Corporate

Workplace Safety & Prevention Services 2012 Annual Report COMPLIANCE IS JUST A STARTING PLACE In 2011, U.S.-based Target Corporation announced plans to open its doors in Canada. Starting in spring 2013, Target will launch 124 stores across ten provinces, each employing between 150 to 200 employees. "Expect More. Pay Less." is Target's brand promise, which includes a strong commitment to corporate responsibility. For Jodi Neuses, Group Manager, Safety at Target's head office in Minneapolis, fulfilling that commitment means making sure employees and guests stay safe in Target buildings. Compliance, she believes, is just a starting place; indeed, the team has implemented solutions that make Target even safer than what Canadian regulations call for. It's the Canadian culture around health and safety that especially interests Neuses. With WSPS showing the way, she and her team investigated all aspects of it in 2012: from government structure, to leadership, attitude, and sustainability. In her own words: JODI NEUSES, Group Manager, Safety, Target Corporation 14 Coming into Canada was new for us. We needed to get it right — to thoroughly understand the health and safety landscape. My team was charged with figuring out what U.S. health and safety programs would be transferrable to Canada, and where we'd need to make adjustments. Rather than do it all ourselves, we launched a request for proposal to find a Canadian company who would consult with us in understanding the nuances of how things work so we'd meet all areas of compliance in Canada. WSPS won the contract. From the initial conversations, it was clear that the folks at WSPS had a strong background in working with a variety of clients similar to us; they understood our issues. We felt comfortable with their knowledge on compliance and regulations and their level of experience with retail organizations. It is essential that we meet requirements to be compliant, naturally, but beyond that it is incredibly important to us to understand cultural norms in Canada: take joint health and safety committees, for example. We have committees in the U.S., but there's more formality around the expectations on those committees and the training of members in Canada. WSPS helped us understand how we needed to change our processes. We're looking at bringing some of those enhancements back to our own programs in the U.S. WSPS also assisted us in scouring our training programs and documentation to make sure we were thinking about everything. We're impressed with their collaborative approach. We felt they knew where we were coming from and they helped us come up with solutions, jointly. They understood our business and asked the right questions. Understanding the health and safety culture in Canada is the right thing to do

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