COVID-19: Fast-tracking a safe return to work

Returning to work at alert level 3 presented numerous challenges for Piritahi, a land development alliance responsible for delivering build-ready land and new and upgraded infrastructure and amenity on behalf of Kāinga Ora – Homes and Communities. This is the story of how its HR and Health and Safety teams addressed the massive challenge of ensuring safety and compliance training was delivered efficiently, effectively and safely.

As New Zealand approached the possibility of moving to alert level 3 back in April 2020, Piritahi teams prepared and planned for how its sites could be managed and operated safely during the COVID-19 pandemic, and in addition to the already rigorous health and safety controls required in a construction environment. Piritahi facilitates government-owned land becoming ready to build new homes on. It also designs and constructs new or upgraded infrastructure, parks and public spaces. A big part of this planning and preparation was figuring out how to educate and inform people on the new mandatory site protocols and procedures that were implemented to keep people safe.

Because of gathering restrictions, social distancing, and the priority of keeping its people safe, Piritahi knew it needed to make the training online and available 24/7 so staff and sub-contractors could complete it at a time convenient to them. It had to act quickly and effectively to get its people trained and back to work safely.

Already having an efficient cloudbased HR system, Piritahi decided to develop an integrated learning management system (LMS) to enable online delivery of training and integration with its HR systems for reporting and record keeping.

Why choose an LMS for the training?

• Cloud-based – needed to be accessible anywhere at any time because so many people were working from home.

• Tablet and smartphone accessible – needed to be accessible on tablets and mobiles because so many staff were working from home.

• Personal email access – needed the ability to gain access to the system with personal email addresses because numerous staff and sub-contractors did not have Piritahi email addresses.

• Off-the-shelf solution – the system needed to be set up quickly with minimal technical support.

• Integration with existing HR software – the system needed to integrate reporting and training records.

What training was delivered via the LMS?

Piritahi created scripts covering the following topics that people needed to understand and know before returning to site:

1. introduction to COVID-19

2. arriving at site

3. visitors to site

4. starting work on site

5. leaving sites

6. what to do if someone gets sick.

The LMS saved the organisation a huge amount of time and meant people could return to site quickly and safely.

What were the main benefits?

Ease of access – the LMS was configured to automatically push out and record inductions and training to new starters, and on-demand, where users could complete their course at a time convenient to them.

Efficient – the LMS saved the organisation a huge amount of time and meant people could return to site quickly and safely. Over 4,000 hours of face-to-face training time have been saved since launching the LMS, and for the COVID-19 awareness project alone, over 700 hours have been saved.

Piritahi decided to develop an integrated learning management system (LMS) to enable online delivery of training and integration with its HR systems for reporting and record keeping.

Better reporting – the LMS delivers better reporting and analysis, enabling the organisation to focus its efforts on core operational areas.

Strategic clarity – the LMS is a onestop-shop for delivering training and tracking completion and results. This makes it easy for Piritahi to accurately report to its strategic learning objectives.

What about the future?

Piritahi is now successfully running onboarding and induction programmes through the LMS, recording compliance training, and using it to house its construction competency matrix. All these projects had been nearly impossible to implement before the LMS. It has been an absolute game-changer for Piritahi’s training, development and upskilling of staff.

What were the key learnings?

• Do not assume the digital literacy of your people or their access to technology.

• Staff make the best advocates. Using colleagues who people recognise and respect boosted adoption, especially among the more technophobic staff.

• Family members make great trainers! Friends and whānau were pleased to help get people online to access their compulsory training, to enable them to safely return to work.

• You do not need big-budget videos. Asking staff to record themselves at home made the content seem more real and genuine.

• This is not just an HR tool or a health and safety tool. The success of its implementation means nearly all the teams use the LMS platform to push out ‘refreshers’ or process changes that need to be communicated quickly and clearly.

• Take advantage of unprecedented times to action something you may have been considering for a while – be brave!

HRNZ Member Helen Baillie- Strong is the Learning and Development Lead for Piritahi. Piritahi gets government-owned land ready to build new homes on. Helen can be contacted at helen.baillie-strong@piritahi.nz