WAREHOUSE VISIONARIES
Building a Warehouse Safety Culture That Sticks with Melody Moore of Rinchem

Key Points & Takeaways

• The Heinrich Triangle in Safety: Addressing near misses and minor incidents is essential to prevent serious accidents.

• The Role of Technology: Rinchem uses tools like OneTrack to gain real-time visibility into day-to-day operations, enabling proactive safety measures.

• Worker Engagement: Policies and procedures are most effective when workers are actively involved in their creation and implementation.

• Innovative Safety Programs: QR codes for reporting safety concerns and accessing SDS sheets streamline processes and enhance accessibility.

• Operational Ownership: Initiatives like aisle ownership foster accountability and pride among employees.

Transcript

Evan: Hey everyone, this is Evan from OneTrack and you are listening to Warehouse Visionaries, where I sit down with the leaders shaping the future of warehousing logistics to talk about how they're doing it so the rest of us can too. Today I am talking to Melody Moore. She's the Director of EHS at Rinchem, a global hazardous materials 3PL. And we're going to dive into what safety looks like in a hazmat environment and how Rinchem is building a world-class safety culture.

So Melody, I appreciate you coming on the show today.

Melody: Oh, yeah. Thanks for having me.

Evan: Before we dive in, can you tell everyone a little bit about who you are, your background, and what Rinchem does?

Melody: Yes, sure. So Melody Moore, Director of EH&S and the quality team here at Rinchem. I've been working in 3PL with hazardous materials for over 20 years with a concentration in safety and compliance. And I'd always admired Rinchem. They've been a leader in this space since 1976. They're the largest network of chemical and gas distribution centers in the world. They have 30 locations in six countries and they handle over 5 billion pounds of hazardous materials. So when you look at where you want to go, if you're wanting to do this with their career, it's somewhere I'd always aspired to. So I was really excited to take on this position and this opportunity.

Evan: So I got to ask, I mean, obviously a global 3PL that has its own set of challenges. But when you're talking about safety and hazardous materials, that's that's a whole other layer of complexity there. So what is it actually like being a safety leader in the hazardous material space? Not to mention a company with the scale that Rinchem does, being in multiple countries with sites all over the world.

Melody: Yeah. You know, the biggest piece is you have to have a great team. Obviously, I'm not doing this on my own. So you have to have great operational leaders with that many sites and you have to have a strong networking system at your corporate level for EHS as well. So, that's the piece that we do have. Like you said, there's an additional layer of risk and complexity with what we do. And our EHS is mainly corporate. So our operational facilities take what we have and they are the leaders in their spaces to push forward everything that we set forth. You know, of course we have great policies, procedures, processes, and systems. Systems are really important when you're dealing with EHS. Nobody can remember everything that has to go into this. So you have to have systems and you have to build your network to make sure that you're not forgetting anything and that you're not only doing it at that corporate level, but making sure that every facility that is under you is doing everything that's required and necessary. So really our systems and our people are the backbone of how we keep it going and how we stay safe and compliant.

Evan: That's really that golden triangle, right? People, process, technology. It sounds like you're hitting the nail on all three of them, which is pretty great. I know speaking from experience, being on a great team with great people goes further than anything else can. But you talked about your processes, your technology. Let's dig into that a little bit. What are you specifically doing at Rinchem to get ahead of some of these challenges that come along with safety and quality?

Melody: You know, with us not being able to be on site at regular intervals, we have to go outside of the box and see what's out there. That's what led us to OneTrack. So having the cameras on our forklifts has really opened us up to be able to view what's going on at a daily level instead of just being able to see with metrics and key processes, you know, looking at all of the numbers and we can see, what is our trend? Where are we going? What's everything looking like? We can also look directly into the facility and see what's happening at a day-to-day level. So OneTrack is one of the pieces of those that has expanded our horizon there and we share those videos during our monthly safety meetings throughout the company. We definitely use them for best practices and sometimes, you know, we use them for what we need to learn from. And our latest deployment at the new sites we didn't find all of the same safety events that we saw when we first started this. We first started a couple of years ago with OneTrack and what we saw then, you know, we've been sharing with the rest of the company. So when we did our second deployment in some of our facilities, we didn't see those same items because they were already learning from what we had put out there and what we had been focusing on. So we believe that's a testament that they're, you know, they're taking those key takeaways before we ever implemented it and we're already starting better than we did before.

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Evan: You know, I think that goes back to the whole world-class safety culture, right? You have people who are buying into these processes. It's not just words on paper, which unfortunately can be the reality that a lot of companies have to settle for—it just goes into a binder and no one can do anything. We always talk about at OneTrack, you can't solve problems that you can't see.

So what are some of those hidden hazards or risks that you said that you had seen, whether in that first deployment or now in this kind of expansion deployment, that otherwise would have gone unnoticed? And what are you and your team doing to get ahead of those problems now?

Melody: Some are very surface level and some were a bigger concern. Some of the surface-level issues that we found were things such as policies surrounding cell phones and earbuds. We noticed that they were being utilized, but maybe they were using some ways to get around them. So we buckled up our policies regarding cell phones—when and how they could be used—earbuds, and types of headwear that can be worn to leave the ear canal completely exposed, and unfortunately, not trying to hide earpods that you may be wearing.

Then we streamlined requirements for safety vests as well. We just noticed that we weren't the same across all of our facilities. When we updated that one policy, it let us see where some things might have been left open for interpretation and button those up.

Some of the more complex issues involve moving a lot of empty containers or residue last contained. We're providing those products to customers, and they bring them back to us, and we send them back to the manufacturer so that they're reusing those containers. But what we noticed is they weren't always being handled in the same manner that full product was being handled. A lot of that just comes from thinking, "Oh, well, it's not a risk because it's not 500 pounds. It's just some residue in the bottom of it." But as we all know, that residue is still the same. It still has the same chemical component and the same hazards as it does when it's full of product.

We saw that, and it created some safety trends that we were not aware of. So we quickly implemented a new process. We had a stand-down for the entire company for handling and storage of these types of containers, and we saw those safety events drop off from the camera footage immediately. Again, that's not something that we were seeing in our metrics or trends or numbers because they're empty, and maybe when they're dropped, they weren't being thought of as a safety event, although it's a safety event every time. That was the most key item that we had, and we put a lot of emphasis into it. We still continue to push that to this day to ensure it's being looked at in the same way, and that we talk about empties as the same as if they were full product.

Evan: And I think that's really important. I mean, when you're talking about the reality day-to-day in a warehouse, right? People can think about, "Well, if I have my headphones in, what's the big deal?" Or, "If I need to open up my phone real quick, it's fine. I just do it one time." Or do something extreme like handling the empties. The reality is that those little behaviors can turn into very serious incidents if the behaviors continue. And I think that is the whole purpose of EHS teams and driving those behaviors out. But it's, again, seeing those little things that maybe you didn’t know about, or the operation just maybe saw a supervisor coach on it, but then never documented it because it's just an earbud. Then, when someone can't hear a horn going around an intersection, that turns into a big problem. So it's important to get ahead of those types of things.

Melody: Definitely. Yeah. We're really glad that we were able to see those. You know, we send out employees that are with our team to do safety audits on site. You know, we're there for a week, going through everything. But again, you're not seeing those items if you're not there on a day-to-day basis. Because it might only happen, you know, once a month, but we were able to see that trend quickly.

Evan: And how do you think physically being able to see what's happening has impacted—you talked about some of the policies you've set in place—but how has it impacted how you investigate safety events after you, you know, you come in and find those empties banged up, or maybe it's a workers' comp claim or something of that nature? How has the actual visibility changed how you approach situations?

Melody: You know the old saying that a picture is worth a thousand words, and I think that just holds so true. We can talk about safety events with hundreds of employees that work with us, but to show them—not only show a picture of it, but to show a video of exactly how something happened and where the breakdown occurred—for them to see that is so much more powerful. They're not just taking our word that, "Oh, this happened, and if we would have done this, we could have been better." They're actually seeing it, and they're putting themselves in that position like, "Wow, this could have happened to me too." There are no words that can ever portray that piece of it.

But it's interesting you said workers' comp. We were able to use the footage in an interesting case, which resulted in the case being dismissed. We all know how much workers' comp cases run, right? So it was a great win for us. An injury that was being claimed—I think, on average, is over $50,000. We were able to pull that footage and see that it could not have created an injury from what happened. We were able to share that with our workers' comp team, and again, we were able to get it completely thrown out, and we’re not required to file that workers' comp claim for our company.

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Evan: So, before we started recording, we talked about something that you called the Triangle Theory, and I thought it was super interesting. Could you just walk me through a little bit in detail what that is and how you're using that at Rinchem to approach EHS and how you do your day-to-day work?

Melody: It's referred to as the Heinrich Triangle. A lot of people call it different things, but the Accident Triangle is well known. Basically, it shows the relationship between injuries, serious accidents, minor accidents, and the near misses. The idea proposes that at the bottom you have your near misses and your minor accidents, and that if you can reduce the number here at the bottom, then there will be a corresponding fall in the number of serious accidents.

When we trend a category of near misses or minor incidents, we step in to bring those to the attention of everyone before it goes into a serious accident or a recordable injury, which we never want to get into the top pieces of that triangle. It's a direct correlation. If you have 300 near misses, then you might have 30 minor incidents out of it, but out of those, at some point, you're going to have one major. The biggest piece is to really take all of that data, look at it, trend it, and make sure that out of those 300 and then the 30, you don't get to that one.

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For companies, it's one of the strongest things that I would suggest because it tells you a lot. If you don't have many near misses or even minor incidents—but especially those near misses—you’re missing something. You really need to work with your employees and with your company to push near misses. Think outside of the box, do what you need to do to really engage the employees, because that's where the culture starts.

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The culture has to be at an employee level where they're thinking, "My safety matters, but the safety of the person who works next to me matters too." Everybody has to always be thinking about safety instead of just management or just EHS. It has to start at the level where the people are doing the work and the culture is there.

Evan: Such a great way to think about it, because I hear some people say, "Well, we track OSHA recordables or TIR," whatever that is. And I think that's great—that's step number one. You absolutely should track that. But that's not the full picture of your safety culture in the building. What separates good from great is the ability to, like you said, get people to buy in on the floor, really track those near misses, because like we just talked about, each one of those is an accident waiting to happen in the future. You have to get ahead of those because that's how you really drive that kind of hockey-stick growth in the safety category, but in the opposite direction—you want to drive it down.

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You talked a little earlier about having a really strong relationship with operations leadership. You just talked about it again, making sure that the people on the floor doing the work are really bought in. In your experience, working from EHS at a corporate level into the day-to-day operations leadership, how can you—or how can EHS in general—better work together with operations leaders to make sure that safety isn't... "getting in the way" isn't the right way to say it, but it can sometimes be thought of as an extra thing to have to think about, or kind of a burden almost. How do you work that out so safety is just part of the culture and part of the day-to-day DNA?

Melody: Nobody wants to be forced to do something or feel like something's being shoved down their throat, per se. So it's really important to work together with operations as a team, and not just, "This is what we say, you have to do it." We have to get insight and feedback from them, and from the associates again that are doing the work at a ground level. They have to be an integral part of policymaking and updating policies and processes.

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Again, if I'm not operating a forklift—which I don’t, and I never have—I can't really think that I am going to tell someone how to do it properly. I could do the research, I can give them statistics, but I want to talk to the people that are doing that job and say, "Okay, here's what the research shows, here’s what the statistics show, and here’s what’s happening. Do you think if we did this, it would be impactful?" What you get from them, when you can get their honest and open feedback, is really important, because then you're able to drive success.

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If you don’t have the operational stakeholders, the process is going to fail. What they're going to come back and say is, "Well, EHS made us do that and it didn’t work." It's going to fail because they're not a part of it. When they are a part of it, when they feel that they had a say in how that new policy is going to be structured and written, they want to see it succeed because they know that they helped you write it. Without that involvement, you can cause distrust and animosity.

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In the over 20 years I’ve been doing this, that’s probably one of the biggest things that I’ve had to learn—you can’t just push it on them. You have to let them be part of it.

Evan: Yeah, it has to be a dialogue, not a mandate, right? No one likes being told what to do and how to do their job. Especially to your point—never operated a forklift—it’s hard to tell someone who operates a forklift every day how to do their job. But if you come to them with a sense of trying to understand, trying to improve, and create a dialogue both ways, I think that's super healthy. It gets people to buy in. And again, back to the culture piece, when people buy in and understand the "why" behind it, that's what’s going to drive it throughout the organization. It catches on like wildfire at that point.

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So you've done a lot of great work at Rinchem. Obviously, I mean, we've been working with Rinchem for a couple of years now, and I’ve seen some of the programs that you’ve rolled out. What are some of those initiatives or programs that you're particularly proud of, that you think maybe others could replicate in their business? Or maybe it’s something that’s coming up next that you’re excited to talk about and bring out to the organization?

Melody: Yeah, so we talked about Good Catch and how it’s really important to make sure that you’re capturing all of those. In thinking of that, you want to make sure that the program you have is really easy for the employees on the floor to use. A lot of times, just because in administration we’re using computers every day and it’s what we do, doesn’t mean that all the workers in your company are doing that as well. So again, making it easier for them.

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We took a Good Catch program and made QR codes and an entire marketing campaign behind it. We have stickers—they’re actually clings, like window clings—and you can attach those all around your warehouse. They can go on racking, windows, or doors. We have them spread out everywhere throughout the warehouse. It says, “If you see something…”—it’s not quite "see something, say something," but it’s that general idea. All they have to do is take their phone, scan the QR code, and it’s a very easy way for them to quickly put in a Good Catch. They didn’t have to log in. They didn’t have to go to a computer. It just took a few seconds of their time to turn that in.

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Another item—of course, we deal with hazardous materials, so safety data sheets are very important. It’s required by OSHA that every employee you have has access to the sheet for any chemical within your facility. Back in the old days, you had binders full of SDS—thousands of them—and every time they made an update, you had to go take it out and put a new one in. You’re using paper like crazy.

We took the same concept and created a QR code for SDS sheets. They’re posted on clings in areas where the product is being kept, so no matter where they go, they can go to the end of the aisle, scan that QR code, and quickly look up a chemical in their facility. If there’s a spill, if they have a question, or if they find product on top of a drum and need to understand the hazards quickly, they can just scan that, look it up, and it’s literally at their fingertips.

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One other item we have is called Showcase Standards. It’s something that operations does, but again, it’s automated. It’s a form that tells them what to look at. So as they’re walking around their warehouse, they are required to look at specific things. Is your product secure that’s over six feet high? Is there debris in the aisles? Is there anything out of place? There are a lot of them, but they go through those once a week.

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We also have signage at the end of aisles that basically designates an “owner” of the aisle. I think it really helps to give them ownership. “Oh, this is my aisle, and if anything’s out of place or shrink wrap is hanging down or things like that, it’s my responsibility to make sure that gets corrected.” It brings that unity and sense of empowerment and ownership back to the employees. If there is something in that area when they walk around, they know exactly who to go to. “Hey, we saw this. How can we get better? How can we take this as a takeaway and make it better going forward?”

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The last thing—we’re really excited about bringing OneTrack AI to several more facilities in 2025, including international sites. Obviously, traveling internationally is a lot more difficult than domestically. So we’re really excited to have that visibility in our international sites as well.

Evan: Yeah, I think I could speak for the whole OneTrack team—we’re also excited about that as well. We really appreciate the partnership with Rinchem. I really like the aisle ownership idea. That’s one I actually haven’t heard before—making or giving people ownership of an aisle. It’s kind of like the adopt-a-highway program, right? Where it doesn’t mean much, but it means a lot when you see your name on the sign. It just feels good, and it makes you want to do a good job. I love that to drive accountability. I think that’s a really creative idea.

Melody: Yeah. They had done that before. When I walked into one of the first facilities, I saw their pictures on them. It has their name, and it’s very nice signage. Again, it led to that sense of, "This is world-class. This isn’t just another 3PL that I’m walking into."

Evan: Yeah, and I’m sure that helps with keeping employees. The employee retention piece that a lot of 3PLs are struggling with on a day-to-day basis—you’re actually getting people to buy in and think, "Rinchem is a great place to come work at." I think, at the end of the day, that’s what you want.

Melody: Yeah, definitely. That’s what we want, right? We all want to go somewhere where we enjoy working and what we do. What do they say—90% of employees don’t leave for money, right? They leave for other reasons. So yeah, if you can create that sense of family and ownership and belonging to an employee, it makes them want to come to work. This is where they’re spending most of their time, right?

Evan: Yeah, absolutely. We spend a lot of time at work, so it’s super important.

Well, Melody, I really appreciate you sitting down and taking some time to talk to me today. I’ve definitely learned a lot from this episode, so I appreciate you coming on and sharing a lot about the great work that you and the team are doing over at Rinchem.

Melody: Oh, sure. No, I thank you for the opportunity to share it.

Evan: And everyone watching, thank you for tuning in to another episode of Warehouse Visionaries. If you ever want more content, you can always find it on the OneTrack website, on the YouTube channel, or follow us on LinkedIn. But for now, I’m going to log off and let Melody get back to her day job. I’ll see you all next time.

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