Digital Perspectives: A Conversation with Reckitt’s Head of Health and Safety Compliance

Reckitt is a UK-based manufacturer of some of the country’s most recognized hygiene products such as Airwick (air freshener), Dettol (cleaner) and Strepsils (throat lozenges).

The company, which has been around for over 200 years, operates in 60 countries with products sold across the globe. 

In this interview, Krishnen Mootien, Head of Health and Safety Compliance at Reckitt, shares his perspective on the impact of digital technology at the company and the challenges and opportunities of the year ahead.

Diana Davis, IX Network: I heard somebody once say that COVID was like a rocket booster to digital transformation. How have digital technologies been affecting your operations at Reckitt the past few years?

Krishnen Mootien, Reckitt: Digital transformation was always part of our conversation prior to COVID.

Covid helped us to look at it in different ways; some things that were in the pipeline were accelerated, for instance, and remote work really took off over the last few years.

But we have been looking at how digital technology can help us service our customers and better run our operations for a long time.

The challenge that we're facing is that there’s a lot out there. Finding the right technologies to adopt and take forward is challenging. But we’re looking at small innovations that we can trial and take it from there. Digital transformation is essential to our plans for sustainable growth.

Diana Davis, IX Network: You work in the health, safety and the environment function. How does digital impact your role?

Krishnen Mootien, Reckitt: Just like the wider business, our global EHS function is looking to digital technology to strengthen and enhance operations.

Global EHS, which is where I sit, acknowledges that technology is the future and we're making good progress with different software systems. But it doesn't mean that we think we're there yet or that there’s nothing else to do.

Whatever part of EHS you look at - whether it's analytics, training, auditing, or inspection management – there are so many different technologies that we could be using.

Diana Davis, IX Network: Is there a particular technology that you think will be a gamechanger?

Krishnen Mootien, Reckitt: It's easy to get sucked onto what's out there because there's a lot going on and a lot of the new technologies are head turners. But it’s important to find what’s right for you.

What we're looking at is something that's going to be sustainable. It not something we start now and then finish in two years. It’s something that we can bring to the table, look to implement, sustain and continually improve.

We’re specifically looking at a few areas. We’re looking at our training function. We've gone digital in some of our training processes with e-learning.

With wearables, we’re more selective at applying them to where our risk profiles are highest.

We’re also looking at auditing processes, training, inspection and analytics.

Diana Davis, IX Network: What are you focusing on in the year ahead in your role?

Krishnen Mootien, Reckitt: We’re looking to learn from the field from both inside and outside our industry. We do a lot of that through external engagement.

We've got our EHS strategy and will be focused on delivering it throughout the year.  We’ve got quite a wide EHS function that spreads across all of our facilities and functions. It’s not only in supply chain or operations, for instance, it goes into the commercial fields and so on.

A big part of our strategy is developing our people. We've got competency framework in place in that bracket and really that’s something that myself and my team are really passionate about.

Interested in learning more?

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Taking place November 15-17 in Chicago, the program has been designed to help you understand how to leverage connected worker technologies to improve operational efficiency, training, asset management, quality and safety.  Download the agenda for more information.