4.1 Health, safety and wellbeing
Chapter 4
We are committed to providea safe and secure workplace for all our employees, sub-contractors and partners.
A safe and secure workplace for all our employees
We are committed to providing a safe and secure workplace for all our employees, sub-contractors and partners. Our goal is that all employees, sub-contractors and partners shall return home every day completely free of injuries. Safety is embedded in everything we do, and our approach is formally set out in NRC Group’s policy for health, working environment and safety. Building a health & safety first - company culture, rigorous adherence to regulations and fostering processes that minimize HSE-risks are of utmost importance in guaranteeing the safety and health of our employees.
Comprehensive approach to health and safety
Ensuring safe workplaces and compliance with regulations across diverse projects at various phases brings its challenges. Many health and safety issues are subject to steadily changing framework terms and conditions, affecting our employees and subcontractor tradespersons, many of whom may be in and out of projects every day. Managing health and safety in this context is complex and requires a comprehensive approach, including training, management systems, monitoring, improvement observations, with regular internal and formal external review.
Health and safety systems certified to ISO45001
NRC Group Finland and NRC Group Norway are certified to ISO 45001, the internationally recognised occupational health and safety management system standard. Through the ISO certified health and safety management system, NRC Group continuously carries out preventive measures to improve the working environment, including risk analysis, planning, training and safety inspections.
Building a stronger HSE-culture
With multiple work sites across three countries, nearly 2000 employees and a wide range of operating activities, NRC Group is actively promoting a culture for how to observe and report on health, safety, environment and quality. To create awareness around this issue during 2023, operational health and safety was, as usual, included in our Sustainability Week.
Our people are our eyes and ears in the projects, and we aim to empower employees to be observant and report situations which could be made even more safe, reduce the risk of environmental impact or improve quality outcomes. It is now becoming standard practice to report and address minor deviations from our standard operating procedures, when relevant risk observations are registered.
We have invested in a reliable recording observations system, and the practice has now become a genuinely useful and functional part of the way we operate. Through recording observations and addressing them, we improve our risk management and highlight good practices. At the same time, recording observations is promoting a culture of openness and discussions, lessons learnt and is enabling continuous improvement.
Learning from all injury incidents is important. NRC Group systematically collects and analyses data through reports and investigations from all incidents. The aim is to identify where the company can implement additional guidelines and routines that work and prevent new incidents from happening. All key learnings from health and safety incidents are shared via company-wide communication channels.
Lost time injury rate
Lost time injury rate
0.0
2022: 6.0
Sickness absence rate
Sickness absence rate
0.0
%
2022: 4.2 %
Measuring our safety performance
We measure the Group’s lost time injury (LTI) frequency which is considered the most important KPI for safe work. The LTI frequency is defined as the number of injuries resulting in absence per million working hours. We also measure absence due to sickness - the number of working days per annum that employee illness causes them to be absent from work. We include our subcontractors in all our reporting of health and safety data.
Our injury frequency decreased in 2023
Our LTI frequency was 5.6 in 2023, which is a reduction from the frequency of 6.0 in 2022. Subcontractors are included in these figures. We continued to maintain our record of zero serious or fatal injuries in 2023 (2022: 0). Sickness absence rate decreased slightly to 3.8 in 2023, down from 4.2% the previous year.
Creating wellbeing at work
We work continuously to ensure that all employees experience job satisfaction and wellbeing, targeting zero sickness related to any work undertaken at NRC Group. A number of specific health and wellbeing initiatives have been created within different operating countries. These include regular employee dialogues, medical checks, access to health support services and occupational health care. We have established routines for closer follow-up of employees on sick leave, making necessary adaptations to facilitate their prompt return to work. Where required, referral to medical specialists is made that is covered by insurance. We also closely monitor overtime work in projects. This is to ensure we remain both legally compliant and and are able to effectively manage workloads within our wellbeing framework.
Employee engagement survey
#yourvoicematters is our biannual employee engagement survey, conducted every eighteen months. The survey plays a key role in our strategic efforts to cultivate and reinforce a shared culture and a robust internal brand. It’s an important tool to gain insight about our workplace on all levels of the organization. From the insights we learn what the right focus areas should be. By identifying what we do right and how we can improve, will enable us to prioritize actions that makes a difference for employees. In February 2023, the response rate was 83%.
Each year we also conduct #yourvoicematters Pulse
survey. This is a snapshot of employee engagement and offer us real-time insight into the organisation’s health and employee engagement. The Pulse measure progress on our actions and helps us adjust if needed. In October 2023, the response rate was 72%.
How satisfied and motivated we are, is likely to influence our behaviour and performance.Engaged employees impact our performance through productivity, efficiency, customer experience, turnover and sick leave. Our leaders are trained in how to follow up on results by involving their team members in defining activities driving positive change, and over 80% of the entire organization participated in #yourvoicematters workshops. Empowering employees to contribute fosters collaboration and innovation, essential in today’s evolving landscape.
Marianne Ulland Kellmer
EVP & Head of HR and Digitalisation
A single Group-wide HSE approach
NRC Group has prepared Health, Safety and Environment (HSE) guidelines to establish a joint set of rules for safe work across the Group, including for subcontractors that work on our projects. With acquisitions of several companies in recent years, we have prioritized the establishment of a single groupwide HSE-culture from the same, single set of guidelines.
We have a set of guidelines for health, safety and work environment for our employees, hired staff and partners. Our handbook is available in Norwegian, Swedish, Finnish and English, and meets regulatory requirements in each country that we operate. It can be downloaded on each of our country web pages. To support the implementation of our health and safety program we also run an annual health and safety awareness week. During this week a number of high-profile communications, safety talks and company- wide focus activities are run to engage staff and embed health and safety practices.Safe and fair working conditions for all employees
Working conditions in Norway, Sweden and Finland are recognised globally as being well regulated. We work closely with employee representatives and trade unions to ensure a safe and fair working environment for all employees.
NRC Group upholds internationally-recognised human rights and labour standards as defined by the International Labour Organization’s (ILO) fundamental conventions and the UN Declaration of Human Rights by acting responsibly in all areas of its business. We require our subcontractors and partners to follow applicable laws and regulations and use dedicated information management systems on our project sites.
NRC Group’s ambition is to be the most attractive infrastructure partner and employer.
