The NEBOSH General Certificate is one of the most popular health and safety qualifications in the UK. Its unitised structure has always made it popular with health and safety professionals that require a wide range of knowledge and T-shaped managers that need to know how to manage their responsibilities for health and safety, fire safety, or construction safety.
There is often a fair amount of overlap between these three topics, especially since most health and safety risks are counteracted in the same way – with proactive management of risks and regular risk assessments. This means that in the past, persons studying a NEBOSH National General Certificate would often find themselves taking a NEBOSH Construction Certificate or NEBOSH Fire Certificate a year or so later.
The coronavirus pandemic (COVID-19) put a temporary stop to all exams, as it wasn’t possible for people to attend an invigilated venue. However, this changed when NEBOSH allowed those that were due to sit the General Certificate’s NG1 unit exam, to take it as an online Open Book Exam (OBE) instead. Taking an OBE for your General Certificate exam will be the new norm, and many are wondering whether the Fire and Construction certificates may change to an online examination as well.
Until that is decided, the current process for NEBOSH Construction Certificate and NEBOSH Fire Certificate exams is that you must successfully complete the unit NG1 (2018 syllabus) or NGC1 (2014 syllabus), and then complete your fire or construction units.
Both the Fire and the Construction Certificate exams are still invigilated and completed in person, and we offer these exams 4 times a year, at 4 locations across the UK.
Why add on to your NEBOSH General Certificate?
To develop further understanding of important topics such as:
Fire Risk Management –
When not properly managed and mitigated, fires can be devastating. The Dusseldorf airport fire in 1996 cost 17 lives and approximately $200 million, all flights into the airport had to be re-routed until temporary tents could be set up for baggage. A fire at the 400,000 square foot Gardman industrial unit cost around £20,000,000 in destroyed stock, ceasing supply of over 4000 lines of products and completely destroyed the warehouse building that stored it. These examples may seem extreme, but their purpose is to show how one small flame can cause massive amounts of damage. It is always easy to point out what went wrong after an event, but a more important thing to focus on is what can be done to prevent a similar one from happening.
The NEBOSH Fire Certificate is designed to allow holders of the qualification to help their organisations to meet their fire safety responsibilities. This means protecting people and property by identifying hazards, assessing the risks, and recommending additional fire safety measures to reduce risk.
Construction Risk Management –
The construction industry in Great Britain is worth more than £110 billion a year, and contributes to around 7% of GDP. Construction includes the creation and demolition of a multitude of things including but not limited to, housing, infrastructure, industrial and commercial buildings and maintenance. With such a variety of aspects to this industry comes a large variety of jobs.
The NEBOSH Construction Certificate is for those that need to be able to identify, evaluate and control a wide range of construction workplace hazards. In addition to an NG1 unit, the certificate provides the knowledge and understanding that you need to commit to a pragmatic approach of managing risk, and cover the main legal requirements for health and safety in the UK, including an understanding of the Construction (Design and Management) Regulations 2015.
To diversify your skills –
Managers have a responsibility to ensure that they and those that they manage are effectively complying with any relevant health and safety regulations such as the Health and Safety at Work Act (1974), and a NEBOSH General Certificate is a great way to measure your compliance. Education is an important aspect of health and safety management, and if you are going to be working in an environment which requires you to be competent in fire or construction health and safety, you will need to take a course to ensure that you are fully equipped for the job.
To change your career –
Whether it’s for a change of scenery, to pursue an interest, or through necessity, you always want to be prepared if you need to change your career. Building on a NEBOSH General Certificate with additional qualifications is a good way to keep your skill-set versatile, and well evidenced. You can do so in 2020 by investing in health and safety training online.
To create a foundation of education for further study –
If you are looking to take a NEBOSH National Diploma NEBOSH recommends that you have achieved either a NEBOSH National General Certificate in Occupational Health and Safety, a NEBOSH National Certificate in Fire Safety and Risk Management, or a NEBOSH National Certificate in Construction Health and Safety. However, if you’re not ready to commit to a full diploma course right now, why not carry on your study with a Fire or Construction Certificate to give you a more holistic understanding of different aspects of health and safety before you begin.
To find out more about anything mentioned in this article please don’t hesitate to contact one of our NEBOSH course advisors:
Email:nebosh@actassociates.co.uk
Telephone: 01384 447915