A Yorkton business has received praise from the province for its employee safety.
WorkSafe Saskatchewan announced the 2021 Safe Employer Award winner, and this year's winner was Triple-A Directional Drilling Ltd.
Vanessa Andres, a co-owner of Triple-A Directional Drilling, said receiving the award means a lot to them.
"It means that we have a wonderful team alongside of us," she stated. "It means our team values the safety culture that we've created; it means that we've set a standard in our business. We've taken a lot of steps to get where we are; we've done it all as a team. We put the time and the effort into our safety."
"There's a lot of good companies in our industry with a high level of safety standards, so to be set apart just really brings the bar up a notch, and we are just really proud of each of our employees and just of our company," she added.
Andres said that one thing that has helped them with safety is a cloud-based safety management system. This program helps to keep safety a top priority by allowing the company to monitor safety compliance in real-time from a desktop computer, laptop or authorized mobile device. Consequently, information from this application can be plotted into analytics to assist in identifying deficiencies and future goals and objectives.
In its commitment to continuously improving, Triple-A has also sponsored a full-time employee to complete a Health and Safety Administration (HSA) course (this worker won SCSA's HSA of the Year award in 2019), hired a full-time, certified National Construction Safety Officer (NCSO) implemented many new engineering controls, and overall adopted a higher industry standard for training.
"It means everybody is trained at a higher level. We've taken the time to not only get the job done right but also safely and efficiently. We just want everybody to go home at the end of the day," she said. "Everybody has a family; it's not just something that we teach in our business but also something we take with us at home. We value each employee; we value their commitment to safety."
The Safe Employer Award is presented to a best practice employer who builds safety into every task. This award recognizes employers who emphasize safety and make it a key part of their operations. Winners do not view safety as an inconvenient requirement but rather as an exciting opportunity to share new safety ideas and concepts with their staff, ensuring that everyone within the organization plays their part in promoting a safe work environment.
Workplace peers and colleagues nominate the recipients of these awards. Two committees representing WorkSafe Saskatchewan, the Saskatchewan Federation of Labour, the Saskatchewan Safety Council and the Canadian Society of Safety Engineers adjudicate the nominations.
WorkSafe Saskatchewan founded the Safe Employer Award in 2007 to honour an employer who shows leadership in health and safety beyond the industry's requirements and legislation.
