, but there's no real set agenda. Each meeting is completely different. And the employees take it in whatever direction that they really want to take it. We don't talk about, you know, OSHA says fall protection is 6 feet. It's not one of those type of training. It's more of a, why do you work safe? Forget PCL's policies. Forget OSHA regulations. Why do you work safe? What's the reason? What's your personal value for safety?
And people start talking about their personal values for safety and what it means to them. We talk about anyone who's seen any serious injuries on previous projects. And people start opening up about those. And sometimes these meetings will lead to tears. And it really has a sense of camaraderie once that meeting is over. But they're very, very, very impactful.
A couple of examples of some of those meetings that had a specific moment that always captured my mind was we had a subcontractor who decided to speak up during one of these craft safety workshops. And he basically said that he had worked on a PCL project before in the past. And he had obviously told his family about how safe we were and how serious we were about safety, because he said the story that every morning when he would go off to work, that his family would always say that they were always scared he was going to get hurt because construction is such a dangerous, dangerous job.
When he went to them and said, hey, my next assignment is back on another PCL project, they remembered what he had said about PCL. And he said that they were ecstatic. He said that they were telling him things like they're going to be able to sleep better at night simply because they know that when he's on a PCL project, he's going to be safe. And that was a-- hearing that almost brought a tear to my eye.
I mean, you can look at numbers like what someone's EMR is, which ours is great, too. But stories like that, to me, mean way more than an EMR number or an incident rate number. I mean, hearing stories like that is truly eye opening. And it makes yourself know that what you're doing is making a difference.
TONY MILITELLO: Yeah, absolutely. And again, those types of stories with that positive feedback, they're really infectious, right? That buys recruitment. That buys retention that you couldn't put a price on. Those individuals are PCL for life, for sure.
So talk a little bit about what lies ahead. You, again, got a lot of great things in place and always working on process improvements. But what are the things that you're looking forward to attempting in the rest of this coming year and for years to follow?
JON VANASDLEN: Yeah, so the big talk, I think, across the country, probably across the world, is technology and AI, And I think it's getting there. I don't think it's there yet in our realm of work. But we have very impressive individuals, business analysts, that are dedicated to our safety department out of Edmonton who are continually improving and innovating the technology that we use on our projects each and every day. Our company allows us to embrace adaptation to the technology advancements in all the aspects of our business, not just safety. So that's lying ahead, I think, not just for our company but for others as well.
And there's a new- I guess it's not new, but human and organizational performance, or HOP. It's a different way of looking at, hey, when things happen, how do you look at it and do a proper investigation? So traditionally, there was the idea that workers were the problem to be fixed. And it's very easy when something happens to say, oh, our guy shouldn't have done that, or he should have done it a different way. And prior, everyone thought safety is just the absence of incidents.
The HOP approach, or human and organizational performance- HOP is the acronym for it. The HOP approach improves the perspective of safety management by shifting the focus from compliance- kind of like what Eric was talking about with that craft safety workshop- to enhancing how we actually perform the work.
So with HOP, safety is actually the presence of capacity. And capacity includes everything from knowledge, skills, and the resources required to meet the demands of the task and effectively respond to change. So like I said earlier, when something goes wrong, it's very easy to point the finger at someone else. But as a project, project team, project management, area management, district management, we need to start looking in the mirror.
And we need to say, hey, did we give them the right knowledge? Did we train them so they have the right skills? And did we give them that right tool? Or was the tool that they were using that might have caused this incident, was it the wrong tool? Was it not in good shape? Did we not have enough of them? So what lies ahead? I think it's a lot of looking in the mirror, which will only improve the processes and the product that we actually put out at our projects.
TONY MILITELLO: Yeah, great. Thanks, Jon. Yeah, that's certainly something that I've found through my career as well. The more that you focus on operational excellence or operational performance or that human operational interface, really, the more sustainable and the more resilient solutions you can come up with, right?
The less you focus on blame the victim, to some extent, you are able to find- like you said, right, when you're changing tools and instead of changing a single individual, OK, now you've prevented- potentially prevented that individual from doing the same thing again. However, by changing the tool or changing a process or changing something systemically, you are able to have a much greater and, again, a much more sustainable and much more resilient impact. Again, fantastic to hear that that's what lies ahead for you guys.
So what would you recommend to all those interested in safety and risk in construction? What kind of mentorship or advice- if you had a one snippet to say, hey, listen, if you're thinking of getting into safety and construction or risk management and construction or you're struggling, these are the things I would recommend you take under consideration, what would those be?
JON VANASDLEN: So I think one of them is become educated in the scope of work of the industry that you're going into. You can't just say, oh, I'm a construction safety professional, because there's a lot of sub-bullets under construction. We do civil work. We also have a district that builds high-rises, stadiums. We have different scopes of work under the construction umbrella.
So if you want to be in the construction industry, you need to know all the aspects, the processes, the sequencing of tasks so you can look ahead and mitigate the risks. We never want to underestimate the power of pre-planning over pre-plan if you can, because if we have the right tools- we want to make sure we have the right tools, equipment, readily available so our people use them. I always say 99.9% of the time, if we have the right tool available and readily available and they know how to use it, they're going to use it.
And the last thing, I think, it's definitely not only safety related, but be an approachable resource. Like Eric said, craft safety workshop that he talked about it, it really opens up a line of communication between our people in the field on the front lines and us. So if you open up that line of communication and you're able to communicate with them effectively, the possibilities are endless. But be an approachable resource.
TONY MILITELLO: Yeah. Thanks, Jon. Again, really insightful and a great time to chat with you here today. Eric, anything that you have or any final comments that you'd like to offer?
ERIC WINDERS: No, it was a great experience being a part of the conference and being able to deliver our speech and talk about how PCL does safety. I think we made it pretty clear during our application and during our speech there that PCL takes it very seriously from all levels, all the way up through the office of the CEO. The leadership and management is really what drives our safety program.
The people that are out there in the field, they're always going to be the ones who also help drive that safety culture. Jon mentioned earlier that technology is coming. AI is becoming bigger. But I still feel that safety at the moment is driven by the people and that culture is driven by the people. So we're not going to get left behind when it comes to technology. But we're still going to focus on our people.
TONY MILITELLO: Great. Thanks, Eric. Well, again, Jon and Eric, I really appreciate you taking the time today to have a chat about all things PCL safety and risk reduction. And again, I really look forward to seeing the great things that are to come for you guys. Back to you, Max.
MAX NELSON: Thank you for listening to another episode of the podcast series dedicated to winners of the 2024 AGC Construction Safety Excellence Awards. We hope you're taking away insights that can be applied to your own programs and processes. For more information on the CSEA, visit www.agc.org/csea. If you found value in today's episode, don't forget to and follow the show.
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