Simon has extensive experience as a risk management specialist with particular skills in health and safety, fire risk management, incident investigation and business continuity practice. Simon is a Chartered Member of the Institution of Occupational Safety & Health and registered on the Occupational Health and Safety Consultants Register of competent practitioners. He is also a certified competent fire risk assessor in accordance BS EN 17024:2012. This is a nationally recognised certificate of competence. Fire risk assessors who have completed the comprehensive technical evaluation successfully and achieved certification are considered 'competent' to produce risk assessments that are 'suitable and sufficient' for the purposes of life safety.
He has extensive personnel management knowledge and experience serving on the Senior Management Team of Lancashire Fire Service for over ten years. Simon managed a commercial training centre and was responsible for developing the training strategy for 1500 uniformed and non-uniformed personnel. With extensive command and leadership experience he also served as a Divisional Commander of a large busy operational Division. He was an experienced Gold Commander for large complex emergency incidents.
In the latter part of his fire service career he became Head of Operational Risk Management where he had wide ranging responsibilities including operations, risk management planning, information management, best value, and national resilience. Designed, procured and project managed the development of a number of emergency response vehicles and developed the Service Business Continuity Plan. Simon's skills and experience are varied, well developed and current. Since moving to the University of Central Lancashire he has specialised in health and safety, risk management, emergency management and fire investigation. He is technically competent but importantly backed by practical industry experience as well as the ability to impart the knowledge to others so that they can gain from real world problems and experiences. His research interest is high velocity human factors in safety critical domains.
