22nd Jun, 2021 Read time 2 minutes

Is it time to start selling health and safety to your directors?

Many talk about the need to get buy-in for your health and safety initiatives, and given the often expensive nature of health and safety, this can often be tricky to get.

The lack of enthusiasm that many company boards show when it comes to health and safety could mean it is time to really start looking at how you can sell health and safety to your organisations.


In many ways, it shouldn’t have to be a hard sell. The health and safety of your workforce directly contribute to your bottom line, and it goes without saying that good EHS practices will help protect against costly accidents.

So where are we going wrong as a profession?

 

Are we getting across the importance of safety?

 

When many people think of health and safety they think of clipboards and tick boxes. Whilst these may still offer a function, health and safety has and is becoming so much more than that.

Looking after your workforce will help to improve productivity and if you are a growing company, hiring new talent is always easier when you operate a safe and happy workplace.

 

Health and Safety event photo UK

These benefits should be put forward to board members, in a language that they understand. Putting health and safety initiatives in cost terms shows an awareness of the commercial stuff, and it will also help you to better illustrate the financial benefits of new EHS initiatives and ways of working.

The health and safety conferences run by the HSE Global Series always look at how we can better promote health and safety in the workplace, and getting buy-in from the board is often a contentious topic.

In order to better prepare our members and the wider health and safety community for getting buy-in, HSE Network will be running a series of content around how to advertise and sell health and safety to those within your organisation. Keep an eye out for upcoming podcasts and articles that will give you the tools you need to get your health and safety initiatives through.

In the meantime, we look back on an interview between Elliot Cunnington and Gareth Mullen, Head of Well-being at Thames Water. Gareth and Elliot chat about the mental health and physical well-being initiates Gareth has presided over at Thames Water and how he got the buy-in from the board.

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