Health and Safety / facilities Careers

Amplus

Amplus

Amplus

Associate
Joined
26 Aug 2018
Posts
900
Location
Manchester
Despite never considering going down this field as assumed it was for boring old men with clipboards (no offence), I've had an opportunity come up to assist the QHSE manager at my work then eventually take over as well as deal with the facilities part of the site. Company will pay for a NEBOSH course as well.

Looking online and the money doesn't seem to bad, seems there are plenty of jobs going in this field and the chance to leave the office as well if doing audits.

Undecided as in process of interviewing for an application support position at my work which involves lots of travelling and teaching people the in-house software. Health and safety role actually sounds like it has more long term stability but be interesting to find out what others experiences.
 
I'm a trainee health and safety officer, and I had the same perception as you of health and safety till I had the chance of assisting one of our safety officers on a site.
Health and safety can most definitely be a long and also lucrative career that pays extremely well. Ex colleague has left to start a part time health and safety consultancy job at £60k for 3 days a week, but she's at the top of her game.
Nebosh is a good route to go down, I completed the general certificate and that awarded me the techiosh status. Look into signing up to iosh after you completed the course. It's how you get to chartership and also go on training courses etc.
Nebosh isn't the only route, there's the NVQ (Not Very Qualified...haha) or there's the NCRQ route. The later if I knew about it at the time is what I would have personally done if I knew about it. There's no right or wrong way, whatever gets you a pass and that you learn from it.
I've only been doing the job for about a year, I still need to learn a hell of a lot and still need to undertake some basic tasks that are expected from a safety officer. But I'm so glad I found what I want to do with my career now.
If there's any questions I'll answer the best I can, but as I mention I am new to the role.
 
Thanks for the reply! Great to read.

Whats your general day like? You get to go out the office much?

Training people is the aspect of it that puts me off a little as I know how boring these H & S courses can be. You have to conduct these?
 
I'm never in the office, I'm on average there about 2-3 days a month. I work from home but I'm mostly out visiting sites. My role is a bit of a funny one as I do PAT Testing, water temperature checks, asbestos checks and just recently, what I consider a proper H&S task is premises inspections. The later is what I consider the most high risk of my role and involves me looking for hazards and making suggestions to the site manager how to eliminate or minimise the hazard or minimise the risk.
Never had to train people, it's not something I want to do but understand that for some h&s roles it can be a part of it.
 
Sounds very interesting. Definitely more interesting then the office based QHSE role at my place.

I can imagine it's a very 'lonely' job however of only in office 3.times a month and visiting customer sites as the lone h & s guy?
 
Too busy to feel lonely but I know what you mean. I used to do admin work at home and that got a bit lonely but then you get used to it along with all the other perks from WFH I don't think I would want to be back to being office based again.

Wish I did have a h&s team, I would learn so much more, but they all left to start their own business and doing extremely well.
 
I have been a facilities manager for the past 10 years. I also did the Nebosh course a few years ago and have a few years of health and safety experience. I am shortly going to be transitioning away from this sector to move more into building surveying and dealing with contractors and be much more hands on that I am now. I have a fantastic opportunity where my employers has paid for my degree and once I complete that I will be starting the process to become chartered with the RICS.
 
I have been in facilities in one form or another my entire life. I was an apprentice HVAC installer in Holland for a few years, then a maintenance plumber over here, then lead engineer, and now I'm a building manager earning a very good salary.

I have had more interactions with health and safety bods than most and I can confidently tell you that the scope of work is ridiculously vast. If you work for a small firm, you'll likely be all over the place, but a larger firm will have a team, meaning that you might be in the office all day staring at a screen wondering wtf you're doing with your life, or you could end up going to all their sites to audit them. It's impossible to say what you'll end up doing, so make sure you properly understand a potential job before going for it. Office H&S bods are where the reputation comes from. These guys have no context for the situations they're handling and often pass rules or processes / procedures to eliminate risks that just hinder productivity completely. These guys are the bane of the H&S world and it's completely the wrong approach to take. A good H&S manager will be out in the field reviewing policies, risk assessments, eyeballing situations, speaking to staff, etc. This is a fantastic part of the job but it can involve a lot of travelling and long days.

I could waffle on for days about this topic but honestly it's so vast and there are so many variables that even typing out a wall of text will barely be a drop in the ocean, so ask some questions and I'll answer them as best I can. Ignore anyone trying to talk you out of it or speak negatively about it, it's an extremely varied, interesting and rewarding career, and everyone thinks H&S is unnecessary rubbish until they're having a finger stitched back on or going round to visit their former colleagues' wife who is mourning because her husband got squashed between forklift and a wall, or fell off a building, or whatever. It's not a glamorous job but you're literally saving lives, and if that isn't rewarding enough I don't know what is.

Keeping up with legislation is a pain though.

I'm doing my Nebosh general certificate in Feb, can't bloody wait.
 
I imagine working for a good company it could be rewarding, but legislation is a funny one. Companies don't do it to save lives, but make money, (obvs). Companies going round ticking boxes on a tablet isn't helping anyone, managers not listening to genuine concerns is soul destroying. Multiple issues swept under the carpet.

When Grenfell happened, i wasn't surprised. I worked in H&S areas, and my old man is a building contractor.

See posts above mine for the flip side/ positive though. A guy i used to work with at one company changed role and specialises in health/nhs areas now, exactly what, i'm not sure. But point is, the company is decent he said and is happy, but loads of driving and long hours. Loads of training/courses also. Lightly a small company as mentioned above.

If you've never driven 1-3hrs to a site and then back in a day, expect to be tired until you get used to it. I'm glad i don't do long drives anymore. It's dangerous af, and Friday traffic is not fun. Though stay aways can be fun.
But i imagine the roles you are on about will be an even amount of paperwork/ driving.
 
I had the health and safety 'coordinator' responsibility pinned on me as soon as I stepped up to a supervisor level. It wasn't part of the job I applied for but I got shafted with it and as I was new to the job at the time I didn't want to kick up a fuss. In my department there are about 8 supervisors (I supervise my area separately without involvement from others). So it is quite good that there are so many people who keep on top of H&S issues and can bat problems back and forth with. We also have a dedicated H&S team on site for 3-4 people in it for advice.

I think H&S is great for putting things in place to avoid people from getting injured but I really hate having to review all of our documents once a year. For me it is mind numbingly boring as not only does it include all of the risk assessments and COSHH, it also includes reviewing all of our SOP's which are linked to them. Perhaps because I find my normal job boring, review processes for it is also boring.

I keep getting promised with the NEBOSH course but still hasn't happened. In all honesty I am not fussed about doing it but will give it 100% if I get put on it.
 
bakes0310 said:
@Diddums how did you get on with the certificate, did you do the two week intensive course, have you managed to sit your exams?
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Sorry mate, saw this ages ago and then promptly forgot about it!

I did the two week intensive course, failed the course. Later found out that the pass rate for our class was one of the lowest they'd seen in years, and then found out that the trainer was sacked, and then yesterday found out that NEBOSH are likely swapping to an open book exam as apparently it's just too difficult. I'll be honest, I just rested on my laurels and thought I'd walk it easily given my history and experience in the facilities game but the focus is very heavily knowing exactly which acts and whatnot are associated with what items or clauses. You really have to know all the technical stuff, there's no common sense to be used here which I guess is fair enough given the nature of the course.

Unfortunately they're not rebooking until at least the end of July and are using this time to assess the feasibility of an open book course, so hopefully I can get it done soon, and easier.

We'll see :)
 
Diddums said:
Sorry mate, saw this ages ago and then promptly forgot about it!

I did the two week intensive course, failed the course. Later found out that the pass rate for our class was one of the lowest they'd seen in years, and then found out that the trainer was sacked, and then yesterday found out that NEBOSH are likely swapping to an open book exam as apparently it's just too difficult. I'll be honest, I just rested on my laurels and thought I'd walk it easily given my history and experience in the facilities game but the focus is very heavily knowing exactly which acts and whatnot are associated with what items or clauses. You really have to know all the technical stuff, there's no common sense to be used here which I guess is fair enough given the nature of the course.

Unfortunately they're not rebooking until at least the end of July and are using this time to assess the feasibility of an open book course, so hopefully I can get it done soon, and easier.

We'll see :)
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I took the nebosh course and it took 3 attempts on both exams for me to pass, the struggle was trying to word it how they want, it didnt seem to matter that you had the understanding of it in there.
If you have a choice on courses, i seriously recommend looking at NCRQ im currenly doing their diploma. Its recognised by iosh so you can be charted, and if you look on job sites you will see them including ncrq into qualification requirements just as much as nebosh.
If you want to know more about the ncrq from me then let me know as ill happily tell you more as i thinki its fantastic and have made the course my life right now.
 
bakes0310 said:
I took the nebosh course and it took 3 attempts on both exams for me to pass, the struggle was trying to word it how they want, it didnt seem to matter that you had the understanding of it in there.
If you have a choice on courses, i seriously recommend looking at NCRQ im currenly doing their diploma. Its recognised by iosh so you can be charted, and if you look on job sites you will see them including ncrq into qualification requirements just as much as nebosh.
If you want to know more about the ncrq from me then let me know as ill happily tell you more as i thinki its fantastic and have made the course my life right now.
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That actually sounds quite interesting, thanks!

Happy to check it out, can never have too many courses, you seem quite keen on it, is it better than NEBOSH?
 
Very keen on it, so much so i hope they bring out more courses in time for me when i finsh the diploma. For me personally i prefer it over nebosh. Im halfway through unit 1 of the NCRQ diploma and i feel quite confident to write up safety policies, risk analysis/RA and to have basic understandings of guidance that i havent used in my current job.
With the nebosh general certificate its a level 3 course and if you decide to do their dipolma your certificate wont count in any way towards the diploma. NCRQ certificate Is Unit 1 of their diploma as its a level 6 course (equivelent to a bachelors degree). I dont know your academic background but for me the hardest course ive done is level 3 nvqs, and ive never been into school or college. But cause ive found a career i wanted to do (H&S) the drive i have to complete the diploma and also the fact i find it very interesting has helped me massively.
NCRQ has no exams just assignments that are based on real life case studies. So your actually doing the work of a health safety person as if you are actually involved in the incident, thats why i feel confident if my work asked me to carry out a risk assessment on something out of my field i would feel confident i could do it at a high standard.
Your not expected to recite legslation as what h&s person speaks like that, but it gives you skills behind the understanding of the legislation to do your job effectively. Also its run by ex HSE employees including an ex director of HSE so its run by people in the know.
 
bakes0310 said:
Very keen on it, so much so i hope they bring out more courses in time for me when i finsh the diploma. For me personally i prefer it over nebosh. Im halfway through unit 1 of the NCRQ diploma and i feel quite confident to write up safety policies, risk analysis/RA and to have basic understandings of guidance that i havent used in my current job.
With the nebosh general certificate its a level 3 course and if you decide to do their dipolma your certificate wont count in any way towards the diploma. NCRQ certificate Is Unit 1 of their diploma as its a level 6 course (equivelent to a bachelors degree). I dont know your academic background but for me the hardest course ive done is level 3 nvqs, and ive never been into school or college. But cause ive found a career i wanted to do (H&S) the drive i have to complete the diploma and also the fact i find it very interesting has helped me massively.
NCRQ has no exams just assignments that are based on real life case studies. So your actually doing the work of a health safety person as if you are actually involved in the incident, thats why i feel confident if my work asked me to carry out a risk assessment on something out of my field i would feel confident i could do it at a high standard.
Your not expected to recite legslation as what h&s person speaks like that, but it gives you skills behind the understanding of the legislation to do your job effectively. Also its run by ex HSE employees including an ex director of HSE so its run by people in the know.
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Dunno why the tagging system is borked, so quoting instead.

A few interesting resources I found recently, free of charge (I have no affiliation with any of this btw, just sharing it in case it comes in handy):

https://www.rocketlawyer.com/gb/en - This site will let you fill in loads of info and spit out a H&S policy, as well as an environmental policy. I just used it as a framework and added loads of stuff in but it's a fantastic foundation for any policies.

https://www.open.edu/openlearn/money-management/free-courses - Free courses from the Open University. I'm already a student with them so I don't know if you'll have access to these but it's worth a look at least. If their regular course material is anything to go by, this will be absolutely fantastic. Once work dies down a bit I'll be hitting some of these too I reckon.

Cheers :)
 
@Diddums any update to doing your nebosh again?

I passed my first unit of the diploma in the middle of last year. Due to funds I could afford to buy the two remaining units till today, can't wait to get started and complete my diploma.
 
bakes0310 said:
@Diddums any update to doing your nebosh again?

I passed my first unit of the diploma in the middle of last year. Due to funds I could afford to buy the two remaining units till today, can't wait to get started and complete my diploma.
Click to expand...

Iv just done the NCRQ Diploma really great qualification, but do you have any experience?
 
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