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Our vision: ‘To be recognised as a Leader in Safety and Project Execution in the markets in which Collen operates’.
Joe O’Dwyer (centre) and members of Collen Safety Department Team
The Irish building construction services market has entered a major growth phase and it’s envisaged that this growth is set to continue in both the commercial and residential sectors for some time. Collen management identified that planned leadership resource capacity, competent emerging leadership and a culture of safety leadership would differentiate Collen from its competitors in this growth phase thus, facilitating Collen Construction’s vision: ‘To be recognised as a Leader in Safety and Project Execution in the markets in which Collen operates’.
The overall outcome will be that Collen Construction will have the vision, leadership capacity, focus and the strategy to drive the next level of organisational performance in both safety and project execution whilst building the required leadership bench strength with the long-term plan in mind.
Following the Collen Construction Leadership kick-off event at Croke Park in Nov 2016 launched by David Lee, Construction Director at Collen, the development of the Collen Construction Leadership Charter has been prepared and adopted into our policy documents. The purpose of this charter was to form the foundation for a cultural shift in the way our leadership and project delivery teams (senior management, project management, supervisors and sub-contractors) view injuries and injury prevention, as well as an investment in Collen’s desired future market position. The charter advocates a continuous improvement of healthy and safe workplaces and communities for Collen’s projects, striving to be an industry leader in safety. The charter allows the project leadership to showcase their commitment to this new set of behaviours and attitudes.
In order to differentiate Collen against competitors within the construction services sector today, the effective management of the supply chain is critical. The oversight required on relationships with suppliers and sub-contractors to achieve greater customer value-added at less total cost is key. A shared safety vision is one of the key factors in helping to achieve this, delivering efficiency as well as a moral responsibility to all workers.
To achieve this Collen engaged with Ingenium Training and Consulting to help facilitate this process.
Donal Hennessy, Collen Commercial Director, together with Ingenium a supply chain engagement ‘Safety for All’ event was held in Croke Park in May of this year to facilitate the implementation of the Safety Leadership Charter for our subcontractor supply chain. The event with over 100 sub-contractor Managing Directors/Directors in attendance, focused on the safety leadership traits Collen expect from its sub-contractors and resulted in a very engaging event where the sub-contractors co-developed a sub-contractor charter to support the Collen Vision. The feedback from our supply chain has been extremely positive, with many commenting on the innovative way in which Collen are advocating safety leadership with our own team together with our sub-contractor supply chain.
The final element identified by our management team was that a culture of safety leadership, when it works, allows everyone to feel accountable for safety, where employees go beyond “the call of duty” to identify unsafe conditions and behaviours, and are comfortable intervening to correct them through clearly defined processes.
To facilitate this process we will be rolling out the P4 Safety Leadership program.The P4 Safety Leadership program will be used to generate knowledge and awareness of safety leadership traits and behaviours with P4 Champions identified and trained across our projects and will be in the form of a safety walk down process. It will provide the ‘glue’ that drives the new culture.
We believe that the overall outcome from these initiatives and tracking our progress to date with these elements is resulting in Collen Construction having the vision, leadership capacity, focus and the strategy to drive the next level of organisational performance in both safety and project execution whilst building the required leadership bench strength with the long-term plan in mind.
Joe O’Dwyer, Health & Safety Manager, Collen
