Emil Anderson – COR gap analysis and WIVA preparation
The Emil Anderson group (EAG) is a well-known, long-established group of companies providing heavy construction services in the transportation and industrial infrastructure sectors.
The Issue
EAG has held COR certification for many years and conducted annual joint audits for 3 different companies and was selected by WorkSafeBC to undergo a WorkSafeBC Initiated Verification Audit (WIVA) as part of the quality assurance process. Stakes were high for EAG. If the audit failed EAG could have potentially lost their COR which would have directly resulted in a loss of work due to COR being a pre-qualification requirement for many clients.
The WIVA was to be conducted by a certified external auditor appointed by the certifying partner, BC Construction Safety Alliance.
There had been recent turnover in the safety department and EAG was looking for a qualified safety professional to assist in preparation for the audit scheduled about 1 month following initial contact with DCS Safety.
The Resolution
DCS Safety was referred to EAG as a potential safety professional and following provision of pricing and references was quickly approved by EAG management to assist in the preparation. Two days later the owner of DCS Safety and a DCS Safety consulting safety advisor were on site at EAG offices to formulate a plan and start on the process.
During the duration of the 2 week project DCS Safety worked closely with EAG staff and provided key deliverables including:
- Development of a COR audit preparation information package explaining the COR audit process and what to expect during the audit. This was sent to all employees.
- Collection, verification and collation of safety records and documentation from the previous 12 months for each audit question. This information was prepared in packages, labelled and laid out on a boardroom table to facilitate easy review by the WIVA auditor.
- Daily progress updates to EAG staff to clearly indicate what had been completed and what was outstanding.
The WIVA audit was conducted shortly afterwards and EAG passed the audit with no significant issues or concerns from the WIVA auditor. Anecdotally the contribution by DCS Safety to locate, collate and organize required documentation made the audit efficient and go very smoothly resulting in COR re-certification of EAG and ensuring uninterrupted ability to continue working.
2 years later, based on demonstrated performance during the WIVA project, DCS Safety was awarded a sole-sourced contract to conduct the joint re-certification audit for an expanded scope of 5 different EAG companies.
EAG was once again successful in COR re-certification.