Patrick W. Saltmarsh Tim Hunt, CHST Dir. of Envt’l, Safety Health and Safety Corporate Director W. J. L. Derenzo French Excavating Corp. Companies
Taking Some COVID-19 Lessons Learned Into 2021 First and foremost, I would like to thank Patrick Saltmarsh for taking the time to write Safety Corner articles for the last two years. He created an engaging monthly article for relevant safety information. I’m looking forward to sharing my experience as a Safety Professional with Construction Outlook readers and building on Patrick’s momentum throughout the coming year.
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s we turn the page and begin 2021, we look back on what 2020 brought us. Many would like to forget about 2020 altogether. I am suggesting you look at it differently. What if 2020 was the best year of your life? Think about that for a minute. Let the thought sink in. You were forced to face challenge after challenge. You were forced to adapt and overcome obstacles you might never have otherwise encountered. You were forced to be more resilient than you thought possible. 2020 forced everyone to grow. Not just a little, but exponentially. We have all heard of the old saying “necessity is the mother of invention.” Another word for invention is innovation and that is exactly what we all have had to do thanks to COVID-19 – to be more innovative. Some things may never go back to the way they once were, and from a health and safety standpoint, that might not be so bad. Prior to 2020, my bet is not many people had been on a video conference call, let alone known how to conduct one. We quickly learned the dynamics of video conferencing. We learned the magic of the mute button, that you need to be aware of your surroundings while on a video call, and that sometimes you can get away with wearing shorts since you are only visible from the chest up, sometimes. Innovation did not stop there though. Decades JANUARY, 2021
old methods used for safety teaching and training were suddenly thrown to the side and a new style was forced to be developed. Virtual training brought on the ability to reach a larger audience. However, you cannot just take the classroom curriculum and throw it into the virtual theatre. Teachers and trainers were forced to review, revise and in some cases, start all over again in order to ensure the material translated well virtually. 2020 gave way to the rise of contactless processes. From means of payment to electronic forms and checklists. The construction industry was thrown into a cyclone of change. Inspections, toolbox talks, daily continued on page 43
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