The Consult

HRP Associates is once again gearing up for National Safety Month. To celebrate, HRP will have something happening every single day throughout June. From Safety Bingo and hazard hunts to wellness initiatives and roadway safety activities, the goal is simple: keep safety top of mind while making it engaging and fun for employees across the company.

“We want to have fun while raising awareness around these topics,” says Jessica Reece, HRP’s Corporate Health & Safety Officer. “Discussing or attending training relevant to health and safety shouldn’t be boring. It’s an opportunity to focus on how we can keep ourselves and the people around us safe — whether we’re in the office, in the field, driving between sites, or even at home.”

The month kicks off with daily rounds of Safety Bingo, paired with health and safety tips shared companywide each day. Throughout the month, HRP will focus on weekly themes that touch on both workplace and personal wellbeing.

Week one centers around “Moving Safety Forward,” while week two shifts focus to roadway safety — an especially important topic for a consulting company where employees spend a significant amount of time traveling between offices and project sites. Week three highlights holistic worker health, including mental, physical, and emotional wellbeing, and week four focuses on preventing slips, trips, and falls.

HRP will also host a companywide safety meeting featuring seasonal safety reminders like heat-related illness prevention, sunscreen use, cooling garments, and other practical summer safety tips. Employees can also expect interactive activities like word searches, spirit week competitions, and a workplace hazard hunt.

Some of HRP’s most memorable Safety Month traditions have come from creative roadway safety competitions. In previous years, employees participated in the “Roadway Safety at the Frankies 500,” a go-kart race that incorporated roadway safety trivia, while another activity challenged staff to play Mario Kart using impairment-simulation “beer goggles” to demonstrate the dangers of distracted and impaired driving. The Mario Kart challenge is returning again this year.

But behind the games and activities is a much larger effort to continue strengthening HRP’s safety culture year-round.

“The improvements and suggestions we get from employees show a real sense of ownership,” Jessica says. “Employee engagement around safety is high because our culture is truly taking it seriously.”

One example is HRP’s recently launched “Report It, Don’t Ignore It” (RIDI) initiative, which encourages employees to report near misses, unsafe conditions, or unsafe behaviors observed in the field.

Jessica is also proud of the progress HRP has made improving communication around health and safety over the past several years. The company now distributes a monthly health and safety newsletter to all offices, highlighting incidents, near misses, seasonal risks, and important safety reminders.

“We’ve worked hard to improve how we communicate safety information,” Jessica says. “Not everybody learns the same way. Some people learn visually, others through hands-on experiences or presentations. But one of the most effective tools is employees sharing experiences with one another. When people share what they’ve seen or experienced, they’re teaching someone else.”

Another growing area of focus for HRP is overall employee wellness — something Jessica believes is directly connected to workplace safety.

“When people think about safety, they don’t always think about mental or emotional wellbeing,” she says. “But fatigue, stress, and burnout absolutely impact safety. We want employees to feel healthy overall because that affects every part of their work and daily lives.”

As HRP continues expanding its health and safety initiatives, Jessica says the company remains focused on one thing above all else: creating a culture where safety is everyone’s responsibility, and one where employees feel empowered to speak up, stay engaged, and look out for one another every day of the year.