PSA: THE BIGGER PICTURE
SAFETY FIRST PSA’s Andy Lenthall shares some key insights from this year’s Event Safety Summit.
Safety Island: that’s what they call the UK, those touring folks from the USA – unfavourably, so we’re led to believe. When they come over here, legend has it that they plant a stars-and-stripes flag on stage and do what they jolly well like. Thing is, every time we pop over to the Event Safety Summit in Lititz, PA, the good people at the Event Safety Alliance continue to see that moniker as a light towards which they should lead their ever-increasing band of followers. There’s so much content delivered over two-and-a-half days that we can’t possibly cover it all due to lack of space and the inability to be in three sessions at a time. What we can do is share a few new insights and look at some responses to an audience survey that was carried out during the event. First word goes to Founder and President, Jim Digby, who left the conference with three takeaways before things had started, simply because he was working in Saudi Arabia before the event had closed. Learn CPR, get trained in the use of an AED and take mental health first aid training – three things that, if acted on by the hundreds in attendance, would see vast improvements. Engagement is always key to the Event Safety Summit; workshops on all manner of subjects ensure that but, as presentations in the main
space took place, the audience was polled on a number of questions. An encouraging split in the experience level of attendees showed 50% of those present having 16+ years of time served, with 16% stating less than five years, showing that there are old dogs willing to learn new tricks or happy to pass on valuable experience. A healthy 57% of attendees were at director or management level, giving the hope that initiatives and learning will filter down rather than struggle uphill through the ranks – crucial with something so critical as safety – even better when 60% have their hands on budget to buy and specify safety-related equipment and services, the majority being from actual production vendors rather than event safety people. Clearly the Event Safety Summit is still talking to the right audience and not preaching to the choir. With the right audience, questions turned to the assessment of safety culture in organisations, probing the attitudes of leaders but bearing in mind that with an audience at a safety conference, data may be skewed by a predisposition to already creating safe workplaces. Two thirds of those who responded claim that safety training is a job requirement. However, one third say the opposite, which on those results alone, leaves plenty of 90
