In this episode Bjørn is guested by Aparajithan Vetriselvan, HSE Mental Focus Specialist, Divisional HSE Manager, Serco, United Arab Emirates.
In this episode, Aparajithan explains his journey from starting in HSE in India to now being a Divisional HSE Manager in Dubai and how he believes that sector has skyrocketed to being more advanced in the span of the last 10 years.
From his point of view listening to the employees of the company is key for success. Simply listening like you have never listened before, will ensure that the trust comes naturally. It may sound very simple, but it has tremendous effects!
In the episode, Aparajithan, moreover, shares what he believes to be the biggest change in the field: the change from documenting just for the sake of documentation to behaviour tranings of employees. When Aparajithan started in the field, he felt that HSE was basically just about ISO certifications. Today he believes that the sector is evolving and including much more specific traning. He firmly believes that this is the most different aspect today as well as the most engaging and interesting part. At the moment, virtual reality trainings are also starting to come across, which could offer new ways of increasing safety measures. For Aparajithan training sessions with this new VR have been mind-blowing! He believes that training people in e.g., fire safety and first aid safety situations could prove to be very beneficial, as you then have a chance to know how things will unfold and to train staff before such dangerous situations might occur in real life.
Starting to engage more with employees as he moved his career to Dubai, he also found himself starting to develop himself more. Especially regarding the engagement part and the communication part. He’s been part of initiating meeting between employees without supervisors which has proven to be very helpful in the process of opening engagement initiatives between the teams, where they’ve come up with safety observations on the side and they’ve created more engagement with near miss issues. Their first HSE committee meeting was simply a floodgate for them!
Listen to this episode to learn much more about Aparajithan’s fascinating HSE career and insights!