Eating the elephant without getting indigestion!

Welcome to the first Safety Elf blog.

There is so much I am keen to share about me and my business, but I am experiencing something akin to stage fright as I look at the blank page before me and wonder where to start…so I thought I would talk how I am trying to 'eat the elephant' without getting indigestion!

Life is full and complex at the moment.

That is to say I am running my new business (The Safety Elf – health and safety advice, training and consultancy) and preparing to go on holiday (I know it will be worth it when we get there, but at this point I am just trying to get to get to the end of the ‘to do’ list before I go) and making preparations to move house 3 days after we get back (exciting but not recommended for relaxation!)!

Each individual element is exciting in it’s own right, but taken together they could be overwhelming. I have been reflecting on what I have been doing to make the process manageable, and I realised there are many parallels here with my health and safety work.

For example, I am employing the same strategy as I do for risk assessments – trying to think of what could foreseeably go wrong, and putting measures in place to reduce those risks.

I’m also writing it all down – in the world of health and safety the recording of your actions is an essential part of the process, and the information is then captured for you and others to refer back to when it is time to review.

I am also embracing delegation! I know it is hard if you like to be in control – but does it ALL have to fall to you?  Try to identify the things that are a good fit with someone else’s expertise and skill set, and give then the satisfaction of contributing to the overall goal too.

So my top survival tips are……………..

·         Don’t get overwhelmed by the scale of the task ahead. Businesses are often daunted by the lists of risk assessments they know they need to complete in order to be legally compliant, but breaking it down and scheduling regular activity in bite-sized chunks is a good way to ’eat the elephant’ without getting indigestion.

·         Spend some to plan and get organised – remember the old adage that ‘to fail to prepare is to prepare to fail’

Think about what systems and processes work best for you – are you a list lover, a post-it note person or would a spread-sheet serve you best?

·         Capture the information as you go  - it frees your mind to keep problem –solving, rather than working hard to retain the detail of what you have already done.

·         Get help

And most important of all….

·         Don’t panic!