Latest / The Elevator Careers Podcast / Establishing Elevator Safety: Habits, Risks & Responsibility | Mike Luraschi

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Establishing Elevator Safety: Habits, Risks & Responsibility | Mike Luraschi · The Elevator Careers Podcast

• 0:00
  SPEAKER_01: You need the employees to own it.
• 0:02
  SPEAKER_01: They have to really feel the ownership of safety is my responsibility.
• 0:07
  SPEAKER_01: You have to instill that in them that listen, safety isn't here for we're not here to discipline you if you're doing something wrong.
• 0:14
  SPEAKER_01: Safety is so you can go home and see your kids at night.
• 0:17
  SPEAKER_01: That's what it's for.
• 0:19
  SPEAKER_01: You have to get them to think that way.
• 0:21
  SPEAKER_01: And it's it's a challenge, but it's a fun challenge, you know.
• 0:26
  SPEAKER_00: Hello, and welcome to the Elevator Careers Podcast, sponsored by the Allred Group.
• 0:32
  SPEAKER_00: I am your host, Matt Allred.
• 0:34
  SPEAKER_00: Does your workforce need a lift?
• 0:36
  SPEAKER_00: At the Allred Group, we are committed to connecting your company with top talent that matches your needs.
• 0:42
  SPEAKER_00: Give us a call at 404-890-0445.
• 0:48
  SPEAKER_00: In this episode, I sat down with Mike Larachi from TEI to talk about safety in the elevator industry, including how it has evolved over the years and why complacency creates the biggest risk.
• 0:58
  SPEAKER_00: We also discussed safety resources for small companies and why mental health support is essential for making sure everyone gets home safely.
• 1:07
  SPEAKER_00: Mike, welcome to the show.
• 1:09
  SPEAKER_01: Hello, Matt.
• 1:10
  SPEAKER_01: Thanks a lot for inviting me.
• 1:11
  SPEAKER_00: You bet.
• 1:12
  SPEAKER_00: No, it was great meeting you in California.
• 1:15
  SPEAKER_00: It's fun to catch up again and uh and learn a little bit more about what you're doing there at TEI and how you're keeping the workforce safe.
• 1:22
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, thanks.
• 1:23
  SPEAKER_01: That was my first uh spring conference with the NAEC.
• 1:26
  SPEAKER_01: So that was a great experience.
• 1:28
  SPEAKER_01: I'm looking forward to many more.
• 1:30
  SPEAKER_00: Awesome.
• 1:30
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, they're uh they're a lot of fun.
• 1:32
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, it's a great, great group of people.
• 1:33
  SPEAKER_00: And and uh I think my first one was like five years ago, and I was a little apprehensive at the time.
• 1:39
  SPEAKER_00: I was like, yeah, I don't know if anybody wants to see a recruiter guy show up, right?
• 1:43
  SPEAKER_00: But they were friendly as could be.
• 1:45
  SPEAKER_00: Nobody ever, you know, was mean or rude or anything.
• 1:48
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, it's just not very, very welcoming, very nice.
• 1:51
  SPEAKER_00: Absolutely, yeah, welcoming me as part of the family.
• 1:54
  SPEAKER_00: So uh been going ever since, and it's uh it's a lot of fun.
• 1:57
  SPEAKER_00: Um, but I do want to talk more, you know, about you, your career, and obviously the work you're doing at TEI.
• 2:04
  SPEAKER_00: And and you know, you had mentioned that you'd work across not just major companies, but also military time, right?
• 2:10
  SPEAKER_00: So I'm curious what what do you think keeps people in the elevator industry, even though they may move between different firms?
• 2:17
  SPEAKER_01: Uh yes, this is kind of like a third career because I was I was military originally and then I worked on the railroad uh before I came to elevators.
• 2:25
  SPEAKER_01: Sure.
• 2:25
  SPEAKER_01: Uh but now I've been in the industry, in the elevator industry almost 15 years, and that time split up pretty even between Schindler, Otis, and TEI.
• 2:34
  SPEAKER_01: But what you see is that's that's very common in the industry.
• 2:36
  SPEAKER_01: You see that all over the place.
• 2:39
  SPEAKER_01: Uh in the office environment and in the field, you know, it's they're competitive companies, but it's the same workforce.
• 2:47
  SPEAKER_01: And and we're all it sounds funny, but we're all a big family.
• 2:51
  SPEAKER_01: You know, in the end, you get to know the people you work with, and then as you as you go from one company to another, you always carry those relationships.
• 3:01
  SPEAKER_01: And uh it's very uh it's a positive environment, which is great.
• 3:06
  SPEAKER_01: Like your competitors on paper, but the elevator industry is very it's I don't want to say it's non-competitive, it's like people are there to help each other out, which is really it's a great feeling.
• 3:18
  SPEAKER_01: And especially in the world I live in of safety, safety is not proprietary.
• 3:23
  SPEAKER_01: Like no, no one company owns safety.
• 3:26
  SPEAKER_01: You don't compete on safety.
• 3:27
  SPEAKER_01: Safety is it's universal and it it's something we all share in common.
• 3:32
  SPEAKER_01: We all have the common goal to get everyone home safe every day.
• 3:35
  SPEAKER_01: And not even the companies, also the unions.
• 3:37
  SPEAKER_01: If you have a unionized workforce, the unions want the same thing.
• 3:41
  SPEAKER_01: They want to protect their workforce and get everyone home safe every day.
• 3:44
  SPEAKER_01: So it's uh it's a great environment to work in.
• 3:48
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, yeah.
• 3:48
  SPEAKER_00: Well, and uh one thing I want to talk a little bit about is uh obviously safety has has changed over the years.
• 3:54
  SPEAKER_00: Um, you know, and I'm sure you've probably seen it in in your time as well, right?
• 3:58
  SPEAKER_00: Changing, but just that it it seems becoming more important.
• 4:01
  SPEAKER_00: So we'll kind of you know dig into that as we go, but uh um are you seeing that on your end as well, that it's that this is something we need to focus on?
• 4:09
  SPEAKER_01: Oh, absolutely.
• 4:10
  SPEAKER_01: Safety is safety is definitely evolving.
• 4:13
  SPEAKER_01: I again I come from outside the industry, but even in the time I've been here, you know, 15 years a little bit of time, you see the turnover of the generations, and you see as the older generation is is moving out and the younger generation is coming in, you have the passage of knowledge, which is huge because you don't really go to school to learn how to fix an elevator, you learn it from the mechanic you're working with.
• 4:38
  SPEAKER_01: They passed that along.
• 4:40
  SPEAKER_01: And safety is the same thing.
• 4:41
  SPEAKER_01: No one goes to school and learns elevator safety.
• 4:45
  SPEAKER_01: You you can't get that course at you know Indiana University or something, they just don't have it.
• 4:50
  SPEAKER_01: So you're learning from the people around you and and the experience around you.
• 4:55
  SPEAKER_01: And coming in, I that's something I really enjoy, is you know, I want to learn something every day.
• 5:00
  SPEAKER_01: We're surrounded by a lot of really, really intelligent people and just try and picking that up.
• 5:05
  SPEAKER_01: And it, yeah, safety is it's definitely evolving, it's growing, but it's positive.
• 5:10
  SPEAKER_01: You try to work safer every day.
• 5:12
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, absolutely.
• 5:13
  SPEAKER_00: Well, and and I mean you didn't set out to to work in safety, right?
• 5:16
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, you came in as a superintendent, you'd like you said, you'd been in the railroad, the military.
• 5:20
  SPEAKER_00: How did safety kind of come about?
• 5:23
  SPEAKER_00: Why and why did you lean into that?
• 5:25
  SPEAKER_01: Um, I well, presently I work at TEI, but when I when I came to TEI, I was a superintendent.
• 5:32
  SPEAKER_01: So I worked as I worked as a superintendent at Schindler, at Otis.
• 5:36
  SPEAKER_01: I came to TEI as a superintendent.
• 5:39
  SPEAKER_01: But through through succession planning, I kind of fell into really good luck.
• 5:44
  SPEAKER_01: Uh Ray Downs is a a a juggernaut of the safety, you know, in the elevator industry, and he was looking to retire, and that's some really big shoes to fill.
• 5:55
  SPEAKER_01: So I kind of got really lucky, and I I worked under his wing for two years.
• 6:00
  SPEAKER_01: And it again, I don't think if you look around and you ask all the the safety directors and VPs of safety in elevator companies, none of them started as a safety person.
• 6:12
  SPEAKER_01: No, everyone either came from the field or they came from another industry into the elevator industry and found themselves in the safety role.
• 6:21
  SPEAKER_01: So it's a it's a unique blend of people and uh again, a unique blend of experiences, which makes it fun.
• 6:29
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, no, absolutely.
• 6:30
  SPEAKER_00: And and uh talked to Ray and you know Ray, but um and and he had talked to me about you know kind of his experience, I think, in automotive before he got into elevators.
• 6:38
  SPEAKER_00: And and I'm curious, you know, for you, what did learning directly under someone like Ray teach you about safety leadership that that maybe some people don't get exposed to?
• 6:49
  SPEAKER_01: It's honestly it was it was great working directly with Ray for that long of a period.
• 6:54
  SPEAKER_01: You see the ins and outs of safety as if you're reading it out of a book.
• 6:58
  SPEAKER_01: You understand that side of it, but there's a very human side of it, and you have to connect with people on a personal level.
• 7:07
  SPEAKER_01: You have to get to know the person, get to know their family.
• 7:10
  SPEAKER_01: Um, because it's you want employees that understand the rules, of course, but you also want employees that understand it's their behaviors that are gonna make a difference out there.
• 7:22
  SPEAKER_01: And that's that's one of the big things Ray always always taught, and he still does to this day.
• 7:28
  SPEAKER_01: To this day, Ray will still call some of the the field foreman we have in the field and just check on him and say, hey, how you doing today?
• 7:35
  SPEAKER_01: You know, and that's that's something he's passed along, and it's great because if the employees of the field guys really believe you care about them because you do care about them and you can get it across, they're gonna they're gonna include that in their decision making.
• 7:51
  SPEAKER_01: And it's gonna guide their behaviors, which in the end is what you want to do as a safety professional is is get people to make safe decisions.
• 7:59
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, yeah.
• 8:00
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I mean you obviously they're having to choose safety, right?
• 8:03
  SPEAKER_00: And I think that's you know, we talked a little bit just briefly about how that culture has changed.
• 8:08
  SPEAKER_00: But you know, I I think even in my own life as a kid, right, we didn't wear seatbelts, right?
• 8:12
  SPEAKER_00: It wasn't a thing.
• 8:13
  SPEAKER_00: And then all of a sudden there's this law.
• 8:14
  SPEAKER_00: And then I remember as as a family, we kind of embraced it and just said, hey, we're we want to be safe, right?
• 8:20
  SPEAKER_00: And we just never thought about it, right?
• 8:22
  SPEAKER_00: But, you know, it's uh I think once you choose to work safely and and do have to do it every day, right?
• 8:30
  SPEAKER_00: Because you know, one day where you choose not to, that's right.
• 8:34
  SPEAKER_00: Might not get another day.
• 8:36
  SPEAKER_01: A lot of that it comes down to habits, right?
• 8:38
  SPEAKER_01: Like sure.
• 8:39
  SPEAKER_01: If you were a kid and every time you got in the car, you didn't put your seatbelt on, then the day you had to put your seatbelt on, it was a change.
• 8:45
  SPEAKER_01: You're like, hey, what am I doing?
• 8:47
  SPEAKER_01: But nowadays we teach our kids the first thing you do is you put your seatbelt on.
• 8:52
  SPEAKER_01: So they build those good habits early in their career.
• 8:56
  SPEAKER_01: And that's that's the idea of how to really teach, especially the young, new, new people coming into the industry, teach them the good habits right away.
• 9:05
  SPEAKER_01: That way they it's second nature.
• 9:08
  SPEAKER_01: And when when safety becomes second nature, and you're not thinking, oh, I have to do this.
• 9:14
  SPEAKER_01: They you just do it almost as a reaction.
• 9:17
  SPEAKER_01: That's that's a victory, you know.
• 9:18
  SPEAKER_00: That's that's well what one thing that's unique about unique about elevator work is that it's it's very decentralized, right?
• 9:25
  SPEAKER_00: You you've got people scattered all over, not just the city, but but multiple cities.
• 9:29
  SPEAKER_00: And not only that, you can't just drive by and and glance.
• 9:33
  SPEAKER_00: You they're hidden, right?
• 9:34
  SPEAKER_00: They're in a pit, they're in a shaft, they're somewhere where most people can't even get there if they tried to.
• 9:40
  SPEAKER_00: And so how do you actually enforce safety when when it's so hidden and no one's watching?
• 9:46
  SPEAKER_01: Right.
• 9:47
  SPEAKER_01: That's it's it's very difficult because if you had you know, if you had a warehouse environment where there's an assembly line, a supervisor can walk right up and down the line and look at 20 people in 10 minutes and say, oh no, you need to put your glasses on.
• 10:01
  SPEAKER_01: But the elevator industry as a whole is so decentralized that you may have a two-person team working in one building and another two-person team working five miles down the road.
• 10:12
  SPEAKER_01: You know, if you have 30, 40 employees working for one superintendent, there's no way that super is gonna physically get eyes on those people and be able to check on them.
• 10:23
  SPEAKER_01: So what you have to do is you you you need the employees to own it.
• 10:28
  SPEAKER_01: They have to really feel the ownership of safety is my responsibility.
• 10:33
  SPEAKER_01: And that's again, it's gonna affect their behaviors, but you you have to you have to instill that in them that listen, safety isn't here for we're not here to discipline you if you're doing something wrong.
• 10:44
  SPEAKER_01: Safety is so you can go home and see your kids at night.
• 10:46
  SPEAKER_01: That's what it's for.
• 10:48
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 10:48
  SPEAKER_01: You have to get them to think that way, and it's it's a challenge, but it's a fun challenge, you know.
• 10:53
  SPEAKER_00: Sure.
• 10:54
  SPEAKER_00: Well, and yeah, it's rewarding, right?
• 10:55
  SPEAKER_00: When everybody's safe, right?
• 10:56
  SPEAKER_00: And and it hurts like anything, like when when somebody's not safe, right?
• 11:00
  SPEAKER_00: It's like, okay, you know.
• 11:01
  SPEAKER_00: So what's interesting too about safety is is it it's not just the pit, the shaft, but you're you're in charge of of drivers.
• 11:08
  SPEAKER_00: You're in charge of ice in front of the office, you're in charge of you know, ergonomics in the in the on the keyboard, kind of everything.
• 11:16
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, absolutely.
• 11:17
  SPEAKER_01: That like the field employee safety handbook is is produced by Elevator World.
• 11:21
  SPEAKER_01: And it's a wonderful book, and it has the nine safety absolutes, and it tells you all the different steps how to how to get on a car top or how to do lockout tag out.
• 11:31
  SPEAKER_01: But if you look at where all the injuries are coming from, half the injuries may be from a slip, trip, and fall on somebody's right, it's an environmental factor, or they're in a car accident.
• 11:42
  SPEAKER_01: So those types of things, they're not in the safety book, but if that's where half your injuries are coming from, you still need to focus that, you know, especially in your safety training, in your toolbox talks, and you know, and just your daily interactions with the employees.
• 11:57
  SPEAKER_00: Sure, sure.
• 11:58
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I mean, just safe lifting, right?
• 12:00
  SPEAKER_00: They could be moving weights in and out of a truck in the parking lot and and haven't even gotten to the elevator yet, and and somebody's got a herniated disc or something.
• 12:09
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, absolutely.
• 12:10
  SPEAKER_01: That's the and those types of the ergonomic injuries, the back injuries, the the knee and hip injuries, those are the ones where you're gonna be lost time.
• 12:19
  SPEAKER_01: You're not coming back to work for a long time, and that hurts it hurts the the employer, it hurts the company, because now you're trying to backfill that position.
• 12:28
  SPEAKER_01: You've lost that experience.
• 12:30
  SPEAKER_01: They're good, the the schedule shot, but it hurts the employee because now they're at home, and if they're collecting workers' comp, they're they're not making that they're not making living they used to make.
• 12:40
  SPEAKER_01: And you still gotta pay the bills and feed the kids, and and it's there's a mental aspect too.
• 12:46
  SPEAKER_01: When you get injured and you're at home, in your head, you're thinking, you know, oh it can get to you.
• 12:52
  SPEAKER_01: It can really get to you.
• 12:53
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, yeah.
• 12:53
  SPEAKER_00: Big time.
• 12:54
  SPEAKER_00: Yep.
• 12:54
  SPEAKER_00: No, very, very true.
• 12:56
  SPEAKER_00: Um, so I'm curious what what makes safety unique in this industry compared to others you've seen, such as military, railroad.
• 13:04
  SPEAKER_01: Well, you go military, railroad, and elevators, all three are dangerous.
• 13:09
  SPEAKER_01: They're inherently dangerous.
• 13:10
  SPEAKER_01: There are there are life-threatening hazards everywhere you look.
• 13:14
  SPEAKER_01: The biggest difference and the challenge I had with coming out of the military, you have something that's called an acceptable level of risk.
• 13:23
  SPEAKER_01: So in the in the military, you you side down the dotted line and you swear, you know, you defend the country.
• 13:30
  SPEAKER_01: So you know there are going to be serious injuries, and you understand at some point there are going to be casualties.
• 13:37
  SPEAKER_01: Even in peacetime training, you know, I've I've lost close friends in in a helicopter accident during peacetime.
• 13:45
  SPEAKER_01: That's not during war.
• 13:46
  SPEAKER_01: But in that environment, it was an acceptable level of risk.
• 13:50
  SPEAKER_01: You know, everyone it's it's sad, it's a tragedy, but you move on because you kind of expect it in the back of your head.
• 13:58
  SPEAKER_01: Once once you get into a regular, you know, like in elevators, there's just zero acceptable risk.
• 14:04
  SPEAKER_01: There's it's intolerable.
• 14:06
  SPEAKER_01: You cannot accept any level of risk to to both the employee while you're working and to the general public.
• 14:13
  SPEAKER_01: You're providing a service, you know, the escalator, the elevator.
• 14:17
  SPEAKER_01: If if there's a question in the back of your head of whether or not that unit is safe, no, you need to shut it off and lock it and tag it out and let somebody know.
• 14:27
  SPEAKER_01: You can you can never put in it, put it yourself, someone you're working with, or the public at any any level of risk.
• 14:35
  SPEAKER_01: And that was it was something that in the beginning I had to I had to learn because it's different than the military for sure.
• 14:42
  SPEAKER_00: Oh yeah, no, absolutely.
• 14:43
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 14:44
  SPEAKER_00: That's it's interesting to to to just hear you say it that way, that uh, you know, zero level of risk, but um, I don't know, maybe it wasn't always that way.
• 14:53
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, just just industrial accidents in general, right?
• 14:56
  SPEAKER_00: 100 years ago was a totally different ball game.
• 14:59
  SPEAKER_00: Oh, yeah.
• 15:00
  SPEAKER_00: And and so it's uh it's obviously good that hey, this that we're gonna value human life more than we did even 100 years ago, um or 50 years ago, right?
• 15:09
  SPEAKER_00: That's let's take it serious.
• 15:10
  SPEAKER_00: I there was a gentleman that I talked to on the on the podcast, or or you know, we were just having a conversation.
• 15:16
  SPEAKER_00: He he said that uh when he was trained, he was just given a safety belt.
• 15:20
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, and that's you don't have to go back that far in time to find that.
• 15:24
  SPEAKER_01: Now you like the 80s and the 90s, that's a long time ago.
• 15:27
  SPEAKER_01: But you can you can go back 15, 20 years and there are a lot of lot of people going to work and they had no safety bag at all.
• 15:35
  SPEAKER_01: Just here's your hard hat, get to work.
• 15:38
  SPEAKER_01: Um, and it's that's one of the best things that's happened with not just with safety, but just in you know, preserving the workforce.
• 15:47
  SPEAKER_01: Um, and that's it's great.
• 15:49
  SPEAKER_01: I I think that's beyond just elevators, not just our industry that that that's doing that.
• 15:54
  SPEAKER_01: Um you know, OSHA has a big part of the enforcement, but at the same time, you you have to you have to believe it.
• 16:04
  SPEAKER_01: You know, when OSHA is just check the box, that's one thing.
• 16:08
  SPEAKER_01: But when you actually you go out there and you show people why the rules are there, like here, this rule is here because if you do not do it, this is gonna be the consequence.
• 16:18
  SPEAKER_01: And that's that's the that's the real key to safety training, is getting that message across that we're teaching you this stuff not because it's just a rule, but because there's gonna be consequences if you don't follow the rule.
• 16:31
  SPEAKER_01: Like this is what can happen.
• 16:33
  unknown: Right.
• 16:33
  SPEAKER_00: Well, and they and they could be dire, right?
• 16:35
  SPEAKER_00: So do you do you feel yourself kind of pushing against kind of that old mentality of hey, safety's for for dummies or or for weak guy?
• 16:44
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, I don't know.
• 16:45
  SPEAKER_00: Do you do you feel any resistance or is it pretty much accepted now?
• 16:49
  SPEAKER_01: I'm very happy to say it's actually accepted.
• 16:52
  SPEAKER_01: And a lot of the reason it is, is because the unions and the companies at the same time are preaching the same message.
• 17:01
  SPEAKER_01: And as an employee, like we all move around.
• 17:04
  SPEAKER_01: I've worked at two other elevator companies.
• 17:06
  SPEAKER_01: The field employees do the same thing.
• 17:08
  SPEAKER_01: And as they go from one company to the next to the next, they're still hearing the same message.
• 17:13
  SPEAKER_01: And if that same message is being repeated year after year from every company, then wow, you know what?
• 17:20
  SPEAKER_01: You you start to believe it.
• 17:22
  SPEAKER_01: And it's uh it's it's a great change.
• 17:25
  SPEAKER_01: It's it's it's wonderful because it's definitely made a difference.
• 17:29
  SPEAKER_01: Absolutely made a difference.
• 17:31
  SPEAKER_00: For sure, for sure.
• 17:32
  SPEAKER_00: So I'm curious if you had to point to maybe the the number one root cause, right?
• 17:37
  SPEAKER_00: The the root cause of most accidents, what would you say that is?
• 17:41
  SPEAKER_01: So, see, that's something else.
• 17:43
  SPEAKER_01: Ray taught me really well.
• 17:44
  SPEAKER_01: When there's an accident or an incident, you got to dig down, really dig down and find the root cause.
• 17:49
  SPEAKER_01: And what you find in most very serious accidents is that there's there's multiple layers of failure.
• 17:57
  SPEAKER_01: Like maybe the person was doing something wrong physically, they were using the wrong tool, and they took another shortcut.
• 18:03
  SPEAKER_01: It's usually not one cause.
• 18:05
  SPEAKER_01: There's usually like two or three minor things that add up, but in the end, my belief is the the number one hazard in our industry is complacency.
• 18:17
  SPEAKER_01: So when when people are just getting that rut and they're doing the same thing over and over and over again, and they really you forget the consequences of what what could happen today, you know?
• 18:29
  SPEAKER_00: Right.
• 18:29
  SPEAKER_01: And you just get very comfortable in what you're doing.
• 18:33
  SPEAKER_01: The repetition of doing the same task over and over again, it makes you comfortable.
• 18:39
  SPEAKER_01: And that's when complacency slips in.
• 18:42
  SPEAKER_01: And I want to say like 80% of injuries, if you go look at it somehow, it it it falls back to complacency at some point.
• 18:51
  SPEAKER_00: Sure.
• 18:51
  SPEAKER_01: At some point, somebody made a decision because they just felt for whatever reason, uh, I don't need to do that today.
• 18:58
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, yeah.
• 18:58
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, you mentioned in a previous conversation that, you know, that you know, when people start out, right, maybe they're a first day helper and it's like, oh my gosh, this is scary, right?
• 19:07
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, there's there's a level of, you know, just maybe it's discomfort, maybe it's fear, whatever.
• 19:13
  SPEAKER_00: And and yet how how would you say people go from being super cautious one day to maybe, you know, vul vulnerable because of uh complacency later on?
• 19:22
  SPEAKER_01: Yes, that's and that's because the alarm clock goes off the same time.
• 19:27
  SPEAKER_01: You get out of bed and you put the same shoes on, you drive the same route, and you park the truck in the same spot every day and year after year after year.
• 19:35
  SPEAKER_01: You do that so many times that you forget that very first feeling.
• 19:40
  SPEAKER_01: The feeling you had, that that knot in your stomach, the very first time you look down a hoist way and you're like, oh my goodness, that's that's a hundred-foot drop right there.
• 19:49
  SPEAKER_01: And you you feel it up in your in your neck, you feel that in your throat.
• 19:53
  SPEAKER_01: You're like, oh my God.
• 19:54
  SPEAKER_01: I try to tell, especially the new employees.
• 19:57
  SPEAKER_01: And when I have a brand new mechanic, somebody who's gone through all their apprenticeship and now it's their first day out as a mechanic, we bring them back in for training just because you're a mechanic now.
• 20:07
  SPEAKER_01: I say, listen, listen to yourself.
• 20:10
  SPEAKER_01: Don't you feel that you're nervous right now, you're scared because now you're the guy in charge.
• 20:15
  SPEAKER_01: You're responsible for building that elevator and doing it on time and doing it safe and making a profit.
• 20:21
  SPEAKER_01: So you you can feel it right now.
• 20:23
  SPEAKER_01: And they all agree, they're like, oh yeah, I feel it.
• 20:26
  SPEAKER_01: And my challenge to them is I want you to carry that feeling with you because 10 years from now, when you've done, I've installed 30 elevators, when you get to 31, you're not gonna have that feeling, you're not gonna be nervous anymore.
• 20:40
  SPEAKER_01: And it's gonna be, oh, I'm back at work, I put my PPE on, I drink my coffee, and today we're gonna go work on the Outrigger.
• 20:49
  SPEAKER_01: And the that fear is gone.
• 20:52
  SPEAKER_01: But the fear is there to protect you because the fear is your body telling you, hey, you're putting me in a dangerous situation.
• 21:00
  SPEAKER_01: Please don't get hurt.
• 21:02
  SPEAKER_01: So that's that's kind of the progress at how it goes from, you know, in the beginning you can feel it, and then after a decade, two decades, you you're just not afraid anymore.
• 21:14
  SPEAKER_01: That fear, fear helps you stay alive.
• 21:17
  SPEAKER_00: For sure, yeah.
• 21:18
  SPEAKER_00: How how big of a factor would you say is rushing, especially around holidays, weekends, deadlines?
• 21:23
  SPEAKER_00: What patterns have you seen there?
• 21:25
  SPEAKER_01: Yes, that's actually just this week I was speaking with another safety director, and he just offhand mentioned it.
• 21:33
  SPEAKER_01: Oh, yeah, it was a it was a Thursday before a long weekend, and I was like, Yeah, isn't that when it always happens?
• 21:38
  SPEAKER_00: Gosh.
• 21:39
  SPEAKER_01: And it's it's really sad, but it's very true that I would say half of the very, very serious injuries I've experienced, and not just in elevators, but also in the railroad.
• 21:53
  SPEAKER_01: Some of these really, really serious injuries happen right before a long weekend.
• 21:58
  SPEAKER_01: Or it's in the summertime.
• 22:00
  SPEAKER_01: It's late on a Friday and everyone just wants to get home.
• 22:03
  SPEAKER_01: And that's that's when you see people at their at that point, they are making a conscious decision.
• 22:09
  SPEAKER_01: Okay, I'm gonna take this shortcut because they see the finish line.
• 22:12
  SPEAKER_01: They're like, we're we're getting we're cut we're working through lunch today, we're gonna knock this out.
• 22:17
  SPEAKER_01: I want to get out of here.
• 22:18
  SPEAKER_01: Everybody wants to go beat traffic or get to the beach.
• 22:21
  SPEAKER_01: And that's it's a big challenge.
• 22:25
  SPEAKER_01: Uh that's that's when you you need to take the extra time during those weeks when you know you're gonna have a vacation or a a long weekend coming up, and really focus on say, hey, listen, everybody, the danger is the same.
• 22:41
  SPEAKER_01: Right.
• 22:41
  SPEAKER_01: It doesn't matter which day of the week it is, the elevator is still gonna hurt just as much as it does on a Monday.
• 22:48
  SPEAKER_01: So try to keep everyone's focus.
• 22:51
  SPEAKER_01: And it's it's one of the challenges we face.
• 22:53
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 22:54
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, it sounds to me what I'm hearing you say is it takes discipline, self-discipline to make sure you're safe.
• 23:00
  SPEAKER_00: It takes more self-discipline when you know you got a long weekend coming up, you got a holiday coming up, you got a vacation coming up.
• 23:06
  SPEAKER_00: The last thing you want to do is spoil it with an accident, right?
• 23:08
  SPEAKER_00: But but a little extra self-discipline to just stay the course, do everything right, right?
• 23:15
  SPEAKER_00: Even if you got to work a few extra hours or or whatever, you know, don't uh risk it by and then if you add in complacency on top of rushing, well, you just got a recipe for disaster there.
• 23:26
  SPEAKER_00: Hey there, listeners, it's Matt, and I would love to know what you want to hear more of on the podcast.
• 23:32
  SPEAKER_00: If you have a topic in mind or a guest you'd like to hear from, head over to elevatorcareers.net and drop a suggestion in the box, or you can email podcast at elevatorcareers.net.
• 23:42
  SPEAKER_00: The link will also be in the description below.
• 23:45
  SPEAKER_00: Thank you so much for being part of this conversation.
• 23:47
  SPEAKER_00: Now, back to the show.
• 23:50
  SPEAKER_01: Right, exactly.
• 23:51
  SPEAKER_01: No, you hit it.
• 23:52
  SPEAKER_01: I you're hired.
• 23:53
  SPEAKER_01: You could be a safety guy.
• 23:54
  SPEAKER_01: There you go.
• 23:55
  SPEAKER_01: Now I just our our last safety meeting we had for our company, that was one of the topics.
• 24:00
  SPEAKER_01: I I spent 30 minutes teaching just discipline.
• 24:04
  unknown: Right.
• 24:04
  SPEAKER_01: And at that, that was part of it.
• 24:05
  SPEAKER_01: It was like, hey, is discipline a positive or negative word?
• 24:09
  SPEAKER_01: You think discipline, oh, I'm in trouble, you know, goes, you know, and school discipline is you gotta go to the principal's office.
• 24:16
  SPEAKER_01: Well, the other side of discipline is that what exactly what you said, self-discipline.
• 24:22
  SPEAKER_00: Sure.
• 24:22
  SPEAKER_01: And it's a decentralized workforce.
• 24:25
  SPEAKER_01: If there's no one else there enforcing the discipline, there's nothing but self-discipline.
• 24:32
  SPEAKER_01: That is the only thing keeping you from doing something wrong or unsafe.
• 24:37
  SPEAKER_01: So you you hit the nail on the head there.
• 24:39
  SPEAKER_01: That's a you're hard.
• 24:42
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, thanks.
• 24:43
  SPEAKER_00: Uh huh.
• 24:43
  SPEAKER_00: Um, so you mentioned uh you know new mechanics, but but I'm curious your your approach with uh new hires, right?
• 24:50
  SPEAKER_00: Maybe right out of the box, right?
• 24:52
  SPEAKER_00: Brand new.
• 24:52
  SPEAKER_00: How do you make safety not just a checklist, but a real instinct and and drive that home?
• 24:59
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, there's two.
• 25:00
  SPEAKER_01: I love teaching safety.
• 25:02
  SPEAKER_01: I love teaching it to brand new, young, you know, a 20-year-old.
• 25:06
  SPEAKER_01: It's wonderful.
• 25:08
  SPEAKER_01: But they're they are probably at the highest risk.
• 25:11
  SPEAKER_01: And number one is because it's a very, very dangerous injury industry.
• 25:17
  SPEAKER_01: And part of that is sharing experiences, sharing the tales and the experiences I've heard from the generations of of knowledge around me about what can actually happen.
• 25:30
  SPEAKER_01: So getting that first point across that like you can no, you're not just gonna get cut, okay?
• 25:36
  SPEAKER_01: You can die on this job and try to get that point across.
• 25:40
  SPEAKER_01: Uh that that's part one.
• 25:42
  SPEAKER_01: And then part two is the you give them a safety book and the book has 200 pages and 400 rules, and you're like, okay, great, here's a book full of rules, but just memorizing all those rules doesn't make you safe.
• 25:58
  SPEAKER_01: Understanding why the rule is written and what the reason the rule is there for, that's the important part.
• 26:05
  SPEAKER_01: So I I love to tell them, listen, read the book, but ask questions.
• 26:10
  SPEAKER_01: Ask your ask your mechanic why do we do it this way?
• 26:14
  SPEAKER_01: Not just, okay, what do we do next?
• 26:16
  SPEAKER_01: And then you execute, but why is there a certain procedure to get into the cartop?
• 26:23
  SPEAKER_01: Why is there a certain procedure for lockout tag out?
• 26:26
  SPEAKER_01: There's a reason each step is there.
• 26:29
  SPEAKER_01: And getting a young employee to understand the reason why we do it the way we do is much, much more important than them memorizing every rule step by step.
• 26:40
  SPEAKER_00: Absolutely.
• 26:40
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 26:41
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, the what the why is huge in all things, right?
• 26:43
  SPEAKER_00: But but I think the the idea to ask, right, why is this the case?
• 26:48
  SPEAKER_00: And especially the ones that seem dumb.
• 26:50
  SPEAKER_00: Oh, that's stupid.
• 26:51
  SPEAKER_00: Why do I have to?
• 26:52
  SPEAKER_00: Those are the ones you really need to ask because you you don't understand the why.
• 26:56
  SPEAKER_01: And that's that's another way where the the industry, the workforce itself has matured in the last two decades, in that 20 years ago, a new employee walking on the job, their job was to go get the coffee, right?
• 27:12
  SPEAKER_01: There, and nowadays, the the the senior and the senior experienced, you know, a mechanic who's got the years of knowledge, they don't treat the new mechanics that way.
• 27:24
  SPEAKER_01: They don't treat the new helpers that way.
• 27:25
  SPEAKER_01: You know, a new apprentice comes in and it's it's a learning experience.
• 27:29
  SPEAKER_01: You know, they're really getting the on-the-job training, which is the only way you can learn anything about elevators.
• 27:36
  SPEAKER_01: You're never gonna learn it sitting in front of a screen.
• 27:38
  SPEAKER_01: So if you're in the field and you have a mechanic that's not willing to teach you, you're not gonna learn it there either.
• 27:44
  SPEAKER_01: And that the the workforce itself has matured to a point now where that knowledge flow is there.
• 27:52
  SPEAKER_01: And you tell them, ask questions, learn something every single day, and it's it's it's great.
• 27:59
  SPEAKER_01: It's working out good.
• 28:00
  SPEAKER_00: That's awesome.
• 28:00
  SPEAKER_00: That's really, really great to hear.
• 28:02
  SPEAKER_00: So, you know, a lot of smaller companies don't necessarily have the same resources as your current company or or the majors for for sure.
• 28:10
  SPEAKER_00: What are some of the most important things they should be doing to protect their teams, even though they may not have a vice president of safety on staff?
• 28:18
  SPEAKER_01: Right.
• 28:18
  SPEAKER_01: Yes.
• 28:19
  SPEAKER_01: You're right.
• 28:19
  SPEAKER_01: The smaller companies don't have the assets available.
• 28:22
  SPEAKER_01: You know, their entire office staff might be four people.
• 28:25
  SPEAKER_01: And it's not, you know, one person's tied into finance, one person's answering all the phones, and they don't have a dedicated safety professional on board.
• 28:34
  SPEAKER_01: So in those cases, you know what?
• 28:37
  SPEAKER_01: Just like the young helper, the the advice is the same thing.
• 28:40
  SPEAKER_01: Ask.
• 28:41
  SPEAKER_01: Ask for help.
• 28:42
  SPEAKER_01: The the NAEC is one of the organizations that is more than willing to help, you know, help the person next to you out, help another company out with safety because it's not it's not proprietary.
• 28:55
  SPEAKER_01: It's it's not you're not going to lose a competitive advantage by helping someone else work safe.
• 29:02
  SPEAKER_01: And the all the tools are out there.
• 29:04
  SPEAKER_01: Now you don't have to reinvent the wheel.
• 29:06
  SPEAKER_01: Somebody's done this before.
• 29:08
  SPEAKER_01: And the the great thing, especially like NAEC, the great thing is people are willing, very willing to help each other out.
• 29:15
  SPEAKER_01: So um I've I've mentioned the field employee safety handbook from Elevator World.
• 29:20
  SPEAKER_01: That's a great resource.
• 29:22
  SPEAKER_01: It's a it's a great supplement to your company's safety program.
• 29:26
  SPEAKER_01: Um, but if you need help with that actual safety program or you have questions about it, there's a world of experience out there.
• 29:33
  SPEAKER_01: Don't be afraid to ask for help.
• 29:34
  SPEAKER_01: I I don't know everything.
• 29:36
  SPEAKER_01: I've only been doing safety now for about four years.
• 29:39
  SPEAKER_01: So I ask a lot of people for help because I'm still learning, but it's it's great.
• 29:44
  SPEAKER_01: It's it's a very positive environment.
• 29:47
  SPEAKER_00: For for sure.
• 29:48
  SPEAKER_00: And I and I've I've found that even for myself, that asking questions.
• 29:52
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, I had had an interesting situation.
• 29:54
  SPEAKER_00: It wasn't safety related, right?
• 29:55
  SPEAKER_00: But I I had a situation in with a client in Florida trying to figure out it was something about how to get, you know, trying to get somebody hired, but he didn't quite have his license.
• 30:02
  SPEAKER_00: And so I asked, you know, three or four or five different people that I knew, how does this work in Florida, right?
• 30:07
  SPEAKER_00: And I was I was just pleased as could be that every single one of them, oh, well, here's what, you know, here's how it works.
• 30:12
  SPEAKER_00: You know, I was like, thank you.
• 30:13
  SPEAKER_00: That that really helped.
• 30:15
  SPEAKER_00: So I've I've found that uh you're right, that the people are willing to help you, but you have to ask.
• 30:19
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, absolutely.
• 30:21
  SPEAKER_01: And that's you got to make the connections so you know who to ask.
• 30:24
  SPEAKER_01: So don't be afraid to go out and and just, you know, just talk to people, rub shoulders and get involved in groups, you know, get get involved in the the industry, it's a niche industry.
• 30:36
  SPEAKER_01: It's there's not a lot of people in it.
• 30:37
  SPEAKER_01: Once you get in it, if if the person you ask doesn't know the answer, they'll know somebody who does.
• 30:42
  SPEAKER_01: And it's oh absolutely.
• 30:44
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, it's great.
• 30:45
  SPEAKER_00: Very true, very true.
• 30:46
  SPEAKER_00: So you had mentioned that mental health is becoming a bigger focus around safety.
• 30:51
  SPEAKER_00: And and so why is it so critical that, you know, especially in construction or elevator work right now, that we focus on mental health?
• 31:00
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, this is something I'm very, very proud of.
• 31:03
  SPEAKER_01: Uh the very proud of TEI, uh, very proud of Local One, the IUEC, the elevator industry as a whole right now is like a full court press into mental health.
• 31:17
  SPEAKER_01: And for good reason.
• 31:19
  SPEAKER_01: And when you look at it, if again, military experience, I have I've lost many close friends to suicide who they're coming out of our military experience.
• 31:32
  SPEAKER_01: You get PTSD, um, it doesn't even have to be PTSD, it's just the difficulties of living in this modern world where there's it's a tough world out there.
• 31:42
  SPEAKER_01: And you look at the suicide rates for the military veterans is in insane.
• 31:49
  SPEAKER_01: But then you look at the the suicide rates for the construction industry, and it's right up there.
• 31:55
  SPEAKER_01: It's right up there with with military veterans, and that's mind-blowing because you're talking multiples like four or five times above the US average if you're a construction worker.
• 32:08
  SPEAKER_01: So when you really look at the numbers, you look into it, are my employees more likely to die from an on-the-job injury or from something not on the job, such as suicide or an overdose.
• 32:22
  SPEAKER_01: And when you really break down the numbers, you the employees and workforce, we may actually lose more people in a year to suicide and drug overdoses than we do on the job, which means it means number one, we're doing a good job with safety because people aren't getting killed on the job.
• 32:39
  SPEAKER_01: But it means number two, we need to really, really focus on what's going on off the job and at home.
• 32:45
  SPEAKER_01: How can we help individuals get help?
• 32:48
  SPEAKER_01: How can we help individuals get their families to get help?
• 32:52
  SPEAKER_01: Because it's not always the the mechanic, it might be his spouse or his child.
• 32:57
  SPEAKER_01: And you're carrying that with you when you go to work.
• 33:01
  SPEAKER_01: And if you're carrying all this stress and the phone's ringing and it's the high school calling because your kid's getting kicked out of school again, those things are not going to make you safe at work.
• 33:11
  SPEAKER_01: You're gonna be distracted.
• 33:13
  SPEAKER_01: And when when you're distracted, that's when you could get injured or the person you're working with.
• 33:18
  SPEAKER_01: So um it's there's so many organizations out there.
• 33:23
  SPEAKER_01: I I think right now every company is really jumping on the bandwagon.
• 33:27
  SPEAKER_01: We're all pushing mental health, and it's really it's kind of amazing, but it's making a difference.
• 33:35
  SPEAKER_01: Like I've only seen mental health now for about two years getting pushed in in our industry, but it is actually making a tangible difference in people's lives where people are not afraid now to say, I need help.
• 33:49
  SPEAKER_01: Right.
• 33:49
  SPEAKER_01: And that's the first step.
• 33:51
  SPEAKER_01: And once you get past that, that's the hardest thing.
• 33:54
  SPEAKER_01: Just saying, I need help.
• 33:55
  SPEAKER_01: And you know what?
• 33:56
  SPEAKER_00: Building a culture and a an open work environment where they can, where they feel like they have permission to say that is huge, right?
• 34:04
  SPEAKER_00: Just because if it's safe for me to say that, well, then it's safe for me to to ask questions.
• 34:09
  SPEAKER_00: It's safe for me to ask about safety, it's safe for me to just be me and know that I'm okay.
• 34:14
  SPEAKER_00: That's huge.
• 34:14
  SPEAKER_00: I think that's uh just in my experience in the corporate world, you know, there's uh it hasn't always been that way.
• 34:22
  SPEAKER_00: So if you can build an environment and a culture of not only do we want you to be safe, we we care about you and your family enough that if you're struggling, we want to know it and we want to provide whatever assistance we can, that's that's massive.
• 34:34
  SPEAKER_01: Yes, it's it's huge.
• 34:36
  SPEAKER_01: It's it's very it's very rewarding actually when you can help someone.
• 34:42
  SPEAKER_01: Um, and it's that's that's probably the best part of my job is when somebody comes and they ask for help and you can actually help someone, it doesn't even have to be on the job.
• 34:52
  SPEAKER_01: It could be, you know, maybe they got a financial issue or you know, they just need help because I've got the experience, like, all right, here's how to set up a 529 plan so you can pay for your kids' college in 20 years, you know?
• 35:05
  SPEAKER_01: Those types of things, it makes us a stronger family as a whole.
• 35:09
  SPEAKER_01: And in the end, that makes us all work safer.
• 35:12
  SPEAKER_00: So absolutely.
• 35:14
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I mean, it's one thing to have an awesome job, right?
• 35:16
  SPEAKER_00: But if I can't translate awesome job into awesome retirement, awesome future, you know, family life or or mental health, it's kind of for naught, right?
• 35:24
  SPEAKER_00: It doesn't, if it doesn't fit in the rest of my my life.
• 35:28
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 35:29
  SPEAKER_01: That's yeah, that's another little thing I tell them to the new hires, a brand new 20-year-old, is like, this isn't a job.
• 35:36
  SPEAKER_01: This is a career.
• 35:37
  SPEAKER_01: This is your entire future.
• 35:39
  SPEAKER_01: This is day one.
• 35:40
  SPEAKER_01: You're starting right now.
• 35:41
  SPEAKER_01: Build those good habits, but don't think of this as a job.
• 35:45
  SPEAKER_01: You know, think of this as your career and embrace it.
• 35:49
  SPEAKER_00: For sure.
• 35:50
  SPEAKER_00: Well, and and if you were to, you know, ask the question, you know, how many of you uh came and you stayed for your entire you know, rest of your life?
• 35:57
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, there's a high percentage that are like, no, I'm it's what I do.
• 36:01
  SPEAKER_00: It's who I am, right?
• 36:02
  SPEAKER_00: It's it's become a part of me.
• 36:04
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, I I couldn't imagine, like, I it's never comfortable like going from the military to to railroad and then railroad to elevators.
• 36:12
  SPEAKER_01: That's it's not a comfortable transition ever.
• 36:14
  SPEAKER_01: Sure.
• 36:15
  SPEAKER_01: But I can't imagine ever leaving elevators.
• 36:17
  SPEAKER_01: Like I'm I'm here now.
• 36:18
  SPEAKER_01: This is great.
• 36:20
  SPEAKER_00: Yep.
• 36:20
  SPEAKER_00: Yep.
• 36:21
  SPEAKER_00: Awesome.
• 36:21
  SPEAKER_00: Awesome.
• 36:22
  SPEAKER_00: Well, Mike, this has been a uh a pleasure for sure.
• 36:24
  SPEAKER_00: I I appreciate all your insights.
• 36:26
  SPEAKER_00: Any final words of wisdom, advice you'd give to newbies?
• 36:30
  SPEAKER_00: What would you like to say as we wrap up?
• 36:32
  SPEAKER_01: Oh, that's a good one.
• 36:34
  SPEAKER_01: Actually, I end all my emails with like a little slogan and it says, uh, now I'm drawing a blank.
• 36:42
  SPEAKER_01: No, it says, do the right thing and look out for each other.
• 36:46
  SPEAKER_01: I I try to break safety down to as its simplest form.
• 36:50
  SPEAKER_01: So in its very simplest form, if you go out there every day and you do the right thing and you look out for each other, that's all I can ask.
• 36:58
  SPEAKER_01: And then we all go home safe every day.
• 37:01
  SPEAKER_01: And that's I think that sums up safety pretty good in one sentence.
• 37:04
  SPEAKER_00: No, it really does.
• 37:05
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, if everybody does the right thing and we're looking out for each other, I mean, is there anything else?
• 37:10
  SPEAKER_01: Exactly.
• 37:11
  SPEAKER_01: That's all you need to do.
• 37:12
  SPEAKER_00: That's awesome.
• 37:13
  SPEAKER_00: Awesome.
• 37:14
  SPEAKER_00: Well, thank you again.
• 37:14
  SPEAKER_00: I appreciate it and uh wish you the best as you continue to create a safe workforce there.
• 37:20
  SPEAKER_01: All right.
• 37:20
  SPEAKER_01: Thanks a lot, Matt.
• 37:21
  SPEAKER_01: Look forward to see you again.
• 37:22
  SPEAKER_00: Thank you for listening to the Elevator Careers Podcast, sponsored by the Allred Group, a leader in elevator industry recruiting.
• 37:29
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• 37:37
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• 37:38
  SPEAKER_00: And until next time, stay safe.