June 2013 Employee of the Month

Meet Industrial Safety Consultant Specialist Deborah Bailey June Employee of the Month

Prevention and Care: Deborah Bailey lives it – every day.

As an industrial safety consultant specialist, Deborah walks the walk and talks the talk. She spends her days listening, reviewing and advising customers on their safety needs. Thanks to her many years of safety experience in private industry, community safety boards and emergency-management teams, she’s a true safety professional. Deborah puts her impressive background to good use by helping employers to identify and develop cost effective, workable solutions to their safety related problems.

“Deb is a true representative of the Prevention and Care motto,” said her supervisor, Employer Services Supervisor Keith Greathouse. “She has the technical skills and knowledge to assist employers with their safety programs to help prevent accidents from occurring, but more importantly she really does care about her customers. Deb will take those extra steps needed to assist her employers in understanding both OSHA regulations and BWC program requirements.”

Those are just some of the reasons she was chosen as our June BWC Employee of the Month, an honor Deborah was surprised she received.

“I was shocked to find out I had won, I certainly didn’t see that coming,” she said. “I am not sure who nominated me, but I would like to thank them.”

BWCWeb can answer that question, Deborah. Your co-worker, Employer Services Specialist Andrew Cate, nominated you, and it’s easy to see why.

“Deborah is always available to assist our customers,” said Andrew. “She also brings her perspective of being a former BWC customer. This allows her to look at issues from the customers view, ‘looking into BWC from the outside,’ and providing safety solutions and services that exceed customer expectations.”

As an OCOSH instructor, six-year BWC veteran Deborah worked in private industry for 28 years. She uses her extensive background to help her translate complicated technical and safety issues into understandable components. She then assists students in taking concepts and theories and turning them into real-life, workable solutions.

In addition to all her regular duties, Deborah has also assisted OCOSH with helping to create new classes (Safety for the Non-Safety Professional and Combustible Dust) and has served as a liaison on NIOSH projects.

Yet another facet of her job – and one she particularly enjoys – is making customer visits.

“One of the great things about my job is that it is different every day,” she said. “On average I make six to nine customer visits a week. These visits can range from a hazard assessment, on-site training to safety team development. After these visits, I document the visit and send a follow up report.”

Deborah frequently presents at local safety councils, and helps develop the Ohio Safety Congress & Expo workshops and breakout sessions. She meets with, listens to and talks with customers in an effort to determine not only what will meet their individual needs, but also the needs of their customer peer groups.

All of these job duties make for a challenging pace, but Deborah is happy to be out and about.

“I love working with and around people,” she said. “I am a degreed chemist, and one of things I didn’t like about working as a chemist was being stuck in a lab with little people contact. I am fortunate to have a great job that allows me to work with employers, teach and participate in the Ohio Safety Congress & Expo, safety councils and a many other events.”

For Deborah, the key to providing good customer service is listening to what the customers’ needs are.

“Once I can define those needs, I can provide the proper training, information or hook them up with one of our other departments,” she said. “Once the initial contact is made I like to follow up to make sure that the customers’ needs have been met.”

Deborah’s energetic, professional, customer-driven tactics are second to none, according to Andrew.

“BWC is fortunate to have her as an employee – she does a fantastic job,” he said.

But for Deborah, it’s all a part of working together to serve Ohio’s employers and injured workers.

“I would also like to give a shout out to the Canton Service Office and especially the employer management team . . . you guys rock, and I am proud to be part of the team!”