Emrill wins regions’ Health & Safety Award at annual Facilities Management Awards

Emrill, the leading Facilities Management company in the UAE, won the award for "Health & Safety Initiative of the Year" at the Facilities Management Middle East Awards held in Dubai recently at The Westin Dubai. 

This prestigious award recognises the paramount importance Emrill places on the safety and health of its employees. The company strives year on year to achieve ‘zero’ accidents and incidents with their employees by focusing on accident prevention. To support this goal, Emrill launched the unique winning initiative “Don’t Walk By” campaign, an ongoing internal safety awareness system. 

The initiative received an overwhelming response impacting the mind-sets of employees and leading to a higher level of safety awareness and accident prevention with a cumulative of 263,366 situations where 4,000 Emrill employees chose “not to walk by”. 

The company strongly believes in delivering high quality services to clients without jeopardizing the safety of its employees and the community by promoting a ‘Safety First culture’. Emrill’s target for zero accidents and incidents policy is simple: If it is not safe, don’t do it! 

Ben Churchill, Managing Director, Emrill said, “The Health & Safety Award is a prestigious award to win and demonstrates how much we truly care for our people. With the “Don’t Walk By” programme, we were able to engage and empower employees at all levels to recognise and raise concerns about unsafe working practices and conditions. Feedback from employees are logged, measured and immediately acted upon to prevent incidents and loss. This pro-active approach from every employee has contributed to Emrill’s excellent Health and Safety standards.” 

In 2011 alone Emrill conducted 13,159 training sessions for staff covering 54 areas of Health and Safety. These training and refresher courses are conducted at all stages of employment to ensure that staff are regularly updated on Health, Safety and Environment best practices. The company’s stringent and extensive safety systems and training programs have been audited and certified the OHSAS 18001:2007 international standard across all operational sites. 

“Identifying and controlling hazards to maintain a safe working environment is fundamental. At Emrill, we want people to return home safely from work every day.” said Mr. Churchill. 

Bonus programmes and employee incentive schemes for Health and Safety have also been built into Personal Development goals for each Emrill employee in order to drive the culture of Health and Safety through all levels of the organisation. 

Emrill takes great pride in this initiative setting the path for its 4000 strong staff to understand and engage in the importance of safety in the workplace. The ‘Don't Walk By’ safety initiative is implemented company-wide practiced by site and office staff alike. Increased staff awareness of Health and Safety issues have contributed to Emrill successfully achieving 10 million safe man hours in September 2011.