Become a BSF Champion

The Building Safer Future Champion process has been an incredible, worthwhile journey for us.

Ian Hopwood

Head of Safety, Health, Environment and Quality at Langley UK Ltd

What is the Building a Safer future Champion Assessment

A rigorous, independently verified assessment offering:

Benchmarking of organisational leadership and culture in relation to building safety.
Assessment through employee surveys and policy/process review.
Independent validation of building safety cultural maturity.
Clear insight into strengths and gaps.
A roadmap for continuous improvement.
Suitable for:
- Those who own, maintain or operate buildings
- Principal contractors
- Principal designers
- Designers and other professional services providers (who do not take on the principal designer role) – for example architects, consultants, structural engineers, fire engineers
- Construction and procurement frameworks
- Housing Associations and Social Housing providers
- Local Authorities
- Subcontractors

The Champions assessment provides independent assurance that an organisation’s leadership, competence and safety‑critical systems align with the expectations set out under the Building Safety Act, the Fire Safety Act and the Building Safety Regulator (BSR).

Dame Judith Hackitt, Chair of the Independent Review of Building Regulations and Fire Safety and Chair of the Industry Safety Steering Group commented:

“Every journey of culture change starts with an open and honest assessment of where you are today. All of the companies who have achieved Champion status have shown the courage to look at themselves and understand the steps they need to take to improve and are now embarked upon that journey.

Their leadership and the benefits they can demonstrate already from setting out on this journey should be a wake-up call to everyone else to get onboard.”

Persimmon has found the team within the BSF to be knowledgeable, supportive and insightful. They have helped us ‘turn a mirror’ on our organisation so that we can identify and address areas for improvement. We are always seeking opportunities to strengthen our approach to building standards and safety and BSF’s scrutiny through the Champion assessment has helped drive further change and improvement.

Andrew Fuller

Group Construction Director at Persimmon Homes Ltd

The Benchmarking and Verification Framework

The Building a Safer Future Benchmarking Framework has been designed to enable companies involved in any part of the construction value chain to understand and improve their safety culture and leadership effectiveness.

The benchmarking and verification framework measures the maturity of your leadership and culture and tests that each aligns with activities critical to building safety. The framework is based on approaches in other major hazard sectors, such as Chemicals (Responsible Care); Oil and Gas (Hearts and Minds); and Rail (RM3) and is a process of benchmarking and verification, underpinned by independent assessment and verification.

Completing the Leadership and Culture module has helped us to raise the profile of building safety across our organisation, and at the same time has given us valuable insight into our business, which we’ll use to establish a continuous improvement plan to promote culture change, and to help improve building safety for all those living and working in our properties.

Mark Sayer

Director of Safety & Resilience at Abri Group Ltd

How it works

There are currently eight pathways in the Building a Safer Future Champion assessment. These ensure that the framework of the assessment is tailored specifically to the requirements of your organisation. The eight pathways focus on

Introducing and discussing our BSF Champion journey, along with our approach to competence, procurement, delivery, quality and risk management, has been instrumental to securing reduced Professional Indemnity insurance premiums and better cover. The comprehensive BSF framework provides our insurers with the assurance and comfort they need to underwrite construction activities, and not just high-rise residential building activities. It's applicable to all construction and infrastructure activities. Our insurers acknowledge our core value to "do the right thing" and our commitment to BSF Champions provides clear proof of this.

Paul Turner

Director at The Casey Group Ltd

Stages

There are two distinct stages to the Building a Safer Future Champion assessment.

1

Assessing Leadership and Culture

2

Corroborating Leadership and
Culture through organisational practice

Module one - Building Safety Leadership and Culture

The first module of the BSF Champions analytical journey involves the distribution and return of an in-depth survey, probing your company’s existing leadership and culture around building safety. This is investigated further in confidential validation discussions held between your dedicated independent Assessor and a sample of individual members of staff.

BSF analyses and explores the current position from all levels of your company’s structure, identifying weak spots and opportunities for further development, as well as examples of good practice and innovation.

You will receive a comprehensive data-rich report, containing invaluable information that will assist you in creating prioritised, evidenced-based, continuous improvement plans to ensure your company always puts safety first. This allows you to benchmark where you are now, how you are performing in relation to the wider sector, and demonstrate and prove progress and improvements over time.

If you achieve the minimum expected level, you will be conferred with the ‘Certificate of Commitment and Progress – Building Safety Stage One: Leadership and Culture’.

Module Two - Building a Safer Future Champion - Full Award

Your BSF Champion analytical journey then continues with a second stage of the assessment and external validation, which consists of corroborating the findings from the Leadership and Culture survey through a robust self-assertion against the BSF Champions Corroborating Elements Framework.

Your company will be asked to demonstrate (with evidentiary proof) your adherence to a set of comprehensive Corroborating Elements expectations critical to building safety.

Your Assessor will review your assertions and evidence and clarify details in a validation discussion with your nominated Company Lead and any accompanying technical or functional experts.

Again, you will receive a thorough, beneficial report to assist you in planning your continuous improvement journey and, providing you meet the minimum standard, your company will achieve full BSF Champion status which is valid for three years.