With the Take Care Award, we make special safety achievements and examples of good safety behaviour visible and reward them. The third Take Care Award of 2024 was presented to the project team of the EACOP (East African Crude Oil Pipeline) project in Tanzania for improving the reporting culture around unsafe situations.

Çetin Eriş, Deputy Project Manager of Ballast Nedam International: ‘Our project is large and complex and has many parties involved. They all insist on safety. We believe that all accidents and incidents are preventable. If employees report unsafe situations in time, you can do something about it and get ahead of the accidents.’ Çetin and his team therefore put considerable effort into improving the reporting culture. Colleagues were encouraged to report, and explained why it is so important. ‘Everyone wants to go home healthy at the end of the day. So with that, you can motivate everyone to report unsafe situations.’

720 reports

The result of the effort was overwhelming: as many as 720 reports were received in calendar week 29-32 (period 8). About half were positive observations, showing that many project staff take safety seriously. The other half consisted of Signs of Unsafe Situations (SOS reports), such as unsafe access to the workplace and violation of life-saving rules (think of the prohibition to walk under a hanging load). Of these SOS reports, 94% have now been followed up, including with training.

Did Çetin expect to win the Take Care Award? ‘To be honest: since the award existed, we had our sights set on it. But given the large number of reports, we just didn't think we would actually win it. Of course, we are proud of it. We will spend the award on a treat for all employees, plus a small party for the colleagues who made the most reports.’

 

Cheque of €500

Every quarter, the Take Care Award jury (consisting of Geert van der Linde, HSE director, and members of the Works Council's HSE committee) chooses a winner from all nominations from the previous quarter. The Take Care Award is thus presented four times a year. For the winning nomination, €500 is made available to arrange a nice treat together with the (project) team or department involved, to donate to charity or to do something fun.