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www.cos-mag.com
Canadian Occupational Safety
"From a business perspective,
OCWA benefited from this too
because some of our non-clients
heard about this, found out more and
are now clients of ours," Plener says.
"Companies and organizations want
to work with other companies that do
things safely."
After looking at things from this
"possible" lens, the staff quickly real-
ized they could achieve what they
thought they couldn't. They ended up
improving safety for many different
processes and tasks.
The agency has a very elaborate
health and safety training matrix for
its 820 employees located across 10
regions of the province. The first level
is common training for all employ-
ees and includes a two-day safety
overview course, Ministry of Labour
mandatory training for workers and
supervisors, an overview of the com-
pany's health and safety portal and a
module on how to complete effective
incident reporting. Phase two is train-
ing based on the hazards and risks
A FEW YEARS AGO, a senior oper-
ations manager at the Ontario Clean
Water Agency (OCWA) was tired of
hearing his staff say that eliminat-
ing certain work site hazards was not
possible. In response, he launched the
Achieving the Possible campaign for
the northwest region and set out to
shift the mindset of his staff.
"He said, 'Nobody likes change, but
we are going to make some changes
and we are going to put our heads
together and come up with how we
can do things better, safer than how
we have been doing them,'" says Randy
Plener, director of occupational health
and safety at OCWA in Toronto.
To spread the word about this new
commitment to health and safety,
the region hosted a safety barbecue
for staff and their families as well as
clients, contractors and community
members. The event spread the word
that OCWA is really making safety
a priority and keeping safety top of
mind each and every day.
By Amanda Silliker, Linda Johnson,
John Dujay and Marcel Vander Wier
Superheroes
Safety
Congratulations to the winners of the 2019 Canada's Safest Employers
awards! These 30 organizations heed the call on a daily basis and use
their superpowers to keep their workforce safe. Visit safestemployers.
com to watch exclusive videos of the gold winners, learn more about
the nomination process and meet our independent panel of judges.
PUBLIC SECTOR/NON-PROFIT
Port Saint John
GOLD
SILVER
SILVER
Saskatchewan
Government Insurance
