Saturday Meetings and Minutes

June 25, 2022

  

• We at the Canadian Association for Black Health and Safety Professionals will no longer be recording our sessions to ensure fruitful discussions and dialogues; however, we intend to be sending out Executive Summaries of each meeting after each session. 
• We had impactful lectures conducted by our guest speakers, Robert Butchike, CRSP, CHSC, NCSO, and George Lorimer.
• Robert Butchike, CRSP, CHSC, NCSO lecturer on micro-aggression, had a case study on a real-life incident during one of his past projects. This incident engaged everyone in the meeting and brought about insightful discussion amongst the participants.
• George Lorimer's presentation on soft skills was truly amazing and helped to put lots of hidden truths into perspective. His lecture gave us an insight into why certain tough decisions are made by senior management within our organizations. In short, before you advocate workplace health and safety concerns, it is important to know who your audience is. There is a way to communicate with the frontline workers, clients, shareholders, middle management, and top management. 

March 19, 2022

  

• This meeting was held with the board of Canadian Registered Safety Professionals (Robin Angel MSc CRSP, and Nicola (Nikki) Wright, CAE) in which the board went over the CRSP and CRST process in great detail and answered questions from the audience afterwards. 

February 5, 2022

  

• Lee-Anne Bartley shared with the group her experience in the industry and some of the industry's best practices that one should use when working as a health and safety professional. She also emphasizes the importance of self-improvement and using all available resources to gain more knowledge because there are free resources out there that safety professionals can benefit from.

December 18, 2021

  

• Dr. I. David Daniels' presentation was impactful. I shared with us statistics on how there was little representation of African Americans when the Occupational Safety and Health Act was first created in the United States. He also shared with us the physiological effects of not being included in the workplace. 
• Dawolu Saul's presentation was also very impactful, where he shared with us the importance of being confident in carrying out the duties of your profession. Although most of his experience came from the public sector, Dawolu could relate to the rest of the audience from the private sector and answered some critical questions regarding why there are fewer Black Canadian Executives in all industries.

November 13, 2021

  

• Richard discussed the hurdles he had to face working in the public sector and the challenges black people are still facing in the workplace. He is one of the co-founders of the Federal Black Employee Caucus (FBEC) / Caucus des employés fédéraux noirs (CEFN), which advocates for issues related to black employees working for the federal government and data collection, mental health and career progression.

October 9, 2021

  

• The October 9, 2021 meeting was our first meeting where myself (Mohamed Hassan), Charles Agunbiade B.Tech, M.Eng.,IOSH, Nebosh, HSA, and Robert Butchike, CRSP, CHSC, NCSO came up with the idea of creating an organization that advocates for Canadian Black Health and Safety Professionals. A lot of conversations took place before we decided to develop the organization. 
• In short, this organization would not have been created without the feedback and support of people working in the industry. We are keen on creating platforms where people can share their grievances and develop a solution that will ensure the Health and safety of all workers working in the industry regardless of their background, race, religion, sex, and age.