In Conversation With: Kate Louise Cole, Managing Director of HAVi Technologies

KATE LOUISE COLE MANAGING DIRECTOR OF HAVi TECHNOLOGIES

Kate Louise joined HAVi Technologies as Managing Director in 2020. Her authentic leadership approach recognises the importance of the team in achieving company success. She is passionate about leading a purpose-driven business that makes a real difference to health outcomes for clients.

What is your role within HAVi?

As the Managing Director of HAVi; the market leader in providing compliance with vibration legislation, my role is to lead a team of passionate individuals in helping our clients protect their workers from the devastating impact of Hand Arm Vibration Syndrome (HAVS). HAVS affects anyone who uses powered hand tools and is particularly prevalent in the trackside work undertaken by our colleagues in the rail industry.

What challenges have you faced in the industry?

We work closely with rail professionals at all levels working in Safety or Operational roles. These individuals are nearly always time poor with a significant and varied personal workload. With so many tasks on their to-do lists and so much competition for their time, our challenge is typically getting their attention. Our unique holistic approach to managing risk and compliance however is designed with their wellbeing in mind and our pragmatic solutions mean HAV risk can be one less thing for them to worry about.

What success have you experienced in the last twelve months and how do you measure success?

Whilst we have been lucky enough to celebrate significant blue-chip contract wins in the last year, our hardest fought and what will undoubtedly become our biggest is to secure a partnership with the UK’s largest rail company.

This bespoke partnership has seen us work directly with their track teams to design a targeted bespoke programme to manage their HAV risk. The solution included conducting detailed risk profile audits, measuring tool vibration magnitudes to the relevant standards, creating risk assessments to meet the requirements of legislation, the implementation of an exposure monitoring schedule and full training of their workforce.

In addition to this, the company also chose us to develop a custom insights and analytics solution to help their teams make better decisions on HAV control measures. One of the main reasons that any project fails is a lack of engagement of stakeholders. To address this we also created a bespoke marketing campaign for the company around the theme of ‘HAVS WRECKS LIVES’. This programme empowers the workforce to be aware of the risks caused by vibration and understand how they can take action to mitigate them.

Our client is delighted with the results of the project so far and the difference it has made to their safety management and outcomes.

What was the inspiration behind starting HAVi?

HAVi was created in 2008 by our current CEO and Owner, Mike Swan. His vision was to create a solution that made a difference to the two million people in the UK alone at risk of harm through vibration. Since its creation, it has continued to evolve, widening its scope from a simple hardware provider to the market leading provider of a full service solution to compliance and worker protection.

What is your Unique Selling Point?

We view our role in the industry as serving a purpose, to protect workers from harm and to ensure compliance for the organisations they work for. To this end we offer a holistic solution that encompasses everything from risk profile audits, tool measurement, risk assessment creation, tool monitoring and the identification and recording of control measures.

Underpinning all this is a unique proposition that assures compliance by promoting employee engagement in managing risk using innovative, experiential learning tools and the implementation of companywide awareness campaigns. We take all of this work from the shoulders of safety and operational leaders, freeing them to get on with dealing with their ever growing to-do lists.

When a client comes to you with a particular problem, what’s your process for coming up with a solution, and how closely do you work with clients throughout the projects?

Our first objective is always to understand the client, their environment and the challenges they are facing. In some cases, a recent HSE visit followed by an improvement notice is the trigger but we are seeing a growing number of organisations seeking best practice in the management of vibration risk. In both cases, we can quickly advise on, and help our clients implement appropriate control measures to address any immediate concerns.

Our solution is infinitely scalable so we can then move with the client into discussions around best practice. From here we put together a detailed implementation plan underpinned by engagement and empowerment. No two clients are the same, and we pride ourselves on having the agility to provide each client with a bespoke solution designed to address their needs, in their timescales to achieve their outcomes.

What new developments/strategies do you have?

We are constantly developing our solution to ensure it continues to meet legislation and our own research on best practice. We were the first to take advantage of using big data to manage risk when we launched our ActivIQ insight management solution in 2023. Our innovations in e-learning and stakeholder engagement were launched in 2024 and have helped many large and small companies make a real difference to health outcomes. There are loads of developments in the pipeline and rest assured they are all focused on making it easier for our clients to protect their workers and stay compliant with vibration legislation.

What are some of the biggest challenges your sector currently faces and what are some potential solutions?

We are witnessing a significant increase, not only in the volume of prosecutions for breaches of vibration legislation but also in the size of the penalties. Fines imposed by the HSE in excess of £500,000 are now commonplace and with private prosecutions in the civil courts rife with uncapped payouts, the fiscal risk to organisations not doing the right thing has never been higher. Most, if not all of this risk can be mitigated simply and cheaply.

There is a significant amount of confusion surrounding compliance with vibration legislation that puts unnecessary pressure on duty holders. Our focus on straight talking advice and pragmatic solutions offers comfort to those with the responsibility of ensuring their organisations compliance.

What are your views on collaborative working?

There is always room to learn. By working collaboratively, we can harness the creativity, talent and expertise from multiple sources to deliver the best outcome to our clients. Our job is to pull this together in a pragmatic programme based on a thorough knowledge of both the client’s organisation and of their challenges. Our approach will ensure the client is left with a solution that is compliant and a team that are advocates of best practice in risk management.