Top environmental health and safety (EHS) professionals and executives from across north America will gather at the annual eCompliance safety conference, NXT 2018: The Future of EHS, taking place Sept. 27 and 28 in Scottsdale, Ariz.
“There are a lot of large safety conferences out there and they are great but what we have noticed is that in our market there is an interest in getting an intimate group of people together and focusing on a few safety topics that really align around forward-thinking safety professionals in the industry,” explained Adrian Bartha, CEO for eCompliance, adding the conference will attract about 80 attendees.
The conference aims to help EHS professionals engage their workforce, build a stronger safety culture and shape the future of health and safety. The event will include keynotes, panels, hands-on sessions and best practice sharing in EHS management.
“The purpose is to get safety leaders together and talk about the future of safety in the industry and some of the innovative things that are going on,” said Bartha.
“It’s about getting the professionals in one place and having them share the best of what they have learned and best of what they have done that has worked and what hasn’t worked, which is sometimes just as important. It’s an opportunity for them to learn best practices in an environment that is a little more intimate and for them to get a little deeper into these topics than they would at a massive conference.”
Networking is a big part of the conference, he added.
“It allows people to mingle with some folks they might know and a lot of folks they wouldn’t normally know and help build relationships,” noted Bartha. “If they can come back with four or five new relationships they’ve made there and people they can leverage in the future in their professional network, I would say that’s a success for each of the attendees. It’s also a really good format to bring a colleague.”
The conference will be attended by construction companies and non-construction companies and offers a few different perspectives on technology and the future of safety, Bartha added.
“For the construction folks, it’s good for them to see how things are done across industries too and for them to contrast because there is a lot of great learning there as well and vice versa,” he said.
The first day of the conference opens with a networking social, followed by motivational safety speaker Brandon Schroeder. The evening will conclude with dinner and awards.
Three awards will be given out: one alongside MySafeWork, the change agent award presented to a company that has done an outstanding job managing change from a safety perspective in their organization, and the safety nerd award for those who have accomplished innovative endeavours within their company analyzing data and information.
Speakers on the second day include Calvin Benchimol, a senior adviser with eCompliance, who will speak about the impact of a high participation safety culture; Ward Metzler, principal at DuPont Sustainable Solutions, speaking on tweaking a firm’s safety paradigm and managing risk; and Star Hofer, director of customer success with eCompliance, who will be discussing the tools and traits every safety leader needs.
There will also be panels and speakers who will discuss the future of EHS.
“One area of focus is change management, how do leaders influence and manage change successfully in their organizations and the changing role of the safety professional,” said Bartha. “What it was 10 years ago is different than what it’s going to be two to three years from now and that is evolving and it has implications on the business.”
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