Page 38 - Food & Drink Magazine October 2019

HYGIENE & SAFETY
Freedom to grow rapidly
When Freedom Foods embarked on its ambitious growth strategy, a comprehensive safety system was needed. Its partnership with Rapid Global has more than delivered. By Kim Berry.
WHEN you consider the speed with which Freedom Foods Group operates (see Plant Fitout & Design story on p24-25) it was imperative the company have safety protocols firmly in place.
Group head safety & compliance Rob McDonald told Food & Drink Business that when he joined the company it was with the edict to build
and strengthen its systems and framework.
When he evaluated what Freedom Foods needed, the solution had to work across multiple sites that produced a diverse range of products in a fast-moving company and sector.
“The only thing that fitted that bill was a system like Rapid Global. We started at the very beginning, with a visitor sign-in, sign-out station. From there, we looked at what their system could allow us to do.”
Rapid Global provides end-to-end workforce management solutions from contractor onboarding and ongoing management, to inductions and training, site access control measures and incident reporting.
Because Freedom Foods was in such an intense period of growth, a contractor management program became a priority.
“Rapid was a good platform for us, because of its integrated signing-in on-site and contractor management solutions. We worked closely with Ethan [Blaine, project coordinator] and the Rapid
solutions including a permit to work functionality for high risk tasks; and a dashboard that shows who is on site and what they are doing.”
For McDonald, one of the biggest achievements was with its contractor compliance, induction and attendance systems. The company’s paper permit-to-work system was a “very clunky, tick-a-box”
When you consider more than 431 companies come through Freedom Foods sites, using an online platform to manage visitors and contractors makes sense.
McDonald calls it “brilliant”. During the most recent builds at Shepparton and Ingleburn, there could be more than 150 contractors on site every day.
“Managing those people, their processes, insurances, safe work method statements and their job safety analyses was a full-time job for one person.
“The system now allows contractors to complete all the requirements before they even turn up.”
If a contractor is bringing staff onto the site, they get access to a dashboard where they can issue induction keys to their employees. They enter documentation and it uploads immediately.
“This system is so fast and
so easy to use. It’s incredible.
I can see everything to do
with their safe work method statement, instantly. I can also do that on the app so wherever
I am I can access it. The peace of mind is enormous.”
38 | Food&Drink business | October 2019 | www.foodanddrinkbusiness.com.au
“ I don’t want to just tick the boxes. I want to make sure our staff are safe. I want to see how it’s applied to the people on the floor. We’ve got to get it right.”
team on defining what we wanted and how we wanted it to work. It has been a real partnership,” McDonald said.
Blaine told F&DB: “We have worked with Freedom Foods on its worker induction program; contractor company compliance management; a hazard and incident reporting tool that can be used by staff, visitors and contractors; asset management auditing; site attendance management
process. While getting Rapid’s solution integrated was also “a bit of a process” due to the size of the business and getting people’s buy-in, it is now the new normal.
The platform allows for different types of contractors and unlocks mandatory and specific prerequisites depending on the person’s job. There are five mandatory courses for all contractors, McDonald says.