A three-year Knowledge Transfer Partnership (KTP) programme between leading public services provider Amey and Leeds Beckett University has been graded as ‘Outstanding’ by Innovate UK, one of only 10% of projects to get this accolade.
The behavioural safety research project, SafetySmart, has led to the development of a unique measurement tool to assess the impact employee behaviours and attitudes have on safety incidents. The tool is now being used in Amey’s Consulting and Rail Business.
Rob Doyle, Director of HSEQ for Amey Consulting and Rail said: “We are particularly proud and honoured to achieve a grading of outstanding for our ambitious and complex KTP. It has certainly challenged, yet supported our approach in developing a tailored behavioural safety framework which has been invaluable.”
Dr Jim Morgan, Principal Lecturer at Leeds Beckett said: “As advocates of the KTP initiative, we are privileged to receive this outstanding rating from Innovate UK in recognition for the school’s capability in the application of psychological theory and methods to improve real world safety management.”
The KTP delivery structure and three-year project timeline allowed Amey’s Consulting and Rail business to conduct an in-depth evaluation of company practices on how it uses employee reporting tools and data for reporting safety incidents, and identify gaps and opportunities for improvements.
Dr Russ Bromley, Knowledge Transfer Advisor for the Knowledge Transfer network, added: “Impacting and improving the collective and individual behaviours of a large company can be difficult to achieve. This project has made a welcome contribution to the avoidance of accidents and the methods used have won the admiration of the academic community through associated publications and conference proceedings. Simply, but profoundly, it adds up to a win-win KTP project of which I am most proud to have facilitated”.