Author Archives: Contributor

Knowing When to Buy EHS Software

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At what point does the cost of purchasing and implementing new software become preferable to the cost of maintaining your existing organizational software? It’s an important question, especially when you consider that as much as two-thirds of the cost of the new software is probably going to come from your EHS budget. Like just about anything else, software has an expected service life. For most well-designed systems, their useful life cycle can be as long as six to eight years; for systems that are less well designed or for applications that evolve very quickly, the useful life of business software can be as short as three years.

To maintain workplace safety you need a tool that will provide software solutions for a wide variety of services like compliance management, risk management, safety management, incident management, audits, document control, training management … the list goes on.

According to a 2017 survey … Read more...

An Insider’s Guide to Buying Safety Management Software: Part I

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With an array of competitive vendors, seemingly complicated technologies, and solutions of varying scope and quality, purchasing enterprise safety management software can seem like an overwhelming process. However, understanding the inner workings of the safety software industry is not as difficult as it may seem.

Further, learning how to maximize your organization’s return on investment (ROI) by choosing the most appropriate software solution for your business needs can be a straightforward process.

The intent of Part I is twofold:

  1. Explain why Safety Management Software can help your organization ensure employee safety and comply with regulatory and legislative standards.
  2. Demystify the software industry, particularly as it relates to safety management software, and provide the questions you need to ask potential providers.

In Part II you will learn:

  1. How to maximize ROI by implementing a safety management software solution.
  2. How to develop effective business proposals that communicate the ROI potential of safety
… Read more...

Chemical Data Management: Setting the Ball In Motion

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When developing a Chemical Data Management program, it is important to keep in mind common foundational elements that can set up your organization for success.

Written by Matt Adams (Partnerships & Alliances, SiteHawk) and Chris Barfield (Product Marketing Manager, SiteHawk)

Organizations across virtually every industry and themselves navigating the roadmap of Chemical Data Management. While some instances require more intricate processes and procedures, there are common foundational elements that can set your organization up for success. The following high-level guidelines introduce each phase of a well-rounded Chemical Data Management program that can be adaptable for your organization.

Know Where You Stand

Having a good understanding of your current Chemical Data Management situation sets the stage for your organization. Outlining current strengths and weaknesses enables you to set appropriate goals, gain support from management and measure progress.

Have A Plan

Creating a blueprint of what success looks like enables you to … Read more...

EHS Managers: Come to Our Free “Building the Business Case for EHS Software” Workshop!

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You may have heard of the powerful changes EHS Management software is bringing to all kinds of organizations. You may have heard how it’s saved lives, money and reduced insurance premiums, but some things that don’t get the attention they deserve are process automation, workforce engagement and freedom from disparate data sources, to name a few.

As an EHS professional, you already know the impact this software can have on an organization. But getting alignment and convincing executive decision-makers can be tricky. What else should you include in your business case to fast-track their approval? You’ll find out at our workshop!

Why should I attend?

Coming out to a workshop with like-minded professionals and experts in the EHS space offers you a unique advantage. We partnered with Microsoft and Arcadis to design a workshop that helps you:

  • Gain influencer consensus
  • Circumvent objections with a readiness assessment
  • Leverage compelling data to
… Read more...

How Technology is Improving Workplace Safety

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There’s a digital revolution underway in EHS, and it’s helping make workplaces the safest they’ve ever been. Safety professionals today are being asked to not only protect their employees, but also their company’s bottom line.

To improve safety capabilities in all areas, safety leaders are increasingly turning to digital technologies.

A new e-book offers suggestions on how to discover and measure the value of EHS technologies, how to manage their implementation, and how to gain buy-in both from senior management and the employees who will be using and benefiting from the technology.

DOWNLOAD NOW Button… Read more...

Tackling the Evolution of Your EHS Program

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It can be hard to step away from the day-to-day demands of managing an EHS program and take a critical look at what needs to evolve. Often, the people, business and goals of the organization evolve while safety processes remain the same.

Identifying areas for improvement can include leveraging leading and lagging metrics, getting stakeholder and employee feedback, or learning from peers.

Once opportunities for improvement are identified, a structured process to make those changes is required. This will require securing stakeholder improvement for the new ideas, initiatives and tools.

Want to learn more? Access our free webinar to listen to Billy Powell, an EHS Director for Smith & Nephew, talk about the challenges he faces today and how he evolves his EHS processes.

DOWNLOAD NOW Button… Read more...

Are You Ready if an EHS Crisis Happens?

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It is important to have a clear plan should an EHS crisis happen. Your stakeholders, employees, external publications and the public all expect communications to be clear, transparent and timely. Without a plan, misinformation can spread, negatively impacting both your personal and corporate brands.

When creating your plan, it is important to involve stakeholders and executives. All employees should understand the plan, including where to access it in time of a crisis. For example, it is best practice to identify one employee as the official communicator, instead of having multiple individuals communicating with external sources and publications.

A successful plan will reduce the negative brand and financial impact of an EHS crisis. Download our free guide today and learn how to build an executable plan should an EHS crises happen, including:

  • Identifying corporate communicators
  • Avoiding costly misinformation
  • Acting in a timely manner
  • Involving shareholders, executives and the community

DOWNLOAD NOW Button… Read more...

Making the Case for Health and Safety with ISO 45001

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The new ISO 45001 standard for occupational health and safety (OH&S), published in March 2018 by the International Organization for Standardization (ISO), specifies requirements for an OH&S management system. It offers guidance to enable organizations to provide safe and healthy workplaces by preventing work-related injury and ill health.

For OH&S leaders looking to drive the adoption of the new standard throughout their workplaces, it is important to understand the goals and motivations of their business leaders. In many organizations, executive-level concerns include:

  • legal
  • social/ethical
  • financial
  • organizational resilience
  • protecting workers from harm
  • financial loss from production, replacing equipment and labour, management time, reputation, orders, worker morale, penalties and insurance premiums.

Traditionally, most OH&S professionals have made the case for improved corporate health and safety conditions to management by using accident data, legal compliance and/or costs of failings. But the movement toward Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) is today a more powerful … Read more...

How to Sell EHS Software to Your IT Department

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As all successful marketers know, to win over your target audience you need to: one, know what your audience cares about, and two, speak their language. Trying to get IT approval on your EHS software initiative is no different. Identifying how your EHS software initiative will improve your IT department’s pain points and understanding the key terminology they use will go a long way to securing their approval.

So, what does your IT department care about?

  1. Resources (Time & Funding)
    Each system in your organization needs to be maintained. That can include adding users, managing permissions, updating software to more secure versions, or paying renewal fees. The more software a company uses, generally the bigger headache for IT. Therefore, consider looking at fully integrated EHS management systems over point solutions. It’ll be easier and more affordable for your IT department to maintain. Ever better – showcase how your proposed EHS
… Read more...

The ROI on EHS Process Automation

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As an EHS professional, your responsibilities include safeguarding employees from deadly workplace hazards and managing the potentially paralyzing mountains of regulations and paperwork that go along with them. But just as technology has revolutionized so many things, from assembly lines to transportation, it can also revolutionize your ability to manage workplace hazards, regulatory compliance, and all those reams of data.

Here are ways that automating your EHS processes can improve your productivity and help achieve your EHS goals:

Staying Compliant

  • Identify and keep up-to-date with the EHS regulations you need to keep track of, across various locations, job types and industries
  • Simplify compliance reporting requirements
  • Automate and track training schedules
  • Organize and streamline document control

Anticipating Hazards and Managing Incidents

  • Standardize your incident management process so that required information is captured and can be turned into prescriptive insights
  • Standardize job safety analysis processes so that they are the same regardless
… Read more...