Health and Safety - the week ahead

Ever wondered how those involved in health and safety fill their time? The week ahead is very busy for my consultancy. This is how we think it's going to pan out.

Hagrid, one of my consultants, is travelling up to Leeds on Sunday to spend three days assisting a company that makes training videos with "a shoot". This follows several days work over the last few weeks reviewing and revising the script. All is ready for the final phase of this piece of work.

When Hagrid returns from Leeds, he is off to Bristol and then onto Hungerford to delivery Legionella and Asbestos awareness training. This continues a large training commitment that will take up most of the rest of this month.

John is off to Dorking to carry out some Fire Risk Assessment work and then is back to Leicester to do the same for a series of small blocks of flats with common areas. He then needs to create the reports.

Richard is off down to London, where he has picked up a lot of my Facilities Management Safety work. At least the student protests of last week did not get in the way too much.

For my part, I'm carrying out a project management task for a client on Monday as well as finishing off a paper for the Board of another client (reviewing their health and safety compliance across their sites). I will also be checking in on the progress with an update on my previous review of Health and Safety at the British Library. On Tuesday I will be delivering a day of Legionella awareness training. Wednesday involves a series of client meetings and a dental appointment. On Wednesday evening, I will be presenting my Consultancy Business to several clients of my Bank. I'll be talking about the key factors in running your own business as well as discussing how to manage health and safety.

Thursday starts off nice and early with a breakfast Networking meeting - again, promoting my business. The day continues with two schedules telephone conferences to chase progress with clients. Friday will again have an early start with more Networking.

Within the week, I also need to progress quotations for work with both new and existing clients; I need to check various reports before that are sent out; I need to review news & blog pages and sort out new content; I need to work on new PodCast materials and develop some ideas for further YouTube video; etc. I also need to address any issues as and when they arise.

Monday's Update
Hagrid reports that day one of the shoot went well, but was sapping as it involved a lot of standing around. Day two will involve film kitchen activity - the key is not to be in the way.

The telephone conference calls went well, as did the project manager review. All of the issues seem to be being progressed. The Board paper is nearly complete, it just needs two small pieces of information from the client (promised for tomorrow). Richard's sojourn in London went well, he not has the reports to put together tomorrow. Need to follow up to ensure that John got on okay in Dorking.

Tuesday's Update
Today's Legionella training course was well received by the delegates. There was lots of discussion on the risk assessments and also on record keeping. It never ceases to amaze me how tiring training is. Some time was devoted during the evening to preparing the business to business presentation (B2B) for tomorrow evening with the Bank and some of its clients. I'm hoping that this leads to contact with some interested new (potential) clients.

Feedback from Hagrid on today's filming for the training video was, again, encouraging. I'm a little envious of him for the experience, but I could spare the three consecutive days out of the business. I've been carrying out a little background research to assist him tomorrow - the power of the Internet can be useful sometimes.

Richard attended "Get Bizzing" on my behalf and reported that it was both interesting and (potentially) beneficial. In other news - report writing continues unabated and Richard has been dealing with various phone calls, and general client issues.

Wednesday's Update
Today started for me with a quick trip into the office to touch base with Richard and "delegate" a few tasks to him. I then met with a local client at 08:15 hrs to attend the start of their Board Meeting (where Health and Safety is discussed). My return to the office saw me finishing off the presentation for tonight (more later) and checking through several reports before sending them on to various clients. I dealt with a couple of enquiries and sent off one proposal for client support.

Before leaving the office to attend a dental appointment, I sorted out some invoices for some of the project clients - this is a routine task that I keep rather than delegate. Following the dental appointment, I made a few phone calls and drove over to Blaby (Leicester) where I was giving a Business to Business at a branch of HSBC to about 35 local organisations. This finished at about 20:30 hrs making today a long one. I found the experience rewarding and I'm looking forward to talking to some of the people that I met.

John enjoyed a day off and Richard was working in the office - and picking up delegated tasks! In the afternoon he set off to see a client only to have them phone and cancel while he was in transit. It doesn't happen too often, but it is frustrating. Fortunately, it was a local client.

Hagrid enjoyed the last day of the filming project, after which he called by to collect the training materials for the next two days (in Bristol and in Hungerford). Busy day for all, except John.

Thursday's Update
Well, with the working 4/5 the way through, it's good to say that most things have been achieved.
I made it to the Early Morning Breakfast meeting and renewed several good contacts. This is not a meeting that I attend regularly (it is one where I substitute into a few times a year).

I managed to chase up a lot of information for one particular client and update them in many areas. This involved an extremely long telephone discussion with one of their suppliers. The information was distilled down into a suitable spreadsheet and then emailed over.

Richard and I planned out service delivery to several clients (with a view to keeping him busy until Christmas). We discuoveed a couple of things that had been missed previously and have put things in place to keep the clients happy.

Hagrid delivered a day of Legionella Awareness training in Bristol and is travelling over to Hungerford to spend another training another group in the same subject. Five more of these sessions to be delived this month! We are alos hoping for some follow on training work.

I have put together a proposal for Food Safety Training fo nearly 250 people for next year -fingers crossed on that one!

I will have to miss the early morning Networking tomorrow as I will be taking the car into the garage for servicing. Real life intrudes on health and safety (whatever next).

Friday's Update
I was in the office early after dropping the car off for a service. So far, so good. While contemplating the day ahead, I have noticed that my writing needs to be smaller to get the ideas and actions up on the whiteboard.

Well, Hagrid completed a tough week of filming and training. He carried out the Legionella training in Hungerford and is making his week home for a well earned rest at the weekend.

Richard and John worked through various reports, submitting them in to the office for the formatting to be checked by Janice before being sent on to the client. One of these Fire Safety Risk Assessments was needed by a care home to show to the Fire Officer.

For my part, I finalised a few reports and spreadsheets for several clients and did my stint of chasing up to ensure that clients are receiving their reports on time.

I also had an interesting conversation with an Enforcement Officer with respect to an issue involving a sub-contractor to one of my clients.