Every so often, we learn about a new business that is committed to being a socially responsible member of our community. Small businesses in Nova Scotia are constantly innovating and seeking to develop solutions for the needs of our market. In this case, Advanced Environmental Group embodies what most of us perceive what a “green” company should be.

Advanced Environmental Group’s website succinctly describes their vision as being able to “achieve a 100% diversion rate of solid waste from our landfills by providing our customers with progressive, forward-thinking material diversion and recycling services.”

From speaking with the company’s owner, it is obvious that their business outlook is committed to serving their stakeholders from both an environmental sustainability and fiscal responsibility standpoint. They have taken a comprehensive waste management approach by offering integrated waste diversion and reporting services to business clients as well as collection and education services to residential customers.

You can learn more about Advanced Environmental Group by going to their website. I highly recommend that anyone seeking assistance with their waste management needs contact them.

Thank you to those that have contacted us about our contest offer!

Registration is now closed, but we look forward to participation in this contest again in the future.

  “Our main goal is to help your business grow”.

This statement has been at the core of our business outlook since we were founded. Now it’s time to prove it!

We are offering one lucky small business the opportunity to have their safety management system designed and produced by us, for free.  The safety management system will be compliant with the Nova Scotia Construction Safety Association’s Certificate of Recognition (COR) auditing standard.

To be eligible, make sure that your business meets the entry criteria* and simply answer the following questions:

Who will be responsible for the administration of the programme once it is implemented?

What is your business classification? (What do you do?)

 Why should your company be selected for a free safety management system? (Are you a new business? Are you a socially responsible company that deserves some help? Are you experiencing higher than average incident rates?)

What difficulties has your company faced when trying to set up their safety programme? (Has limited administrative support been a barrier to setting up a programme? Are you simply too busy to do it yourself?)

How will a safety programme benefit your business? (Are you seeking COR certification or are you looking to bid on additional contracts?)

 
We will select one company from the submissions that we receive and reply to the winner with details on how to proceed.  The offer will at midnight on June 30th, 2015 or when we reach thirty submissions (whichever comes first).

Email your submission to [email protected] with “June, 2015 Offer” as the subject line.



This is the first time that we are extending this type of offer and we hope that it will be a success.  We would like to make this a recurring event in an effort to promote workplace safety in Nova Scotia and help to grow local businesses.

 



*Entry Criteria: Your business must:

Be registered and operate in Nova Scotia.
- Have 20 or fewer employees.
- Be willing to provide a written testimonial at the end of the project.
- Not currently be represented by another safety consulting firm.
- Be willing to have your business showcased on our website. 

Every company that investigates incidents will no doubt encounter challenges when working to complete their investigations.  Mark Paradies recently posted a top ten list of common mistakes observed when performing investigations, as voted by attendees of the first TapRoot Summit in Gatlinburg, Tennessee in 1994. The list was also later published in the August, 1994 Root Cause Network™ newsletter:

1.      Management revises the facts. (Or management says "You can't say that.")
2.      Assumptions become facts.
3.      Untrained team of investigators. (We assign good people/engineers to find causes.)
4.      Started investigation too late.
5.      Stopped investigation too soon.
6.      No systematic investigation process.
7.      Management can't be the root cause.
8.      Supervisor performs investigation in their spare time.
9.      Fit the facts to the scenario. (Management tells the investigation team what to find.)
10.   Hidden agendas.  

For anyone who is not familiar with the TapRoot incident investigation system, please visit their website: www.taproot.com. You will find a wealth of information relating to their investigation system as well as articles posted by many of their company representatives.

If your company needs assistance in performing incident investigations or mentoring your personnel on effective incident investigation practices, please visit the contact page and reach out to us.

- 

Whether we want to admit it or not, we are now well into Fall and Winter is just around the corner. With early morning frosts and snowy conditions on the horizon, it is a good time of year to review how your company intends to manage these hazards at your worksites. 

Reviewing your company's annual general hazard assessment is always a good idea, but there are also some specific exercises that you can conduct in order to prepare for slip/trip/fall season:

• Site or area specific hazard assessments to look for areas of concern before slippery conditions develop.
• Discuss the importance of footwear condition with workers to ensure that personal protective equipment is suitable for seasonal challenges.
• Ensure that housekeeping inspections also focus on "transition areas" like office foyers, boot rooms and areas unfinished floors, as these often overlooked areas are responsible for many slip/fall injuries each year in many industries.

Have you ever wondered how Workers' Compensation rates are calculated in Nova Scotia? As a business owner, understanding how your business is charged the applicable assessment rate can help you create a benchmark for safety performance and lower your compensation premiums over time based on your company's experience rating. For detailed information on how the Workers' Compensation Board of Nova Scotia calculates their rate premiums, please visit their website here.

Generally speaking, job procedures are a list of the specific steps that are required to complete a specific task while at work. A "safe job procedure" will explain how to perform the job successfully. Some people confuse a "safe job procedure" with a "safe work practice", which is more of a tool to provide general awareness rather than a list of steps that need take place for a job to be successful.

Admittedly, both safe job procedures and safe work practices are not the most exciting of safety related topics. In fact, they are often overlooked by many smaller businesses in order to focus on other areas of their business. When looking at how a business completes their work, overlooking the importance of safe job procedures can be detrimental to the company's workers and reputation.

Effectively developed and implemented safe job procedures will:

• Provide workers with a plan for how to safely complete a job.
• Communicate the quality and service expectations that a small business owner wishes to maintain if they are not present at all work sites.
• Identify the hazards and precautions that are expected when completing the specific task.
• Reduce the likelihood of workers being injured when completing the job identified in the safe job procedure.
• Decrease the frequency of quality or service errors.
• Provide a reference to any external information that may be needed by an unsupervised workforce. 
• Act as a marketing tool for the company when bidding on new work by assuring prospective customers that a defined process exists for work that your business is contracted to perform. 

If you feel that your business could benefit from an established set of safe job procedures, please visit the contact page. We would be happy to help. 
 

Claymore Safety Inc. has been added to the Nova Scotia Department of Labour & Workforce Development's Consultant List. This list identifies Safety Professionals in Nova Scotia that are able to help businesses satisfy their mandated Occupational Health & Safety requirements.

If you are interested in searching the list of Consultants, you can view it here.

We look forward to working with our Customers to build collaborative relationships with the Department.
 

We are getting ready for the upcoming New Year by planning website upgrades and expanding our service offerings.


Stay tuned for information on specific improvements early in 2014.


We are really excited for things to come and would like to thank our customers and clients for their continued support.

We would like to extend best wishes for the Holiday Season and the upcoming New Year to our Customers and Clients.


All the best to you and yours!