Greetings!

    I trust this letter finds everyone doing well, staying healthy and successful. I know a lot measure success differently; however, as a safety family I believe we all value safety, both on and off the job similarly. With that said, I hope this letter finds you safe for all the right reasons.  

   Since our last meeting, we’ve experienced a lot of change. I guess change is becoming more and more of our constant. How’s that for irony?  Seriously though, we really have become more AWARE as a result of the pandemic. Awareness, as a whole, has always played a big part in our safety efforts, but it seems like everyone is simply more aware these days. As I travel, I see people paying more attention to the news in lobbies, restaurants, and such. In fact, I overheard a group of young people exiting the hotel yesterday reminding each other to “be safe” as they were heading out. Two little words that drive countless requirements and actions. I love to hear them spoken!

   Our May meeting is fast approaching, and I hope everyone is able to join us live and in person. It would be great to get back to thirty or forty on a given month. Please try to make it in person if you’re able. Our speaker this month is Randall Arms. For the last 15 years, Randall has dedicated his career to safety. He spent his first 8 years in the safety distribution industry providing product solutions to clients, and educating the latest updates with standard organizations such as ANSI, NIOSH, etc.  He also had the opportunity to spend time as an EHS professional managing EHS programs at companies such as Bridgestone, Dal-tile and Gibson Guitar.  Randall understands that safety is more than a standard or legislation – it’s how people think, behave, and react. Today, Randall is the regional sales manager for Blackline Safety where he promotes connected safety devices that focus on lone worker and gas detection solutions.

   As for our challenge this month, it’s May and it’s getting hot out there already. What are we doing to prepare ourselves and our teams for the heat? Let’s make this a conversation during our next meeting. Let’s bring those best practices together as a share. I’ll start the conversation and count on everyone to share a bit.

   As we go about our personal routines, let’s not forget to check on others. Truth be told, none of us can go it alone. Sure, we may think we can, but I’d disagree. Let’s be each other’s keepers – that means we’ll ask questions AND we’ll listen to the responses.

   I look forward to seeing all of you on the 20th. Until our next – call, text, or email me if I can ever be of assistance. Take care and please stay well.

 – Paul

Paul Thurber
President – ASSP Alabama Chapter
paul@everguard.ai

It’s April Already!

    I hope this letter finds everyone doing well. It’s the first week of April and it seems like everyone and everything is operating in the fast lane. How many of you can remember what the Eagles had to say about, “LIFE IN THE FAST LANE…”? Let’s make certain we’re doing everything we can to prevent surprises. Remember, surprises lead to incidents and incidents lead to injuries.

   I recently had the privilege to speak at the Forging Industry Association’s inaugural Safety Conference in Detroit, where I introduced our AI (artificial intelligence) solutions to that industry. It was a great meeting by the way. During said meeting a “near miss” was defined by an attendee as “any unplanned event”. Think about that for a minute, if something happens that we weren’t expecting, it could or could not – would or would not result in injury solely based on reaction and response. To us safety folks, those are code words for LUCK. In all my days, I have not heard a better definition for near miss than that. With this in mind, do we think we do a good job of capturing “all near misses”. I think we’d all agree, WE DO NOT. 

   Our April meeting is fast approaching, and we have our good friend Tom Robinson from the AGC coming to speak to us about Work Zone Hazards. UA SafeState will be sponsoring the lunch for this meeting, so please plan to attend. We’ll be meeting at the same time and same place as our usual meetings.

   As for our challenge this month, it’s April and we’re well into the second quarter of 2022. How are we doing? NO, I MEAN HOW ARE WE DOING? Let’s self-check often and routinely. As we go about our personal routines, let’s not forget to check on our fellows. Let’s be each other’s keepers – that means we’ll ask questions AND we’ll listen to the responses.

   I look forward to seeing all of you on the 15^th. Until our next – call, text, or email me if I can ever be of assistance. Take care and please stay well.

 – Paul

Paul Thurber
President – ASSP Alabama Chapter
paul@everguard.ai
334-247-5170

A Big Hello To All!

    Here we are in March already, busy times for sure. I hope this letter finds everyone both safe and healthy. I don’t know about you, but I’m certainly thankful we’re seeing a little reprieve to our COVID related cases here in Alabama and their associated variety of severity. Kudos to our safety, HR, and healthcare related members for their persistence and perseverance throughout this ever-changing pandemic. In fact, kudos to everyone for just hanging in there and weathering this storm.

   Our March meeting is scheduled for the 18^th and it’s an in-person meeting at the AGC building off of Grant’s Mill Road. Please try to attend in person if your schedule will permit. I’d like to see us fill the room like we were doing pre-COVID.  Our presenter will be Alex Blevins from Jeff State and he will be demonstrating their CDL training simulator. I am certain this will be both educational and entertaining for everyone.

   Thankfully, we’re beginning to fill our speaker calendar; however, we have a few open months still available, so feel free to continue making those recommendations for speakers and/or topics. We appreciate everyone’s input thus far.

   Just as an update, we met, discussed, and enabled a survey to share our opinions surrounding the recommended changes to the ASSP as sent to us through the national office. As a body (Alabama Chapter) we elected to support the changes and believe that they will better our Association’s ability to operate. Some skepticism may still exist, but nothing out of the ordinary. Remember, change equals opportunity. We need to remain diligent in reading and following along with our national association’s ongoings, so that we can be a conduit of feedback whenever/wherever necessary. Thanks to everyone for their participation and opinions throughout the consideration process.

   As for my challenge this month, it’s March already and at month’s end we will have concluded the first quarter of our new year.  OH MY!! Are we mentoring one or some of the people in our employ? Are we sharing the who, what, where, when, how, and why? As we go about our personal routines, let’s not forget to check on our fellows. Let’s be each other’s keepers – that means we’ll ask questions AND we’ll listen to the responses.

   Remember, knowledge without action is useless. Let’s let our actions pave the way toward World Class Safety in our jobs, families, and communities. Have a great month!

   I’ll look forward to seeing all of you on the 18^th. Until our next – call, text, or email me if I can ever be of assistance. Take care and please stay well.

 – Paul

Paul Thurber
President – ASSP Alabama Chapter
paul@everguard.ai
334-247-5170

Greetings!  

    How does it feel to be in the second month of this year already? Time sure does fly when we’re having fun, right!? Hopefully, everyone has completed their 2021 reporting and posting requirements. While I’m thinking about it, let’s remember to briefly talk about that during our upcoming meeting on the 18^th. We’ll have an official speaker as well, but we’ll talk recordkeeping and reporting for a networking opportunity later in the meeting.

   Our friend and fellow member Justin Shephard has graciously offered to become our program manager (for lack of official title) for this year. We believe it’s imperative to offer a quality and planned topic and presenter list for our membership. We’ll be looking forward to those recommendations for topics and speakers in the coming days. A special thanks to Justin for stepping up to help us out with this valuable service.

   As always, thanks for everyone’s continued support of the ASSP. It’s kind of like church, we get out proportionately what we put into it and I’m talking participation wise primarily. Please plan to attend on the 18^th if your schedules will allow it. Thanks for notes and leads concerning my presentation last month as well. Several of you had/have good questions and comments and I trust everyone found the information helpful and informative. Thanks again for allowing me the opportunity to share.

   As for my challenge this month, it’s February and it’s time to begin editing the goals we established for this year. We’re half-way through the first quarter and it’s always a good place to check-up. Self-checks are a vital part of our professional (personal and spiritual) health. As we go about our personal routines, let’s not forget to check on our fellows. Let’s be each other’s keepers – that means we’ll ask questions AND we’ll listen to the responses. I know we’re all busy, but let’s not forget that we “WORK TO LIVE not LIVE TO WORK”. Have a great month. I’ll look forward to seeing all of you next week on our call.  

   Until our next – call, text, or email me if I can ever be of assistance. Take care and please stay well.

 – Paul Paul Thurber
President – ASSP Alabama Chapter
paul@everguard.ai
334-247-5170

Happy New Year!

    Can you believe it’s January again? It seems like we celebrated a new year only a few months ago and here we are celebrating it yet again. Hopefully, for those operating with a “resolution” in place, everything is on target and progressing as planned. For everyone else, I hope this note finds you happy, successful, and progressing just the same. So, here’s to us all making 2022 the safest and healthiest we possibly can. – CHEERS!

   2022 brings our Chapter an opportunity to get back on track. Of course, we’ll be kicking off January, thanks to the pandemic, VIRTUALLY. We’ve thought long and hard about it and it just doesn’t make sense right now to meet in person. Hopefully, some of the recent spikes will pass and we’ll be able to get back together in February or soon thereafter. We’ll be communicating so that everyone knows when to reassemble. Until then, we’ll do the best we can in the virtual setting. Let me give Vincent Scott a special shout out for driving this side of the meeting for us. His tech skills are quite handy when conducting these virtual activities. We are thankful for him!

   Thanks for everyone’s continued support of the ASSP. We’re still open to everyone’s suggestions for topics and presenters in 2022. We have a couple months covered and could really use several more topics and/or presenters of interest. If you have one (or some) just shoot me an email, call, or text and I’ll reach out to get them scheduled accordingly.

   This month, I’ll be presenting on New Safety Technologies. As many of you know, I am a VP with Everguard ai, and I want to make certain I’m doing my part to help educate my colleagues about the “next level” safety solutions that I’m seeing changing the way we’ve traditionally done safety. I promise NOT to make this a sales call; however, a brief information session since we’ll have some additional things to discuss as well.

   As for my challenge this month, it’s January and I know everyone’s working on reporting, goal setting, and such; however, “Let’s find someone to share ourselves with. Let’s mentor another by giving our knowledge, assistance, patience, or perhaps even time.”  Have a great month. I look forward to seeing all of you next week on our call.

   Until our next – call, text, or email me if I can ever be of assistance. Take care and please stay well.

– Paul 

Paul Thurber
President – ASSP Alabama Chapter
paul@everguard.ai