Conference Kickoff: Incident Prevention 

Incident Prevention. It’s the name of our magazine, the name of our conference and the title of our kickoff. In this engaging, energetic, interactive session, we’ll discuss what it takes to stay safe and be well at the organizational, team and individual levels. You will also be challenged to think about how safety is led and who has the ultimate responsibility for safety. When the session is over, you will leave motivated for the rest of the conference, with practical action items that will benefit you and your organization.

Learning objectives include:

• Understanding the impact of culture on safety.
• Who should be responsible for your safety versus who and what are responsible for your safety.
• Identifying and mitigating common industry shortcomings that overly rely on protective equipment, other people and technology.

Solution Spotlight

How Does Underground Integrity Management Lead to Public and Worker Safety

Identifying underground defects – before they become hazardous and create emergency work scenarios – helps to eliminate the opportunity for injuries in this type of work.

Join this session to:

• Learn how reactive work increases injuries and how being proactive drives them down.
• Understand what you need to know about system reliability.
• Acquire knowledge about technology that pinpoints important issues to drive a proactive work environment.

Solution Spotlight

Explore Your Safety Superpowers

Join this interactive discussion to learn more about where our information comes from, how we can use it to predict the future and what we can do to avoid traps along the way. Session facilitator William Martin will also lead you through exercises intended to help you improve your mind-reading and reasoning skills.

Learning objectives include:

• Understanding our human data collection and retention system.
• Perceiving and cultivating superpowers in ourselves and one another.
• Recognizing how group thinking and confirmation bias weaken our superpowers and cloud outcomes.

Solution Spotlight

Lineworker Safety and Tool Training

This presentation will fill in the gaps regarding the functionality of voltage detectors and phasing meters. Live, known voltage sources will be used in a safe, controlled environment, and session information will be presented in a noncommercial, unbiased format.

Learning objectives include:

• Arc flash and incident prevention
• Proper and improper work methods.
• Understanding how a lineworker couples with capacitance even with PPE.

Solution Spotlight

Join us for a Virtual Networking Hour celebrating all the Safety Super Heroes! We all know someone that’s a safety super hero whether in their day-to-day role or because of a big event where they demonstrated successful safe practices.

May the 4th (may the “force”) be with us as we celebrate one another during this virtual networking hour. Bring stories of safety super heroes you know, and be prepared to share your favorite super hero or sci-fi movie, too!

Understanding Distribution Cover-Up: How to Achieve Isolation & Insulation

Often, distribution cover-up training programs are measured solely by what the regulations require, which is not enough. In this session, you’ll learn how one company changed their training program to require more than the regulations and how that has resulted in fewer contacts and fatalities. Additionally, we’ll explore whether OSHA missed an opportunity to require additional cover for path-to-ground and secondary points of contact to reduce flashes and contacts.

Learning objectives for this session include:

• How cover-up has evolved over the years.
• How your company’s program measures up to industry and regulatory standards.
• Cultural procedures in training that allow accidents to occur and how to address them.

Solution Spotlight

How to Create a Just Safety Culture

In this session, facilitator Rod Courtney will lead a discussion on topics including safety culture; the difference between active errors and latent conditions; the blame cycle and how to stop it; and accountability versus culpability.

Attendees can expect to learn:

• How to stop naming, blaming and shaming.
• How responding to failure shapes the way our organizations learn.
• That learning is a strategic and operational choice toward improvement.
• That we must fix the work, not the worker.
• That in a just culture, everyone wants to be accountable for their actions.

Solution Spotlight

Determine Worker Alertness Through Cognitive Testing

This presentation will help determine if workers are fit for duty through cognitive testing. After years in the safety field, new technological breakthroughs are few and far between. This one is worth a look. In just 60 to 90 seconds, a science-based test can determine if workers are at risk of alertness deficiencies that may negatively impact safe working judgment. Whether related to a lack of sleep, intoxication, illness or other causes of impairment, employees and companies must work to better understand and mitigate fatigue risk to sustain effective productivity and safe performance. The test is simple; requires a phone, tablet or laptop; and can be done at the beginning of the day, at midday or hours into storm restoration.

Learning objectives include:

• Understand benefits of cognitive testing.
• Explain how fit-for-duty knowledge indicators save lives.

Solution Spotlight

Virtual Training Panel

Virtual training has been forced on many of us due to the pandemic, and unfortunately, many on-site trainers have never received instruction on virtual delivery. This panel of experts from the Incident Prevention Institute’s Train the Trainer Mastermind will share their top tips for virtual trainers and provide insight into developing, delivering and evaluating virtual training. In addition to sharing lessons learned from their experiences, the panel members are eager to answer your questions and address the challenges you face, so come to this session prepared.

Moderator: David McPeak, CUSP, CSP, CHST, CSSM, Incident Prevention Institute

Panelists: iPi Masterminds

Solution Spotlight

CUSP Meeting – Open to All

Bring your questions and learn a little bit more about the CUSP program and exam, including information about online exams, recertification, and more!

Personal Protective Grounding: What Works & What Doesn’t

How much do you know about personal protective grounding? During this presentation, become confident in your understanding of the role of personal protective grounding in utility construction and maintenance. Grounding expert Jim Vaughn will highlight best practices, discuss induction incident case studies, and provide a thorough explanation of what works and what doesn’t.

Learning objectives include:

• The principles of current flow in grounded systems.
• How bonding ensures protection for workers.
• The purpose and limitations of grounding for transmission and distribution, trucks, underground installations and substations.

Solution Spotlight

Managing Safety Through Potential – Intro to SIF

SIF injuries change an individual’s quality of life. Current studies show that although minor injuries and events are declining, serious injuries and fatalities have plateaued or increased. Session facilitator Jordan Hollingsworth will lead this conversation on the realities of safety principles and the effective resources needed to move the needle with your safety program.

Learning objectives include:

• An increased understanding of potentially serious injuries and fatalities.
• Recognizing and addressing the reasons why people are resistant to change.
• How to apply data-supported concepts for the reduction of occupational injuries.

Solution Spotlight

Lagging Indicators, Leading Indicators…Let’s Start Over

Recent discussions in the occupational safety and health (OSH) community about leading versus lagging indicators have been lively. Many OSH professionals are thoughtfully considering how they can create indicators that effectively measure their organization’s performance, and they are learning to appreciate that it doesn’t mean throwing out lagging indicators altogether or that all leading indicators are created equal. In fact, while many OSH professionals say they appreciate the value of leading indicators, they confess to not really knowing what they are or how to create ones that are meaningful to their organization. This presentation will explore the role of indicators in performance measurement, especially as it relates to an effective OSH management system, and help attendees better understand how to put the pieces together.

Learning objectives include:

• Attendees will be able to explain how OSH indicators are connected to OSH performance management as well as how they are integrated with an organization’s overall performance management.
• Attendees will be able to define the inherent characteristics of effective performance indicators, both leading and lagging.
• Attendees will be able to compose effective leading and lagging indicators that are applicable to their organization.

Solution Spotlight

Conference Highlights and Next Steps

This wrap-up session will be a unique opportunity to review highlights from the conference and discuss your path forward. The facilitators promise to be entertaining and insightful as they interact with each other and the audience. They will discuss lessons learned from the conference and how those lessons can be applied to your personal and professional lives. This is a can’t-miss session sure to be as enjoyable as it is educational.

Solution Spotlight

Wrap Up & Grand Prize Drawing