Swanson Group: Streamlining incident tracking with BLR
About Swanson Group
Swanson Group started out as a single sawmill with 40 employees that was purchased by two brothers in 1951. It has since become a family of businesses: Superior Lumber Co, Superior Plywood, Superior Helicopter, Swanson-Superior Forest Products, and Sun Studs. They have a diverse product, customer, and geographic market mix and have been using BLR’s comprehensive EHS management solution, EHS Hero®, since 2012.
Challenges
Before using EHS Hero, Swanson Group’s incident tracking system was a single, minimal form that provided no means for helping with an investigation when it came to submitting workers’ compensation claims. With mills across Oregon and 750 employees, Swanson Group needed a more solid structure for employees and managers to report and track all incidents, particularly those requiring more in-depth investigation.
Solution
Swanson Group was already using some of EHS Hero’s management tools to track various activities that affected its daily work, such as the Training Management Tool. However, the company needed a way to track incidents and assist with the investigation into what caused the incidents. Safety Manager Jennifer Rudy worked with BLR® to tailor the Incident Investigation and Reporting Tool to assess the key factors for what causes incidents. Together, we developed ways to capture, track, and trend well-recognized key contributing factors in four categories:
- Management factors
- Employee factors
- Environmental factors
- Equipment factors
BLR built an enhancement to Swanson Group’s system, allowing it to customize the factors most critical to the company. Over time, not only was each incident being resolved more efficiently on an individual basis, but Rudy was also able to identify trends and recurring issues within the company to revise safety policies.
EHS Hero’s management tools are now used at nine of Swanson Group’s sites, one of which is its aviation division. The aviation site worked to achieve Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) approval to use the Incident Investigation and Reporting Tool, which enables it to build unique incident types specific to that industry and location.
“The Incident Investigation and Reporting tool allows us to give claims adjusters as much information as possible and email it directly to them”
– Jennifer Rudy, Safety Manager
Moving forward
For over 10 years, Swanson Group has been using EHS Hero’s management suite to track and manage workflows across its different sites. With the ease of the Incident Reporting and Investigation Tool, Swanson Group is able to submit comprehensive forms to its claims adjuster that paints the full picture of any incidents. The company spends less time answering questions because the information is all there, which speeds up the process of submitting the claim and gives it time to focus on more mission-critical work.
Access a downloadable version of Swanson Group’s story here.
