Safety is a mindset, but it doesn’t need to be expensive. Brian Fielkow, CEO of Houston-based Jetco Delivery and executive vice president of Montreal-based The GTI Group, has written numerous articles on safety and its impact on rising insurance rates in the past and has now launched an on-demand safety training program called Making Safety Happen.
Fielkow said fleets that participate in the six-course program will come away with a better understanding of how to implement an effective safety program.
“[These are] ideas they can implement so they are practical ideas,” Fielkow told FreightWaves. “They are low-cost ideas. I’m not coming in saying you have to spend all this money to make it happen because to create a safe company and raise the bar takes time and commitment, but it really doesn’t take a lot of money.”
Fleets have faced a steady rise in insurance premiums and jury awards, but Fielkow believes his program can help these fleets achieve better results and employ safer drivers. To illustrate his point, Fielkow noted that Jetco Delivery saw a decrease in insurance premiums this year.
“What’s unique about Making Safety Happen is that I come from this not from the perspective of a safety consultant, [but] I come from this from the perspective of a CEO,” Fielkow said. “Clearly safety is the right thing to do, but it also gives you a competitive safety advantage.”
Many fleets say they are focused on safety and they may listen to presentations at conferences, but Fielkow believes his program is different in that it is not a one-size-fits-all approach. It also works, he said, because it is what Jetco and many other fleets have used to great success.
“They have to take [the program’s concepts] and make them their own,” he said. “They have to tweak them and tweaking them is important because every company is different.”
A one-time fee of $897 gives users access to the Making Safety Happen program, but those who buy it also receive access to Fielkow’s consulting services through monthly group workshops. Fielkow offers one-on-one consulting for an additional fee based on a fleet’s unique needs.
Within the Making Safety Happen program, fleets get six 30-minute recorded sessions. Sessions are:
- Establish safety as a corporate value.
- Decipher when good can be bad: Identify and eliminate safety dysfunctions.
- Engage your front-line team in your safety mission.
- Create a just culture and ensure accountability for safe outcomes.
- Apply the power of process.
- Utilize the right metrics: Capture the leading indicator and practice prevention.
For Fielkow, safety has become ingrained into everything he does at Jetco and GTI, but the approach he takes was learned years ago when he worked at Waste Management. The company had just hired a new senior vice president of safety to address issues.
“I first thought he was going to be [about] rules, regulations and bureaucracy [as] Waste Management was struggling with safety at the time,” Fielkow said. “He came in with a ‘burn-the-rule-book’ approach. And I watched how he took a 50,000-person company from worst to first [in safety].”
Fielkow said the approach was proactive rather than reactive. “I learned the skills and studied hard and those are the skills that I brought to Jetco and GTI,” he said.
That approach and those skills are what form the foundation of Making Safety Happen.
“I really have a desire to help this industry how I can — it’s in crisis with safety and insurance — and if we can do something and help one company save a life, it’s worth it,” Fielkow said.
Once a user buys the program, it is theirs forever, Fielkow said. “Safety has to be a way of life, not a department,” he said, “so use this course to spark some of those difficult conversations.”
Truckload Carriers Association (TCA) members are being offered a special VIP package. TCA members participating in the Making Safety Happen program will receive an invitation to the Safety VIP Trucking in the Round sessions at the Truckload 2021: Nashville conference and the opportunity to attend quarterly Safety in the Round webinars.
In addition, TCA members are being given the opportunity to attend member-only workshops led by Fielkow.
Importantly, the lessons presented in the six sessions can help a fleet of any size, right down to owner-operators, Fielkow noted.
“Safety is at the foundation of an excellence company,” he said. “If you pride yourself on being operationally excellent and you are not achieving excellent safety results, I would challenge that.”
Making Safety Happen will be updated in the months and years ahead and anyone who purchases the program will receive those updates.
Through Sept. 30, anyone signing up for the course and using the promo code MSH20OFF will receive 20% off the list price of $897. More information on the program is available at www.brianfielkow.com. You also may email Fielkow at brian@brianfielkow.com for more information. To register, click here.
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