Challenge

1. Cross-Industry

The multi-faceted nature of Mitie's business meant they needed an EHS solution that could meet the demands of various sectors. Not only do Mitie put in place systems and control measures from it's own point of view, but they have to take into account that clients have their own controls and processes, too.

2. Lack of Engagement

Processes and systems in place did not support the QHSE team in building a safety culture in the business. Incidents were managed from a centralised phone line in a linear process and operation management were form filling rather than managing QHSE data in source systems.

3. Safety KPI Reporting

Because of a low rate of input, it was difficult to measure KPIs and the QHSE team did not have enough data to make strategic safety decisions with confidence. 

Solution

For Mitie, EcoOnline proved to be the solution to their challenges

1. Cross-Industry 

Built using modern architecture and SaaS (software-as-a-service) principles, the solution appeals to organisations in any industry - perfect for the multidimensional Mitie. As a single-code base application, it offers configuration, not customisation.

2. Increased Engagement

In order to drive engagement, the Mitie team recognised that they had to adapt their processes to include new ways of working. Mitie moved to a model where end users report incidents, near misses and hazards directly onto the platform.

Integrated action tracking means actions can be easily assigned and tracked through to completion. Giving end users direct access would open more reporting avenues, increasing engagement with the system and safety culture at Mitie. 

3. Ease of KPI Reporting

EcoOnline would allow Mitie to better measure and report on their KPIs. The QHSE team at Mitie are able to better understand the wider picture of their health and safety ecosystem. For day-to-day reporting, Mitie use a suite of dashboards and reports. However, to align QHSE reporting with the strategic data visualisation, Mitie pull data from the platform into Microsoft Power BI for deep data analysis. 

See, trust and present data in an easy to understand format.

The introduction of a new software solution coupled with the Mitie team cementing new processes has helped to drive some blockbuster results in their first 12 months. They have seen:

• 140% increase in hazard and near miss reporting
• 14% decrease in time lost to injury

John Blackhurst observed - "I don't think it's a coincidence that we've increased hazard observation and near miss reporting, our lost time to injury is reducing month on month. It's of course part of a wider picture, but EcoOnline does contribute to that. We're spotting the hazards before they happen.

"What the new platform helps us to do is to see our data, trust our data and present that in an easy to understand format in real-time. It allowed us to capture the data in the way we wanted to capture it, not create KPIs based on the way the data was shaped at that time."

Looking Forward

The future for Mitie's QHSE initiatives looks positive. From the initial boost in statistics, the Mitie QHSE team can build on the data they are getting and continue to improve their statistics. 

John Blackhurst says "I am very positive and very happy with it so far. It has a good future if it continues developing at the rate it's been developing."

Following a period of transition and change, the team at Mitie are now looking to move other parts of their QHSE programme forward. Audit Management and Risk Management are likely to play a big part in how the platform continues to support Mitie in the future.