The Conception and Birth of Sensible Safety

2016 has been a big year for me, both personally and professionally. I welcomed the birth of a bouncing baby boy, to give me a total of 3 children under the age of 4 (for a fortnight anyway) and there was a change in key pieces of legislation that had been a strong focus of my Company, Swensen and Associates Ltd, since its inception 4 years ago. This legislation was the Health and Safety at Work Act and its associated Regulations.

After taking 5 minutes out of my hectic life, to pause, I asked myself:

  • What did it all mean?
  • What was really that different about this legislation?
  • Why did everyone seem to be so scared of it?
  • Where did all these “Health and Safety Professionals” suddenly come from?
  • How on earth are all these small to medium businesses, the backbone of the kiwi economy, expected to understand any of the ‘noise’ out there and not just pack up shop and go home?

After dragging myself out of the foetal position, under my desk, and making sure no one had seen me, I made the most SENSIBLE decision of my career, to date. I’d challenge conventional wisdom and take on all comers.

“Why not just work with these businesses and make it simple?”, I thought. Then I looked back over all the work I had in Health and Safety over the years there were 3 things stuck out as REAL motivators to business minded Kiwis. They want to…

1.Be Compliant –No one wants to get into trouble with the regulators. Least of all getting slammed with a fine that’ll take food off the table or cripple our business.
2. Be Competitive – We all love a good stoush and there’s nothing better than being the underdog and coming out on top. In business, there’s no ‘Participation Awards”, just winners and those who don’t last.
3. But Care –I’ve never met a business owner who has any sort of intention of sending their workers onto the job and expecting, or wanting, them to be hurt. We all know that a safe and healthy workplace is a productive one and that having all your workers with 10 fingers and 10 toes at the end of the day is preferable to the alternative.

And just like that, Sensible Safety was born!!!

  • We committed to “Keeping it Real”
  • We set ourselves the challenge of making “Common Sense” formal.
  • We concluded that we knew quite a bit about your customers and clients were looking for, before offering you contracts, work or consideration for tenders and quotes.
  • We found ourselves in the fortunate position of becoming Licenced Mobile Assessors for the ConstructSafe Competency scheme.

Now, here we are!

To find out how you can be compliant, be competitive, but care contact us.

2017-06-05T13:50:37+00:00