This week, Colin meets Christian Harris, the founder of Slip Safety Services, experts in slip testing and anti-slip treatments.
Colin and Christian talk about everything from slips and trips to flooring conditions and staircases, in an insightful, informative conversation that everyone will find incredibly useful.
KEY TAKEAWAYS
Slip Safety are a floor maintenance company with two key specialist areas:
Cleanliness and hygiene in hard to clean areas. such as kitchens and poolsides.
Prevention of slips, trips and falls, particularly in environments where floors are likely to get wet.
It was important for Christian to use his time and career to focus on something that would make a positive difference to the world. Christian takes huge pride in helping people to solve problems.
When your heel touches the floor, if there is sufficient friction between the two, then you will not slip. The pendulum test mimics this in a scientific way, and tells how slip-resistant the floor’s surface is.
Floors and their surfaces wear and change over time. Cleaning regimes can have a huge impact. Some of the chemicals we use today were not taken into account when certain floors were made.
30% of care home residents fall in any given year. Of those who fall, 75% are likely to fall again. Older people are far more susceptible to serious injury.
Lighting is critical. We need to make sure that walkways are illuminated not just for obstacles or spillages, but also so that we can visually appraise the surface of the floor.
People are more likely to register an injury claim in private sector places. Christian puts this down to the sense that people seem to have, that there is more money in privately owned places, than publicly owned ones.
There is a direct correlation between clean, hygienic premises and customer satisfaction, and therefore sales. Studies show that clean places often report increases in sales of around 20%. In leisure this is heightened.
BEST MOMENTS
’I spend too much time on my hands and knees in toilets!’
‘Environment is something that people often neglect’
’Things like single steps are a big issue’
’There’s a correlation between cleanliness and customer satisfaction’
‘It’s not expensive stuff. It just requires a bit more thought'
VALUABLE RESOURCES
The Interesting Health And Safety Podcast - https://podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/training-competency-creating-effective-plan-process/id1467771449?i=1000452692837
Slip Safety - https://slipsafety.co.uk
Christian Harris LinkedIn - https://www.linkedin.com/in/christian-harris-slip-safety/?originalSubdomain=uk
ABOUT THE HOST
Colin Nottage
‘Making health and safety as important as everything else we do.’
This is the belief that Colin is passionate about and through his consultancy Influential Management Group (IMG) is able to spread into industry. Colin works at a strategic level with company owners and board members. He helps business leaders establish and achieve their health and safety ambitions.
He has developed a number of leading competency improvement programmes that are delivered across industry and his strengths are his ability to take a practical approach to problem-solving and being able to liaise at all levels within an organisation.
Colin also runs a company that vets contractors online and a network that develops and support H&S consultancies to become better businesses.
Colin chairs the Construction Dust Partnership, an industry collaboration directly involving many organisations, including the Health and Safety Executive.
He is a Post Graduate Tutor at Strathclyde University and a highly sought-after health and safety speaker and trainer. He has a Post Graduate Certificate in Safety and Risk management, an engineering degree and is a Chartered Member of the Institution of Occupational Safety and Health (IOSH).
