Spotlight on…health and safety across AG Facilities Solutions

Our transformation journey is about coming together, working towards a shared Purpose, celebrating our legacy, and collectively reshaping the future of Al Ghurair. It’s a privileged position, and we all have a part to play in shaping and driving the transformation!

With change all round us, every day, it’s important that we don’t miss milestones along the way, and that we look outside our own teams and departments to see how others are championing and enabling our journey.

Our new ‘Spotlight’ series aims to shine a light on transformation highlights, across the business. Each edition will feature a different team or colleague, showcasing progressive action, innovation and Purpose-led progress!

In this edition of ‘Spotlight’, we hear how the AG Facilities Solutions business prioritises exceptional health and safety standards to achieve the highest quality of service excellence for its customers.

Health and Safety for Quality Excellence

With exceptional experience in managing diverse clients throughout the region, AG Facilities Solutions (AGFS) is known as one of the leading facility management companies providing innovative, efficient and sustainable facility solutions. The one stop shop for all facility management services; AGFS possesses a unique delivery capability that provides the entire spectrum of facility management solutions - including individual services as well as fully integrated facility management services to its clients.

No matter the industry, health and safety should be a top priority in every workplace. For the FM industry, health and safety is a complex concept, but essentially the root of the idea is quite simple. Quality health and safety best practices are an investment - in the business and its people.

With this is mind, it is imperative to recognise that health and safety is not an entity on its own, or the responsibility of a single department or person – but is rather a way of working and doing business. Part of the way a positive safety culture is embedded within an organisation, is to ensure that it is not simply seen as something that sits with a particular department, but instead is a line management responsibility; something for which every employee should be held accountable.

Aside from valuing the health and safety contributions of all people within the company, AGFS proudly recognises the value of a strong Quality, Health, Safety, and Environment (QHSE) team, along with the benefits of implementing safe systems of work and safe behavioural practices at all levels of the business. Further enforcing these principles is the company’s QHSE team led by Shahzada Zulqarnain, who work to enable the business to operate within the standards, policy, strategy, and legal framework - creating a safe working environment while continuously improving the quality of products and services.

One of AG Facilities Solutions’ initiatives aimed at improving the company’s health and safety culture and standard is M-Coins, a recognition scheme designed to motivate all AGFS teams to consistently strive for achieving exceptional QHSE standards by rewarding employees based on QHSE performance. The initiative consists of a written procedure for implementation by employees on work sites, of which the effectiveness of each is examined and verified upon completion. Once successfully completed, employees receive an ‘M-Coins’ voucher – a monetary incentive that is put towards the salaries of employees!

In addition, the business proudly holds multiple ISO certifications for quality standards including for Quality Management System, Environment Management System, Occupational Health and Safety Management System, Facility Management System and more – ensuring quality excellence in all its operations.

“Health and safety cannot be pigeonholed into a department; it is a way of working - a culture and a roadmap to how the business operates. Safety also doesn’t happen by accident. As a business, we have an obligation to our stakeholders, employees, vendors, and customers to genuinely invest in health and safety – not just creating policies but enforcing them equally and demonstrating safety as a value. 

As part of our contribution to Al Ghurair’s commitment to ‘Enhancing Life’, we are proud to be working very hard on ensuring that services are provided to our esteemed clients at the highest standards - that effective management of health and safety is an extension of the normal management process and operations of our business.” - Tarek Nizameddin, CEO of AG Facilities Solutions