Case: Improving safety performance and awareness for BigLift Shipping B.V.

The challenge

BigLift Shipping B.V. is a leader in the field of worldwide ocean transportation of heavy lift and project cargoes. They want to improve their safety performance and increase safety awareness amongst their employees, both onshore and offshore. To accomplish this, they asked us to take the lead in the design and implementation of a safety awareness program. It was important for them that this program would fully suit their identity and their day-to-day activities.

How Quattor P helped

Getting to know the organization
In order to design a safety awareness program that fully matches the activities and identity of BigLift Shipping, we first focused on getting to know the organization. To gain better insight into their day-to-day activities we accompanied various people on their job and interviewed many others. We wanted to understand:

  • what they were doing and how they were doing it;
  • what assumptions they had;
  • their doubts, struggles, and overall attitude towards safety;
  • how they currently dealt with safety;
  • where they saw room for improvement.

Creating a safety awareness program
With the information collected, the design of the safety awareness program could start. Once the first elements were designed, we focused on various people within the company. By ensuring that personnel were involved from the beginning, buy-in was created, resulting in an atmosphere whereby ‘ambassadors’ were promoting the program amongst their colleagues. Top management of BigLift Shipping played an active role in the kick-off of the safety awareness program, both on board their vessels and in the office.

A digital portal where everyone can share
Essential features of the safety awareness program are its dynamic character and the fact that people are able to identify with it. By using a digital portal combined with various forms of media, information can be easily shared between people working on board the vessels and those that are in the office(s). The information shared is not only based on our experience and knowledge, but is also provided directly by the people at BigLift. They can use the digital portal to share their views, their experiences, and any current issues. In other words: all safety-critical information that they feel and see as “worthy to be shared with their co-workers”.
ed with their co-workers”.

Source: BigLift Shipping B.V.

Quattor P have an interesting variation in backgrounds, are highly experienced, and have a vast knowledge on culture and processes. This made them the perfect party to design and implement our safety awareness programme Safe Sailings, taking into account the unique requirements our organisation has.Michiel van MondfransGeneral Manager Operations

The result

The result is a tailored safety awareness program, that fully suits the identity and activities of BigLift Shipping. People at all levels of the organization can identify with it. The digital portal makes providing information and receiving feedback easy. Because everyone learns from each other, safety awareness is increased, which leads to better safety performance.

Every six months a new safety theme is highlighted and discussed. By introducing these new themes, the content of the safety awareness program stays up-to-date and aligns with the current standards and views on safety.

After having led the process of developing and implementing the safety awareness program, we slowly took on more of a mentoring role. The safety awareness program “Safe Sailings” is now kept on course by BigLift.