SHEQ is a critical element of operational best practice for both BES and our clients. As a company that designs and delivers critical projects, often in live environments, our commitment is to ensure safety is achieved by choice, not by chance.

The role of the SHEQ department is not only focused on safety, but we are also responsible for environmental best practice, quality assurance and health and well-being. All these elements are essential and interconnected aspects of both our operational management and our company culture. We strive for continuous improvement and achievement beyond our clients’ expectations.

As part of our commitment to continuous improvement, we have implemented several initiatives recently focusing on safety, quality assurance, environmental goals, health, and well-being; all of which will contribute to the successful delivery of our projects.

Safety

We work on a variety of projects, some of which are design only and others with design and build requirements. Following our involvement within the Kick Off Meeting, where we look to identify any possible hazards, environmental permitting considerations or our resource requirements for the project, another key role for the SHEQ Team is our involvement with the design risk management process. From the RIBA Stage 3 design, we will begin to review our designs for hazards and constructability issues. As such, we complete a Safety in Design review, where we take into consideration the life cycle of the project, including build, end-user requirements and maintenance. The output of this process is the Residual Risk Register, which is then communicated to all interested parties.

As a project moves to construction, we must manage the risk of all works. When we are acting as Principal Designer and Principal Contractor, we need to manage all contractors and their associated risks. We manage this process by carrying out our Plan Do Review (PDR) Meetings each morning. Additionally, our safe systems of work (SSoW) Review, undertaken by our highly experienced construction managers, ensures we gain a great rapport with our subcontractors. This collaborative approach has resulted in improved content, timeliness, and quality of RAMS, lifting plans and CoSHH Assessments from across our supply chain.

Over the past five years, alongside an exemplary RIDDOR score, we have also successfully achieved ISO 45001 certification and increased our CHAS Health and Safety Basic accreditation to the Elite status. During this time, we have also garnered numerous client awards for health and safety and have now successfully achieved 2 Gold RoSPA health and safety achievements to date.

Our ongoing investment in digital health and safety processes will further enhance this track record. Providing a faster, more consistent, and more transparent approach to collecting, reporting and analysing occupational health and safety data, our digital systems will also help us to measure improvement. The data will be used to complete the trend analysis, to help us set SMART objectives and provide targeted training for both our team and our supply chain partners.

Environment

Following our achievement of obtaining ISO 14001 for environmental management, we continue to improve our management systems, with integration into our everyday working methodologies, allowing us to do the ‘right thing’ and achieve better business outcomes – without any compromise.

Our design team have also benefited from training to ensure we focus on embedding sustainability and reducing carbon emissions into projects at the design stage, enabling us to extend our positive focus on environmental improvement across the upstream and downstream delivery chain. This sustainability offering has also been well received from our clients, who are striving to achieve their own ESG objectives, demonstrating their commitments to innovation, risk reduction and a measurable impact.

In addition to the more generic ISO requirements and expectations, we are keen to make a real difference for future generations and, as such, have set ourselves the ambitious goal of achieving net zero emissions by 2050 and have launched our carbon reduction plan to help us achieve it. This plan prompts actions such as enabling agile working and promoting car sharing for our team to reduce journeys to the office and site locations, as well as behavioural change and a commitment to reduced waste.

We aim to set achievable goals year-on-year and report on what we’ve achieved so that we are accountable for credible environmental improvement, having already made some fantastic changes to reduce the environmental impact of our buildings.

Wellbeing

At BES, we know our multi-disciplinary team is our greatest asset, so we continue to launch new wellbeing campaigns and initiatives that provide meaningful support for physical and mental health.

We already have several mental health first aiders within the business who can signpost people to sources of support should they need it. Our health and wellbeing initiative includes a free 30-minute medical consultation with personalised advice for improving physical and mental health. All information from the health assessments will remain confidential, but will be used to carry out trend analysis by various metrics, to ensure we implement any additional wellbeing support if a need is identified.

The initiative is part of our focus on supporting every member of our team, building on our company culture and aiding staff retention by ensuring every employee feels valued.

Putting clients first

SHEQ is high on the agenda for our clients, which makes it a key priority for us at BES, as in every other aspect of our activities, we aim to exceed expectations. That’s why we’re investing in the systems, initiatives and people who will help us make a positive difference.