Our Good Catch Journey with Jay Canada

NSSGA Podcast

Joining Libby today is Jay Canada, VP of Safety and HR at Pine Bluff Sand and Gravel In this episode, Jay shares details about his company’s Good Catch program, including its journey all the way from its origins up to the current day, and the remarkably positive impact it continues to have.

Episode Highlights:

• While the Good Catch program officially started in 2009, it really has its roots in a 2007 presentation by Ron Lehmann regarding culture, skill sets, and mindsets
• This presentation got Jay and others at Pine Bluff thinking about their culture, and they decided to become more proactive about safety
• After consulting with Cajun Industries about their Good Catch program, Pine Bluff decided to start their own
• Over the years the program has gone through an evolution regarding why they do what they do, and how to do that better
• Any idea which notes how things can be safer where their employees are working everyday is deemed a ‘Good Catch’
• They have been doing this for over 10 years and are committed to continuing it
• In 2021 alone, they harvested 946 good catches, many of which dealt with potential serious injuries or fatalities
• By focusing on the prevention and the proactive side in the Good Catch program, they have very positively affected incidents and events
• They now get together every six months, and instead of having a safety meeting, they have a culture meeting where they talk about good catches more and celebrate those, recognizing people and giving them awards and recognition for the good catches that they've submitted
• They still talk about incidents as well, of course, but they have fewer to talk about now
• Like any safety journey, the Good Catch journey never ends
• Jay definitely encourages others to take consider implementing some kind of Good Catch program or process
• Their Good Catch program is forward thinking, it’s looking before something happens; even more than that, it is a mindset, a part of their culture, and it is empowering to employees to find those things that might be unsafe for their worksite

Toolbox Talk Discussion Questions:

• At Pine Bluff Facility, they look at their safety culture and shift the focus to proactivity. What are your thoughts on this?
• How can we work to build this type of mindset among ourselves?
• Does anyone have a good catch that they’d like to share with the group?

Quotes:

“How do we think about safety? And how do we think about our culture? And how do we move into people's mindsets? And how do we look at the decisions that our team members make when they are at work?”

“But how do we get upstream? How do we become more proactive and get into the equation of the decisions they're making when that incident happens? And so we decided to think about Good Catch.”

“It's gone through an evolution, it's gone through many changes.”

“Tell us what your ideas are, and tell us how this thing can be safer where you're working every day.”

“It'll evolve and change, but it's something we believe we're going to do for a very long time.”

“We have not had a lost time at a quarry since April 20, of 2016, and we have greatly reduced our ‘recordables’ or ‘reportables’.”

“It's really a mindset.”

Links:

National Stone, Sand & Gravel Association website