Having traveled the world in their respective professions, the Sayle brothers are back in Atlantic Canada developing a company they hope will revolutionize safety in the workplace.
Bryan and Stephen Sayle are natives of Prince Edward Island and their Halifax-based company, SayleGroup Inc., has developed three products that work together to digitize and improve workplace safety. Two of these products are on the market and being used by 27 paying customers ranging from Fortune 100 companies to small businesses. SayleGroup is also a finalist for the Halifax Chamber of Commerce’s Business Awards, which will be presented Jan. 26.
“We are raising the awareness around safety culture,” Stephen Sayle said in an interview. “The general safety culture movement is years behind, say, the environmental movement . . . Or to compare it to something that grew locally, compare it with the anti-bullying movement.”
Stephen has spent his career in workplace safety, mainly in the oil and gas industry, working in the Middle East, the Far East and Latin America. Bryan is a software developer, who has spent the bulk of his career in the U.K with stints in other markets including Silicon Valley. As they flew back and forth, they would meet up in airports around the world and discuss plans to work together one day.
Now they’ve moved to Halifax to raise their families and launch a business that capitalizes on their areas of expertise. (Interesting point: Both brothers married Nova Scotians called Heidi. One Heidi is a lawyer and the other Heidi is a chartered accountant, so SayleGroup’s professional services are all handled within the family.)
The company has three product lines:
• An online course that teaches companies how to implement safety culture, the most basic step in improving safety in the workplace. Comprised of four five-minute modules, the course is priced so businesses of any size can afford it.
• A supply chain readiness product helps companies raise their safety practices so they can participate in megaprojects. Virtually all megaprojects demand that each company in the supply chain has a minimum level of safety standards, and this product helps all companies reach that level.
• SayleGroup plans in 2017 to release its third product, a mobile application that ensures work teams maintain safety standards and check the things that must be done. It lets workers all have a safety device on their cellphones. “By putting a virtual safety officer into a tool that everyone has and tying it to other (people within the organization) it puts a system of checks and balances in place,” said Bryan.
The brothers said there are now no international standards for workplace safety, but the International Standards Organization next year will release a set of regulations that jurisdictions and companies must meet to be considered safety-compliant. The SayleGroup products all meet these standards, and the pricing of their products mean that companies of any size can be sure to meet international requirements.
They believe Nova Scotia is the “ideal place” to launch this business. The brothers have received support from the Atlantic Canadian Opportunities Agency and Nova Scotia Business Inc. And Nova Scotia is a jurisdiction that needs to improve its safety record.
“We have higher-than-average injury rates here,” said Stephen Sayle. “We believe that everybody wants to go to work, do their job and get home safely.”
