In 2018, RoSPA developed the RoSPA Awards Ambassador scheme, aiming to create a community of people who champion RoSPA’s goal to drive up health and safety requirements through the RoSPA’s International Health and Safety Awards. With greater than 27-years of expertise in OS&H administration, and over half of these spent working abroad, Stephen Storey, who relies in India, was nicely positioned to be RoSPA’s first worldwide awards ambassador. We meet up with him to see what this implies for him.
Stephen Story has spent fifteen years working abroad in OS&H administration within the Center East and Asia. He’s at present company EHS head for Larsen & Toubro (L&T Heavy Civil) in India.
Stephen is a kind of on the frontline. His private aim is to drive up requirements throughout the board in a rustic the place safety 
tradition is just not as mature as say Europe or the US. In his work with L&T, he’s in command of the safety and wellbeing of hundreds of staff and contractors working in high-risk environments in heavy infrastructure sectors reminiscent of tunnels, rail, roads, bridges, nuclear, hydropower, defence, ports and harbours.
The Indian health and safety scene presents its personal specific challenges. Greater than 22 official languages are spoken within the nation, and it additionally has a transient workforce which poses an issue for these making an attempt to instil good OS&H follow and creating safer working environments. Nonetheless, Larsen & Toubro have labored exhausting to beat these obstacles and use the RoSPA Health & Safety Awards to reveal an enormous dedication to health and safety with constant entries into these worldwide awards for nearly 20 years, with over 100 entries throughout Larsen & Toubro in 2019.
“The workforce is extremely cell and seasonal and this produces a big, fast turnover of labour, which comes primarily from the agricultural sector.
“Staff typically have little or no expertise or understanding of advanced development and engineering work strategies, and the right safety behaviours that requires implementation to allow accident prevention.
“Making that change and developing those skill sets in a small window of time – before the workforce leaves the projects to take up jobs outside the construction industry in their native region – is a big challenge.”
So how is Stephen tackling these points?
He’s making an attempt to implement and develop a safety tradition, not solely via his day-to-day work on the bottom however via making a agency dedication to staff and by looking for methods to additional develop his affect and promote greatest safety follow.
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hen repeatedly works with the Nationwide Safety Council of India and the International Labour Organisation, amongst others, and each January Larsen & Toubro maintain a safety month which reaches hundreds of stakeholders together with staff, contractors, suppliers, JV companions, and purchasers. With theme’s reminiscent of ’embrace digital for a safer workplace’, which included putting in safety apps, together with safety inspection and near-miss apps on smartphones used within the workplace, and staff participating in digital actuality development safety coaching, it’s clear that Stephen has his finger on the heart beat of all the most recent developments and applied sciences in safety.
“We also focused on third-party training from international bodies in crane management, operation and rigging, and scaffolding inspection and erection, and ran occupational health campaigns on heart attacks, strokes, diabetes and yoga fitness.”
In 2018, Stephen was chosen to be RoSPA’s very first worldwide awards ambassador.
“It is an honour to be approached to support such a prestigious global brand in safety,” Stephen says. “In accepting the role as ambassador it gives me an opportunity to give something back to the occupational safety and health industry and support RoSPA in its overall vision, mission and beliefs.”
Stephen intends to encourage extra organisations in India, via his networks, to enter the RoSPA Well being & Safety Awards and assimilate the entry course of into their safety methods, as Larsen & Toubro has completed.
“Having the opportunities as I do to be invited to talk on various boards, at conferences in India and Asia more widely, and to government and industry forums, I can speak to them of the value an organisation can gain from simply entering the awards process and understanding how they can improve and eventually be recognised as RoSPA winners.”
In case you are focused on turning into a part of the RoSPA Awards, go to www.rospa.com/awards and discover out extra about our internationally recognised award scheme.