As we close out the year, I want to take a moment to highlight an exciting step forward for our association and our industry. ASCC is officially launching the first phase of our Safety Benchmarking Initiative, a project that will give members meaningful insight into their safety performance, identify what truly drives improvement, and ultimately raise the bar for safety excellence across the concrete industry.

This initiative is being developed in partnership with FactorLab, using their SmartTagIt platform ,  the same system we integrated into this year’s Safety Awards program. The goal is simple but powerful: shift our focus from lagging indicators (what’s already happened) to leading indicators (what helps us prevent it) and build a member-driven benchmark that reflects the real work being done every day in the field.

We’ve started with this year’s Safety Award participants, companies that have already shown initiative, transparency, and a commitment to advancing safety through data. But the next step opens the door wider,  inviting any interested member company to join the discovery process. This is your chance to have a voice in shaping what gets measured, how it’s defined, and how we use this data to learn from one another.

Phase one will include 10 exclusive member companies who will serve as the initial implementation group,  setting a strong foundation for broader participation in 2026 and beyond. The process is intentionally streamlined, with just three short calls designed to make participation easy and meaningful:

• Discovery Call: Discuss what matters most, what we want to learn, and what a useful benchmark should look like.
• Participation Call: Confirm involvement and outline the specific data points that will drive insight.
• Implementation Call: Align logistics and finalize how it all comes together.

This isn’t a labor-intensive task. It’s a collaborative research effort that will benefit not only participating members but the entire concrete construction community. The insight gained will help identify patterns, validate best practices, and illuminate what truly defines safety leadership in our trade.

If you’re interested in being part of this initiative,  whether as one of the first 10 participants or as a contributor to the discovery process , I encourage you to reach out directly to me at jwhiteman@ascconline.org.

The members who take part in this effort will be helping shape something that belongs to all of us,  a benchmark built by ASCC, for ASCC, that reflects who we are and where we’re headed.

Together, we can ensure that our collective knowledge, innovation, and leadership continue to move the entire industry forward.