Mr. Mai Quang Hung, Head of Safety Department of Northern Power Corporation
Reporter: How do you assess the management of labour safety in 2018 of EVNNPC?
Mr. Mai Quang Hung: Year 2018 is a successful year of EVNNPC, when there wasn’t any labour accident occurring by subjective causes throughout the Corporation. This is also the first time the that Corporation has gained this achievement.
In particular, in 2018, EVNNPC successfully built and put labour safety management software into operation, with 382 monitoring centers from power units to company, corporation levels.
Through this application, all levels can simultaneously monitor teams working on the grid at all locations. Thereby, any error can be timely found, immediately adjusted, contributing to ensuring labour safety.
Reporter: How does this software system work, sir?
Mr. Mai Quang Hung: In 2018, on average each week, the Corporation has about 12,500 jobs on the grid. For safety control, personnel in charge of safety shall go directly to the site for performance. This process both consumes time and takes a lot of effort as well as travel expenses, etc. Meanwhile, EVNNPC’s management scope extends over 27 provinces/cities; Most of them are located in remote areas, islands, therefore, the travel is very difficult, the number of safety personnel is limited. Besides, when workers go to the site, work on the grid, then inspection teams come, hence, the inspection and control work is not conducted timely, etc.
This application of software system has limited and overcome these shortcomings above. Specifically, each week, the units will conduct registrations for on-grid jobs, submit them to levels for approval on the software system. As a result, the Corporation will control over the entire weekly workload of each power/power company, know clearly what and where the work unit is doing, and who controls the labour safety, etc.
In particular, each team when going to the work site must use smart mobile devices to take photos of the actions, then post them on the system. At this time, safety personnel at all levels from power office/company/corporation will immediately receive images for monitoring and supervision; At the same time, it is possible to analyze and provide technical solutions and troubleshoot when necessary without going directly to the site.
With the introduction of this software, each staff and worker must be more aware in implementing the safety procedures and technical regulations during the working process, because when the images are posted on the system, if they don’t comply with safety procedures, their scores will be deducted.
Reporter: To successfully implement this software, does the Corporation face any difficulties, sir?
Mr. Mai Quang Hung: The biggest difficulty is the change of employees’ perceptions and performance methods. In the past, they worked only manually, so when applying information technology to daily activities, they face many difficulties, especially for older workers. Also, the requirements for taking and updating photos on the system also increases the pressure of being monitored while performing their duties.
To overcome these difficulties, the Corporation has organized propaganda and training for all subjects in online form. So far, the entire system has been operating in stable manner. Workers are familiar with the operation on the system when undertaking the task and the sense of complying with labour safety procedures has been significantly improved.
Reporter: Along with this software, in the coming time, will EVNNPC continue to develop new technologies for labour safety management, sir?
Mr. Mai Quang Hung: That is a trend in the digital age. Currently, the Corporation has researched and implemented new functions on labour safety management software, which will be deployed in 2019 and the subsequent years.
Specifically, the registration and approval of construction plans will be done on network, through digital signatures; Instead of ending each working shift, electric workers must return to the unit office to close task sheet and take new duties. All these operations are done on the software, via the handheld mobile device of the workers, helping them to save travel time.
In case of handling incidents in natural disaster prevention and emergency response, workers can also share photos from the site scene to the system. At this time, departments such as Safety, Technology, Moderation, Capital Construction, etc., can analyze the incident situation in a timely manner, and work out plans for handling it in a fastest manner.
In particular, the Corporation is conducting research on and put artificial intelligence into image analysis of safety. For example, when a photograph of a worker is posted on a system that does not fully comply with safety procedures and technical regulations, the system will have a warning signal, forcing the team to pay attention to their performance; build a system of way directions for workers to find out the locations of the lines and electric poles with incident, etc.
EVNNPC is installing safety control screens at offices for on-duty teams. Thus, in addition to repairing and operating the grid system, the operation team will have additional safety control tasks, while safety personnel will perform other tasks, contributing to improving the labour productivity.
Reporter: Thank you, sir!