How FlexManager rose to challenges posed by COVID and climate change

James: [00:00:19] Hello everyone and welcome to the US TV special. My name is James Burton, managing editor of Canadian Occupational Safety, and today I'm delighted to welcome Gary Cunningham, Customer Service Director at Flex Manager. Now Gary has a wealth of leadership experience and manages implementations of Flex manager to global enterprises. Gary, thanks so much for joining us. 

Gary: [00:00:40] Thanks very much for having me. We're delighted with this nomination and award. 

James: [00:00:43] Now, Flex Manager was recently named as COS five star software and technology provider. So a huge congratulations to Gary and his team. And what better opportunity to find out more about what has propelled this success. So, Gary, first up, how can flex manager enhance workplace safety? 

Gary: [00:01:02] Well, our software flex manager is a tool for enabling our clients to manage their current and future workplace compliance. Whether you have strict procedures in place or more fluid processes, our cloud web and mobile enabled software intends to adapt to your company's requirements and enable you to track workplace compliance. And, of course, safety. Flex manager is highly configurable by nature, and through this adaptability, our clients, regardless of industry or workplace type, can setup, manage, monitor and track their processes and procedures and ensure that workplace compliance is maintained and ultimately improved. We have a suite of over 70 modules that can manage or adapt to manage the various aspects that fall under the umbrella of workplace safety and compliance. From a support perspective, the Flex manager team based our success on our client success. And when they are approving or enhancing their workplace safety, we are improving as a company and as a product offering overall. Furthermore, in terms of quality management of their workplaces, many of our Canadian and European clients have achieved industry relevant certification. Be that core auditing or ISO standards, for example, or achieving recognized awards such as this one within their own industries through the use of our Flex manager platform. 

James: [00:02:44] Thanks, Gary. Now. What do you think gives you the edge over some of the other platforms out there? 

Gary: [00:02:50] Selfishly, as the head of the support team, I believe that our standards of customer success delivery give us a greater edge over our competitors. However, I must admit that many of our clients have said that the Flex Manager product itself is an intuitive, interactive, integrated and most importantly, easy to use solution that was easier to implemented than softwares that they have used in the past. On top of that, as many of our system administrators are leading experts in workplace compliance and safety. They appreciate the high levels of configuration on Flex Manager, which allows users create their own processes without the need for development intervention. Much of our configuration outlook began with our founding father, head developer and current CEO, who himself was a leading health and safety expert and trainer. His previous experiences in the workplace compliance and safety alongside his openness to adapt. Flex manager, with the help of expert client feedback, has meant that our product has evolved to what it is today and will continue to evolve to the same. We work closely with our system administrators to ensure that Flex Manager ticks all of their boxes and the lessons we learn are then implemented for all of our clients during our quarterly release cycles. For all software products. Implementation is key and we pride ourselves in striving for the perfect rollout for our clients. Our Flex manager implementation experts make it their goal to ensure that our clients are successful. Our Canadian clients and their users, for example, both new and old, have fed back to us during numerous interactions that our responsiveness, helpfulness and experience differentiates us from our competitors that they have previously used in their professional careers. 

James: [00:04:57] Thanks, Gary. Now, obviously, the last couple of years have been challenging. I wanted to ask you what safety, what workplace safety trends have you noticed in 2022? And then how have you as a company adapted to them? 

Gary: [00:05:14] 2022 has been a strange year with the reopening of many countries following the global pandemic. Thankfully, Flex Manager as a cloud based software was not as impacted as other workplaces, and the features within it became more relevant for some of our existing and more recent clients. Flex manager modules such as online training, loan working policy and procedural management, PPE management and so on, became organizational requirements because of COVID and they were standard offerings as part of our package. The ability to add these dynamically within our flex monitor solution, within the same platform for our clients, where they may have been managing audits and incident reports, for example, allowed our clients to offset the challenges COVID presented. The workplace has extended beyond a physical building or area, and during COVID, many of our clients were very thankful to have the ability to allow remote working. Flex manager became an effective tool for managing their workplace compliance without any interruption to operations, and many have stated that it actually improved engagement with their employees and unveiled efficiencies to their work practices without compromising oversight for managers and above. Of course, one of the biggest challenges we are all experiencing as global citizens currently is the environmental crisis through climate change and so on. And while our clients were implementing the reactive solutions for COVID management, our development team have been expanding our offering or extending environmental related modules, including carbon emissions, calculator, waste logging Permit Control. Environmental Incident reporting. Environmental auditing. In terms of the ongoing energy crisis, Flex Manager has always had the ability to track workplace safety related costs, and it provides tools for tracking energy usage and for implementing efficient procedural changes. But more recently, we've extended this to include the ability to link Internet of Things or IOT devices for the automated control of certain elements, including energy management and so on. In summary, Flex Manager allows our clients to track all of their environmental, social and governance activities within the same platform as well as maintaining their workplace compliance. And this adaptability is something we intend to keep as part of our ethos and future to offset any workplace safety trends that may emerge. 

James: [00:08:02] Yeah. Thanks, Gary. And that was a good look at 2022. But maybe looking ahead into the future, what challenges or ambitions are on the horizons for Flex Manager. 

Gary: [00:08:13] Winning awards such as this one and getting the recognition within Canada, which is one of our strongest marketplaces. Was always an ambition ambition previously. And we hope that this award will alleviate some of the challenges we've experienced and gain recognition for our Flex manager software. Thankfully, Flex Manager is entering a new phase of growth that we feel is starting to allow us to realize our true ambition to become a market leading software provider. Flex Manager was founded over ten years ago with the intention of service in the needs of major Canadian companies, regardless of industry. And the first of these was, and still is, our longest standing Canadian customer. They were a construction provider called NAC or North America Construction. Our aims have not deviated much since then. We still target industry leading organizations with the knowledge that we can not only improve the efficiency in which they operate, but also to improve Flex manager as a product and as a service. Flex manager has been very fortunate during the recent pandemic and that our turnover and market share has actually grown and we intend to use our adaptable workplace safety software to face up to and evade some of the industry specific challenges experienced by others, including things like employee retention, rising energy costs and so on. And we hope to pass these experiences onto our client base, both current and future. Of course, with growth brings great challenges and potential opportunities. And we believe the Flex manager will continue to grow with our vision to become the industry leading workplace compliance software provider, not only within Canada, Europe or North America, but worldwide. 

James: [00:10:10] Thanks so much, Gary. That wraps up another COS TV special. Thank you so much for joining us and sharing your insights. 

Gary: [00:10:17] Thanks very much for having me. We're delighted with this nomination and award. 

James: [00:10:20] Now you can find more information on Gary and his team at flexmanager.com. And don't forget also to check COS at thesafetymag.com for all the latest news and views on the industry and if you haven't already, please feel free to sign up to our daily newsletter. I'm James Burton. Until next time.