Practical Experience in Implementing Safety Contacts

I believe most HSE DAYS participants are familiar with the practice of conducting Safety Contacts, and most likely, many of you actively use this practice in one form or another. In this post, I would like to share our experience of implementing Safety Contacts at ROUST Group and highlight the key benefits of this practice.

Safety Contact – this is an important safety message relevant to a specific group of people at a particular time, focusing on actions each employee can take to avoid situations similar to the one described in the Contact and to prevent potential unsafe situations in the future.

When ROUST Group decided to implement this initiative, we pursued three goals:

1. Expand employees' knowledge in the field of health and safety
2. Engage employees in safety discussions
3. Shape safe behavior through constant dialogue with them

An extremely simple format for the Safety Contact was established:

• One page
• One important message
• Key takeaways

The following agreements were also fixed:

• A Safety Contact is conducted before the start of scheduled activities (meetings, sessions, training) involving more than 5 people
• The Safety Contact is led by the meeting/session/training leader
• Duration of the Contact – no more than 5-7 minutes
• A Safety Contact is issued once a week (i.e., 52 times a year)
• The topic for the Contact is determined based on the following priorities:

🔻 An accident, minor injury, or some incident/occurrence has happened within the Group;

🔻 An incident/occurrence happened at a neighboring facility or within the industry;

🔻 Seasonal risks: slippery paths, ice, peak respiratory disease periods, outdoor recreation, seasonal allergies, etc.

Over the two years of implementing this practice at ROUST Group, it has undergone some changes. While in the early stages, information for Safety Contacts was selected and prepared by HSE specialists and used only during scheduled health and safety meetings, now department heads and middle management are also involved in this process. As the next step, we envision involving shift employees.

To communicate Safety Contacts, in addition to scheduled meetings, ROUST Group also actively uses "5-minute meetings" held with employees before the start of a shift. In critical moments — specifically if an incident has occurred — we resort to the practice of "briefings": we stop production and analyze the circumstances and causes of the incident in detail, agreeing on what actions each employee should take to prevent a recurrence.

The most effective way to present a Safety Contact is to have it presented or conducted by an employee who was in an unfavorable situation or involved in an incident. In simple language and based on personal experience, they can explain HOW (?) it happened and WHAT (?) they will do differently next time so that the situation does not happen to them again.

The practice of conducting Safety Contacts is proving its effectiveness. It not only helps engage employees in solving and discussing safety issues at work and at home but also shapes their attitude toward personal safety, which consequently impacts their behavior.