Why Franchise Health & Safety Consulting?

On Thursday 20 October I was privileged to join the stage with a panel of professionals that have successfully utilised Safe365 to grow and develop their business offerings and supercharge their clients capability.

The panel comprised of Monika Sharma Wakeman , Director at Deloitte New Zealand, Amanda Barker , Founding Director at Pillar Consulting New Zealand & Australia, Vanessa Martelletti, Director of Channelled Consultancy and myself.

One of my key takeaways was how each of us brought our own style and technique to consulting (from start up, to in-house growth, franchising to representing one of the largest professional services networks in the world) and how, despite those differences we were unified in our insatiable desire to improve our clients health and safety outcomes and strengthen our broader professional community.

The Advanced Safety Franchise Opportunity 'Behind-The-Scenes' workshop recording can be viewed here.

Safe365 Commercial Manager, Shane Knight did a great job at throwing probing questions at each of us in turn.

Below is my attempt at summarising the questions directed at me and my responses.

Shane Knight: "We see most consultancy organisations go down the centralised model and grow within and maybe expand by market or sector. You have taken another route being a franchise model, what made you go down that way and how is it going?"

Matt Jones: "That’s exactly how Advanced Safety started too, however there were three factors that stood in the way of continuing down that path:

1. I am naturally adverse to being a boss or manager – I don’t feel inspired by the carrot and stick approach to life. My preference is to grow leaders, which requires an entirely different mind-set. To let go of the reins and provide an environment where individuals with exceptional talent can create their own future, is far more empowering for everyone involved.
2. Just like many of us, I was burned by the Covid lock-downs. I was forced to let go of two fantastic full time consultants and I became weary of repeating that experience again.
3. Repeating the same formula will produce the same results. With an estimated shortfall of 2100 health and safety practitioners in NZ (HASANZ, 2019) within the near future, new models and methods must be tried. We also need a swell of competent and confident leaders to inspire the next generation. Our franchise model is designed to create exceptional leaders who inspire their teams to become equally fantastic leaders.

Shane Knight: "What have you found to be the challenges in the franchise model and where do you see the opportunity?"

?Matt Jones: "It hasn’t been done before. Breaking new ground is always going to present challenges. However, with a growth mindset the challenges bring with them huge opportunities for growth, collaboration and partnerships".

?Shane Knight: "For other partners who are scaling and considering this model, what advice do you have for them?"

Matt Jones: "Do your homework. Study franchising and understand its nuances. Most importantly however, is doing the work on yourself. Mindset is THE most important factor to your success. If you have hang ups about letting your influence go, are overly protective of your IP that you have spent decades creating and feel that generating wealth is a bad thing, then you will be setting yourself up for failure."

Shane Knight: "In terms of recruiting, you're not generally looking for someone who wants a 'job', so what attributes and what type of health and safety professional are you after?"

Matt Jones: "Accolades, titles, letters after a name mean little when it comes to finding the right candidate. Experience is a big factor for me but most importantly, is the ability to hold a conversation, show a genuine interest in the other person and a desire to do great things beyond themselves. I’m looking for leaders and those who are ready to make the jump from manager to leader."

Shane Knight: "Typically, who are your clients and how are you using Safe365 with them?"

Matt Jones: "Tier two construction and project management companies, logistics and transportation, manufacturing and in recent years we have also partnered with Pacific Business Trust (and Deloitte) by supporting their members, (largely comprised of medium and small Pasifika owned enterprises) establish their health and safety management systems.

Safe365 is a superb conversation starter which enables us to define safety in a visually pleasing and simple way. The tool enables us to generate a road map for improvement, which if agreed to allows us to build a portfolio of work for the next 6months and beyond. This then places our clients well to achieve recognition from Tōtika and potentially ISO45001:2018 accreditation.

#franchise #leaders #closingthegapof2000 #liveevents #business #mindset

To discover more about the Advanced Safety Franchise Opportunity check out our info page and 'behind-the-scenes' presentation here.