The theme of this year's event, “The Quest for Zero!” nicely mirrors the commitment to safety goals found in Synebar Solutions’ long term emphasis on "Doing things right the first time, every time!"
The first ever Safety Summit, held last year, sold out, and the popularity of the event was demonstrated again, as this year’s increase in attendance made clear. Conference attendees this year totaled 477 representatives from across the country, an increase of nearly 40% over the 346 who attended the first event in 2012.
Safety Summit San Antonio 2013
Prior to this year’s Summit Gary Pfann, NRECA director - executive and staff education, said he anticipated a blended and mixed audience. He was proven correct, since although the largest group of attendees was made up of Safety professionals, they were far from a majority at just 31% of the total. The next largest group was made up of GMs/CEOs at 20%, and there were also a wide variety of attendees from other areas, including field operations staff (Ops. managers, supervisors, and line workers) along with finance, engineering, HR, marketing and communications staffers as well.
This is a reflection of the many options to choose from among the breakout sessions on offer, which were selected to appeal to a wide variety of audiences, not just to safety professionals, but also to CEOs, crew leaders, line superintendents, HR staffers, with something for everyone directly involved in the safety leadership and a co-op’s quest for zero incidents.
The summit included an expo hall for exhibitors and also hosted the Leading Practices Showcase, where a variety of co-ops had displays showing something unique that they’re doing in the safety arena. Hurtado & Associates were represented at the event and in the exhibit hall by H & A founder Jess Hurtado and by Safety Consultant Bruce Wright, who also participated as a breakout session leader.