It’s All About Ensuring My Crew Feels Safe and Confident Handling the Equipment

I started as an administrator working in an insurance company with over 1,000 employees. I loved the work, and I was good at it, but always felt like something was missing. Like being in a really quiet library and having to sneeze. Always uptight. You were being judged. Don’t speak up at a meeting, you’ll be seen as pushy. Don’t offer your opinion on that, you don’t work in that area. Moreover, the competition to have more, be better, wear the right clothes, be on the right diet, etc. just never seemed to fit me.

The white-collar world wasn’t for me. It is amazingly relaxed in the blue-collar world, all the technicians treat me like their sister (or dare I say mother as I’m at that age) and they are respectful of the duties that we provide to and for them.

Currently, I’m an Administration Manager and COR-certified Internal Auditor responsible for admin and accounting tasks, safety management and support of our technicians, whatever form it may take. Dyna Crane provides safety management solutions, so preparing safety paperwork is a big part of what I’m doing.

The laws for our industry are very strict, and non-compliance results in severe fines and penalties. Much worse than that, overhead cranes can cause serious injury or death at the job site. We keep those cranes maintained, serviced and provide training on their use. Inspections are a big part of ensuring that they run correctly.

We create digital safety documents and checklists and make sure each crane has its own individual information that needs to be documented. We track the safety tickets and incoming paperwork handled by our technicians to make sure everything is passed, locked out as required until repairs can be completed or even removed from service if it is deemed too dangerous to operate.

“The best part about my job is an unbelievable work environment. I feel relaxed and can be myself. We laugh every day, and have fun and enjoy ourselves at work.”

All of the employees at Dyna Crane have made me feel welcome from day 1. Their computer skills are incredible as is their communication. We are all very safe, and we discuss safety at work a lot.

Dyna Crane started with 3 people on the team. There was only one designer and she had to manually create forms and compile safety manuals. It was a lot of paperwork so she was looking for a paperless solution and eventually found Fluix.

Our crews seemed much more comfortable utilizing their phones or iPads than manually completing documentation. Also, if you’re handwriting these documents, trying to locate them to get copies to our clients to ensure compliance can be really hard.

“We use Fluix for ALL safety paperwork now. This includes our own, FLRA’s, vehicle inspection checklists, JHA’s, you name it. Everyone knows that in this industry safety paperwork just to get on a jobsite can seem overwhelming.”

All the information is secure and protected from loss. Our clients, and that’s for over 1,000, love it because they receive neat, automated reports that can be labeled and stored and backed up.

Also, previously, field workers spent extra time (approx. 1 hour each day AT LEAST) on routine paperwork while office workers had to manage large quantities of paper. Time and cost savings: 3,185 labor hours and $ 286,650 annually. I believe these numbers might even be low. We couldn’t do it without Fluix.

Some companies are reluctant to go digital and would rather do everything manually. I get it – change is hard. Especially something this big. But once the original sheets are created, they can be copied, improved on, and immediately uploaded. The clients are amazed at our service, the time the crews spend getting these items ready and staying organized has helped massive organizations save money and time.

We catch one loose bolt on a crane and tighten it, and make a note in a report. This way the client can be confident that their equipment is safe and they are doing all they can to protect their employees. It’s all about constant improvement.

I understand that the age gap can also be a blocker for digitalization. As hard as it is to admit – I AM the older generation. I’m used to paper copies. Completing and signing and then filing dirty, ripped and sometimes missing paperwork is my job! The younger crews were happy to show me what they needed and how to complete things online. I had to learn to accept help and advice. The more I do it, the better I get at it.

Working in this industry can be hard. However, I’m thankful to my crews every day and I tell them that. They literally are a second family to me, and I care about them a lot. I do my best to help make their job, an extremely dangerous one, a little easier so that they can go out and do what they need to do.

“I never pretend to be better than anyone else in my crew. Their job is to fix cranes, I don’t know how to do that. They don’t know how to administrate, so I help them with it. We are all very supportive, and that’s all that matters. Treat your colleagues with dignity and respect and they’ll return the favor tenfold.”