Written By: Randy Gieseking
Safety Management Group (SMG) has a bright new jewel in its crown of safety achievements. Earlier this year, the Board of Certified Safety Professionals (BCSP) recognized us as a Ruby tier Certification Champion, as we currently have 43 certified safety professional credentials linked to our company record. (The BCSP has been “setting and certifying the technical competency criteria for safety, health and environmental (SH&E) practitioners since 1969.”)
With budgets for training and continuing education, SMG encourages team members to pursue these certifications so they can grow professionally and ensure our clients are in the best hands possible.
“In terms of our core values, this represents commitment to our clients and associates,” said Director of Safety Operations Jordan Hollingsworth. “We’re a service provider, and people are our service. We want to provide our clients with highly competent, professional individuals who have the most reputable certifications in the industry. And we’re committed to helping our associates with their professional development. For my team members, I require a BCSP certification within one year of employment.”
SMG’s Newest Certified Safety Professional
Jesse Camp, one of the members of Hollingsworth’s group, became a Certified Safety Professional (CSP) earlier this year. He said the exam training and certification process is crucial in helping safety professionals understand how to make safety not just part of a specific jobsite project but a permanent fixture of a company’s culture.
“Becoming certified ensures that safety professionals go one step further in field observations,” Camp said. “Let’s say they see employees not wearing safety glasses or using a harness lanyard. Rather than simply saying, ‘Hey, put your gear on,’ a certified safety professional goes to the next level in determining the reasoning behind that deficiency in wearing protective equipment. Is their current equipment insufficient? Does it not fit employees’ needs? Is this a cultural issue?”
These are the kinds of questions our onsite advisors ask as part of our ProSolutions services. Going through the certification process helps our safety experts step back from the frontlines, see the bigger picture and understand the intricacies of complex projects. In other words, a certified safety professional takes a bird’s-eye view of a company’s safety culture, keeping an eye on the business at large, not just individual employees.
“From studying for the certification exams, I learned a lot about business continuity as well as legal and environmental liability,” Camp said. “Again, safety isn’t just about protecting people — it’s also about protecting property and the environment.”
In terms of this wider scope, Camp pointed to the practices of a food plant sanitation company, specifically the chemical storage and wastewater management protocols it implements to avoid environmental emissions and affecting pH levels downstream. These protocols not only keep employees safe and the business operating — they safeguard the surrounding city and environment as well. Before Camp went through the certification process, he didn’t quite realize the level of widespread impact that protocols like these make.
Hollingsworth confirmed this deeper understanding, saying, “Certification changes the way you analyze issues. It brings a whole different set of skills and tools to your mindset — from better understanding of business to human behavior and philosophy. During the certification process, you learn about various personality types and how to approach different workers in the field. It’s more about coaching than being a safety cop.”
Camp added that this understanding creates “a unique bond” between certified safety professionals. SMG’s team of 300-plus experts boasts more than 15 different types of certifications.
Certification ensures a level of expertise that’s vital in helping us deliver what we promise through ProSolutions, namely education and training for your company’s team as well as safety program and policy development, leadership and management. We’ll build your company’s safety culture from the classroom to the construction site.
How can we guarantee your team’s growth if we don’t invest in our own? Putting our employees on the path to certification helps us become better equipped for large-scale projects within industries such as:
- Steel mills
- Power plants
- Chemical facilities
- Pharmaceutical production
- Automotive manufacturing
For more than 30 years, leaders within these industries have leaned on us for environmental, health and safety (EHS) solutions. (Click here to learn how we reduced the Total Recordable Incident Rate (TRIR) by 64% for one of the nation’s largest investor-owned utilities.)
Our ProSolutions team of certified professionals help enforce sustainable operations, reduce incidents and increase standards for quality.
Learn more about SMG, and if we can be of service to you, please contact us.
