Three Key Pillars that Support Faith’s Uncompromised Focus on Keeping People Safe

One of Faith Technologies’ core values is the uncompromised focus on keeping people safe. In other words, Faith has an unwavering commitment to making sure every employee goes home safe every day. Here are three key pillars that support this core value that we hold dearly.

1. Management Commitment: The success of any safety program is highly dependent on the commitment and involvement of the leadership team. At Faith, we are proud that our management is truly committed to our safety culture and supports its growth by providing the needed resources and personal involvement.

When it comes to financial support, Faith’s management commits all the resources necessary to ensure our safety department is staffed with the best and brightest safety professionals, and employees are provided world-class personal protective equipment (PPE) for the highest level of protection. Employees also receive best-in-class safety and leadership training, which equips them to perform their jobs safely.

Site safety audits are conducted to support and encourage safe behaviors and to observe and correct any unsafe conditions. In 2015, Faith’s management team completed more than 5,000 safety audits, and is on course to complete more than 6,000 audits this year. Their outstanding actions send a loud and clear message to our field personnel that Faith truly cares about their safety. There is no doubt that the safety culture of a company thrives when the leaders embrace and model it.

2. Employee Involvement and Ownership: Employee involvement and ownership are critical to the success of Faith’s safety program. We have many internal programs in place that help enhance our culture, which encourage employees to speak up about unsafe conditions, report incidents and near misses, and follow safe work procedures; a culture of caring for each other. Three of these include:

• Safety Meetings: Our employees actively participate in monthly safety committees (usually led by a field employee) where safety issues and concerns are discussed, and major decisions that affect employee safety are made.
• Operational Risk Management (ORM) Meetings: Our field employees participate in a daily Operational Risk Management (ORM) process that involves identification of tasks to be performed that day, potential hazards that those tasks may pose, and methods to eliminate or control those hazards. “Toolbox Talks” on pertinent safety topics are often included in these sessions.
• Short Service Employee (SSE) Program: This program assigns new employees (mentees) to long-tenured employees (mentors) to allow for new hires to be coached and mentored and seamlessly integrate into Faith’s safety culture during their first six months with the company.

3. Effective Training: Faith prides itself in providing best-in-class training for our employees because we believe training is an essential component of building a positive safety culture. Each year, we complete a minimum of six week-long safety, management, and leadership training sessions in our Georgia, Oklahoma, Kansas, and Wisconsin locations, which are attended by nearly 600 employees. Employees receive standard-based trainings facilitated by highly qualified instructors. Sessions are tailored to meet the specific needs of our employees but exceed OSHA’s requirements at the same time. Our training weeks are complemented by individual classes based on project and employee needs.

In addition to the week-long sessions, we have an in-house apprenticeship program that focuses 4-6 hours on safety training. Our onboarding training for new hires covers six hours of safety training, which prepares our new employees to observe and mitigate the hazards they could encounter on the jobsite on their very first day of work.

Chuck Rutledge, one of our Safety Directors, notes, “Many who see or hear about Faith Technologies’ program focus on the cost of providing the level of training provided to our teams. Our leadership team has made a commitment to develop our employees in every area of their professional development.”

Faith’s commitment to our safety program, our employee involvement and ownership of the program, and providing best-in-class training for our employees are the key components that drive our focus on keeping people safe. We continue to rely on industry best practices to ensure we achieve our goal of zero injuries for our workers.