Hi there,

Do we have any College/University H&S/Compliance officers out there that can possibly assist me on this?

What are the 3 biggest challenges facing SHE Officers in managing safety compliance issues within the estates sector of Higher Education?

I'm assuming the possible issues are that of shared ownership/stakeholder management, control of MOPs/young persons and budgetary control. But I could do with someone who is already living/breathing/eating the role to give me a sanity check.

I'm currently working within a manufacturing environment and have been for donkeys years - but contemplating a sideways shift into a different sector.

Thanks in advance,

Lol!!! You're really selling it to me. 

Thank you so much for your response, your succinct answer is pretty much what I had suspected - particularly the last one! Having come from an FMCG background where a bad decision made in a timely manner is still better than a protracted good/no decision, I may well find this element of the job the most frustrating. 

You've given me food for thought. 

I am a recently retired University safety officer from within the academic side of the operation. Relationships between academic departments and estates can be complex because the boundaries are not always well-defined, and there is often lack of understanding between them. Although I agree with what A Kurdziel says you do need to bear in mind that academics are trying to push back the frontiers of science and this is not only dangerous at times, but the academics involved actually know rather a lot and are often right.

Estates - they need to listen to what the academics, and the safety officers who are representing their interests are saying, sometimes they actually do know what they are talking about. Especially in things like bulk cryogens. They probably know more about it than you do.

Estates - there can be a divide between the teams that actually design, build and commission buildings and the team(s) that maintain buildings. This may be a combination of estates staff and internal staff in the department who occupy the building. This can lead to a huge hiatus when the building is about a year old when no-one knows who is responsible for fixing problems and no-one actually knows how to because of the lack of communication.

Working with departments. Large academic departments may have a considerable sized maintenance teams, who get to know the building a lot better than Estates do. This will depend both on the size of the estate and the size of the department. They are your friends, not your rivals. If there are aspects of maintenance that you normally undertake, then make sure that you liaise with the department to reassure both parties that the work is being done. If, for example, the estates dept is short  on peoplepower remember that you can work as a team with the department, provided you are honest about what you can and cannot do.

Common sense approach - for instance, don't install emergency showers without drains in the floor, just because the standard does not actually specify that there should be a drain. It should be obvious that one is needed. Remember that laboratories are potentially more dangerous than offices, so use good practice and don't do things like mixing electrical phases on the benches and having emergency cutoff switches that only shut off a tiny fraction of the sockets in the room. Again, if the safety officer representing the academic's interests is not happy with your approach, listen to them; this will build trust. If you don't listen, then distrust will flourish, which benefits no-one.

I worked in universities for many years as University technician before moving over to the civil service when I took up a H&S role. I assumed when I returned to academia that things had changed and they had but not as much as I had hoped.  The sector seems to be only just getting away from the idea that H&S is what the H&S person does   and that the academics are only interested in teaching and/or research and anything that impedes this is only “pointless red tape”.  

I must take issue with the idea that research is intrinsically dangerous.  In my time I have been involved in number of hazardous activities but in every case the risk has been managed and residual risk has been acceptable.   A research laboratory should be the just about the most controlled environment in any workplace.  Most researchers understand this and work with us to control the risks but a  few though seem to follow the old school approach; for example one when I was looking at fume hood use seemed to spend most their time telling (boasting about?) of the number if fume hoods he had destroyed  during his research days.  

Not a good example to the next generation!

The worry about overseas students including PhDs is that you explain something to them like COSHH and they smile and nod their heads and then you realise that they have not understood a word and that the basic concepts HAZARD RISK and SAFETY don’t really feature in their vocabulary. So you have a word with the academic and suggest that they keep a close eye in them and you keep your fingers crossed!