Jill James:

This is the Accidental Safety Pro, brought to you by HSI. This episode is recorded March 12th, 2024. My name is Jill James, HSI's Chief Safety Officer. And today my guest is Lisa Blotsky. Lisa is a US casualty Risk Consultant with AXA XL, one of the world's largest insurance carriers. Lisa is a board-certified safety professional, has a master's in occupational safety and health from Georgia Tech, and recently earned her associate in insurance and is working toward her associate in risk management. Lisa joins us today from Atlanta, Georgia. Welcome to the show. Lisa.

Lisa Blotsky:

Thank you so much for having me. I'm delighted to be here.

Jill James:

So Lisa, how'd you get your start? What's your origin story?

Lisa Blotsky:

So my origin story, I was born in Detroit and my parents moved us down to the suburbs of Atlanta when I was three years old. And it was actually, I remember it was Friday the 13th.

Jill James:

What, you remember that?

Lisa Blotsky:

I remember that. And I think I've loved spooky things ever since. I think that was probably part of it. And I went to a Catholic school inside the footprint of Atlanta. There's a couple of different schools here, lots of Catholics in the area. And ever since I was three, I always wanted to be a veterinarian. And it was just, I loved animals. I actually had some allergies to animal dander, and my parents were like, "Yeah, yeah, yeah, you, you're going to outgrow this." And of course I didn't. And I volunteered in high school at a veterinarian. The clinic I worked at was actually a really kind of swanky part of town. It was the area where all the Braves players lived and the movie stars, like the rappers, Michael Jackson had a house down the road. We were seeing the bougie dogs and cats. And so by the time it was time for me to go to college, the vet that I had worked for was an Auburn grad.

Lisa Blotsky:

And I think that was part of why I specifically looked at Auburn and I really wanted to be close to the Atlanta area so that if I needed to run home, I could run home a little bit. So I did look at UGA, I looked at Auburn, and I really felt when I went on campus that Auburn was a better fit for me. But then I love to tell this story, when I ended up filling out all the post admission paperwork, what my field of study was going to be, I said I wanted to be pre-veterinary medicine because I knew they had a college path directly on campus because there was a vet school there, and I filled out my paperwork and I got it. And they're like, "Okay, you've been accepted into the College of Agriculture." I'm like, "Hey, we've got a problem. Because I'm a city kid." I came from Detroit. I was working on dogs and cats. I don't even know what I'm doing necessarily around large animals.

Jill James:

You're not a girl from the farm.

Lisa Blotsky:

No, I am not.

Jill James:

You weren't in future Farmers of America when you were in high high school, okay.

Lisa Blotsky:

No, I didn't even know what that was until college actually. And so we actually drove the two hours to go visit the Dean of the College of Ag, to be like, "Hey, you got to fix our paperwork." And I remember him telling me, "If you really want to be a vet, the science and math kids, where you would've been, those kids are sitting in a classroom all day, and if you really want to be a vet and you want to actually put your hands on an animal, then you need to be College of Ag. Trust me, you won't regret it." And I was like, "All right, whatever. You're the pro." And I was really scared to leave. You're already going to a different state, you're already leaving mom and dad, you're leaving that environment.

Lisa Blotsky:

But immediately I was welcomed into the College of Agriculture, and they actually had me do a lot of leadership roles. Once they realized I had a gift for gab and I was comfortable in a crowd and I was comfortable with strangers, they ended up starting to use me for recruiting purposes for the College of Agriculture. We had a program there that was called the Ag Ambassadors. Most land grant universities have that like Auburn. And it was there that I really got to meet a lot of folks from the state. I got to learn more about the work that is agriculture and the breadth of it. In my mind, it was chickens and pigs and cows. And in reality, I went, "Wait a minute, this is agronomy. This is soils, this is right. This is entomology or etomology." I can write entomology. Am I [inaudible 00:05:28].

Jill James:

I think you got it.

Lisa Blotsky:

Did I get it right?

Jill James:

I think you got it.

Lisa Blotsky:

And it wasn't just your typical farmer turf grass management. Oh my gosh, wait a minute. I can get a degree. Not that that's obviously what I did, but I could get a degree in how to grow beautiful, pristine grass where sports teams play, what? And so went through the College of Ag. I was in the program, totally invested in being a vet. I had continued to work at the vet over the summer and on breaks, and I interned at Vets at Auburn and the whole nine yards. And I had applied once. Everyone applies really early and doesn't get in. It's a practice. I don't get in no big deal.

Lisa Blotsky:

And I even had my like, "Hey, you didn't get in," letter on the wall as inspiration and I study and I'm getting great grades and I'm ready to go again. And I literally have the voice of God moment, your conscience, whatever you want to call it. I have the "You're not going to do this." And I responded out loud like, "Okay, that's great. What am I supposed to do? This is what I always wanted to do." And I got that, "You'll figure it out." And I was obviously very concerned to tell my parents, "Hey, I'm not supposed to do this. I don't know what I'm supposed to do, but this isn't it." But I did. And they're like, "Well, what are you going to do? Are you going to change your major?"

Lisa Blotsky:

Because at this point I was already technically on paper a senior, but it was my junior year. And I went, "Okay, I don't know. I might as well finish this out." Talking to counselors and whatever at the school. I already was so close to the end. I had a couple more classes to keep that pre-vet in my degree title. And so you might as well do it because it looks really good on a resume to say, "Hey, I did all the extra stuff. I proved myself. I didn't just take the regular classes. I took the super hard stuff." And then thankfully, I had been to a couple career fairs at school. You walk around and yeah, it's tractor supply. It's the company that does Oh, Agri Stats or there's a couple different... Purina was there? There were a couple big names that I remember just seeing, I took the paperwork back and went back to the apartment and just slept on it.

Lisa Blotsky:

Interviewed at a couple places, and I remember thinking, hey, I saw Tyson. There was a Tyson in South Georgia in Vienna, Georgia, and they had a representative there across the border and also a very agricultural area. And I remember speaking with their HR manager and said, I actually called him up later and said, "You have one close to Atlanta. I remember there was a map in your display." And he was like, "Yeah, but I'm only at this one." I was like, "Great. Give me that phone number though." Because mom and dad are there and at least I have a link to home. It was down the road. So I started at Tyson as a production supervisor in August of 99 working on the floor pretty much straight out of school. I might've had a couple months off in between.

Jill James:

So in a processing facility?

Lisa Blotsky:

In a processing facility, yes, yes in a processing facility. That facility employs the entire complex. So from egg hatchery, farm, trucking, the whole process, all of that employs about 1200 team members, 1300 team members now. And I was just at the processing facility and I was in what's known as the evisceration department, so [inaudible 00:09:34] the department, the department where the birds come in. And there was-

Jill James:

What type of bird was it?

Lisa Blotsky:

Broiler yeah.

Jill James:

So chickens, okay.

Lisa Blotsky:

Chickens. Yeah. Oh yeah, sorry, I should say that. So it was chickens, and I remember starting and feeling very out of place, of course, but grateful that I had had hands-on agriculture experience. When I started I remember very much feeling like I was seen as, I wasn't going to make it. There were comments made, like we say now, microaggressions, little, "I can see you at Auburn with a bow in your hair just walking through campus and you just thought you were a preppy girl and you can't make it here." And I remember one particular supervisor I worked with saying something similar, and she was just not nice to me. We're friends now. But I remember thinking, "I'm going to prove you wrong. I'm going to make it. I know I'm going to make it."

Jill James:

Funny how that works.

Lisa Blotsky:

Right. And so I worked in evisceration. I worked in the live department where the birds come in off the trucks. I worked night shift, I worked day shift. I ended up, in, I think I was in what we call the D-bone department. So where the legs have already been separated from the front half, and then the front half is cut into portions, and those portions were marinated and frozen and then put into big boxes. And those big boxes go to some of the larger retailers with the large packaging, large portion packaging. And from there, I think I worked also in mechanically deboned meat. We ran some products for some dog food. And then I think we also ran some product maybe for some of the potted meats that are popular. And when I was in, maybe towards the end of my second year, I started to work in a lot of leadership roles, and I was happy to get that extra experience and feel like.

Lisa Blotsky:

I was trusted to do extra things, work on the budget, actually come through and do other items where I was doing the team member evaluations, like training managers on how to perform those evaluations, leadership classes for the supervisor. So I was actually the trainer for those, and it was great, but at the same time, I'm like, "I don't know if I want to do this. What am I supposed to do?" And I had my peers falling off. A lot of people end up in poultry that were pre-vet. And so people that came in with me, "Oh, I'm going back to grad school." And then now one in particular, she's a veterinarian now. So I thought maybe that's where I'm supposed to be. I don't know. Maybe I'll go work at a zoo. Literally.

Jill James:

So you're hoping this voice comes back again to tell you. What's my next move? What's my next move?

Lisa Blotsky:

Exactly. What am I supposed to do?

Jill James:

What happened?

Lisa Blotsky:

Making a longer story, I'll make it a little short. I had been given this opportunity, the position opened up in safety, and at the time, I remember my first thought being, "Well, I'm off the floor. At least I've got a little office time and a little extra." And it was pitched to me like, "Well, you've got all these leadership skills and you've done all this extra. Here's another extra opportunity." And after some hemming and hawing just like, "Okay, whatever." I jumped into the role and started seeing very quickly that the things that I had studied in my undergrad at Auburn, I could use them. The fact that I understood basic chemistry because I'd of course taken organic chemistries and physics and all these crazy classes.

Lisa Blotsky:

All of a sudden I went, "Oh, I can use that." And I actually... Medical terminology, when you have team member goes to the doctor and we get a diagnosis immediately, I understand what that diagnosis is, and the nurse is looking at me, her eyes are bugging out of her head like, "How do you understand what that is?" And I'm like, "Well, I did take all these... I know how to break it down. I know the Latin root, I know the suffix. I know the prefix. I got it." And so I found that it was a natural fit, and I still had my hands in the process. I was still touching a chicken. I still had that agriculture itch scratched a little bit. I still was able to deal with people and solve problems. I was using my background in the sciences, practical sciences in agriculture, and I understood the process because of it. And then therefore, when a safety problem came up, I wasn't coming at it from a completely ignorant perspective.

Lisa Blotsky:

I understood the process of how the bird actually has to be run through, and therefore what the person's impact is on that process, and therefore how they can get injured or how we can solve for that equation and make it safer. And it was validating to see that. And then, because I had always had this drive to have DVM, doctor of Veterinary Medicine behind my name, I like having the alphabet soup. I wanted someone to call me Dr. Lisa. That was in my head since I was three. Then I had, thankfully through all the leaders, I had one gentleman who told me one day, he's an area director and he's just in my area and we're hanging out and he's telling me he's studying for some tests. And I'm like, "Oh, okay. What are you studying for?" And he tells me, "Oh, it's a board certification and I'm going to get my CSP." And I was like, "A what?" And he was like, "Certified safety professional." And I was like, "Rally? That's a thing. You could do that?" And he opened my eyes to, wait a minute, this is legitimate.

Lisa Blotsky:

I'm not just pushing papers around. Yeah, I'm solving problems. Sure, okay, that feels good. But on some level, I'm checking boxes that have to be checked because someone at the government or someone at corporate says, I have to, but then all of a sudden, wait a minute, I can solve problems and do things and I can have some personal satisfaction and feel like I'm awesome. I can be legitimized with a piece of paper like, "Wait, what?" And once I got that, oh, okay, there's some level of satisfaction. Then that led eventually to, "Oh, I can get a master's in this." Because I never had formal education in it. I took an OSHA class or two. Okay, I went to our internal safety courses to be a hazmat instructor or whatever. I went to a conference, big whoopty doo, no, I can be internationally recognized with an acronym that says, "Hey, she actually knows this stuff." It gave me some credibility.

Jill James:

That's right. How long into working in safety from the time you got that, like, "Hey, there's an opening in the safety department," to when you decided to start grad school?

Lisa Blotsky:

Grad school, I probably started thinking about that maybe in 2015 or 2016, because in part, I thought the CSP was going to teach me more practical knowledge, and I wanted a little bit more, I definitely value the certification. I promote it. I think there's a lot that comes with earning it, and there's a lot that comes with keeping it that is valuable. But I wanted more about safety culture. I wanted more about the sciences behind why we do certain things, the psychology of it, the biology of it.

Lisa Blotsky:

I wanted more of that than what I got with the CSP. And some people do it the opposite direction, but I went, "Oh, okay." Because I had the CSP, I really should say that, because I had the CSP and to maintain it, I was in the American Society of Safety Professionals and was going to their meetings. And at their meeting, we had a presenter from Columbia Southern, I think it was. And at the time they presented, "Hey, this is how you can get your degree. This is what we have up for offer." And because of the poultry, the National Safety Council, or whoop, let me reverse. I was involved at the time with Georgia Tech through their National Safety Conference for the Poultry Industry.

Jill James:

That's right. Yeah. I've been part of that one too.

Lisa Blotsky:

Right. We talked about that. Because I was part of that. I had connections at Georgia Tech because Georgia Tech was very involved, and I heard whisperings that they were working on a program. And here I am, somebody who thought she was going to be a doctor. And I'll admit it, I like the clout of Georgia Tech. I like feeling like, "Hey, I might not have been a veterinarian, but I went to a really quality school." And I went, "Oh, and I have these connections." So these are people that are already part of my community that would be teaching me. People I already knew, face-to-face that I already worked with.

Lisa Blotsky:

And that I felt that I had some respect and they respected me. There was this mutual admiration society thing we had going on, and I thought that that might be something I was interested in. So I just sat on it for a little bit. I honestly don't remember if I applied to multiple schools, but I do remember going through the process and applying to Georgia Tech, and then I deferred for a year because I thought there was some scholarship money out there that admittedly, I wish there was more available to us as safety professionals, but what was available was not as drastic as I thought it was going to be. And so I deferred for a year, and I joined in the second cohort at Georgia Tech. And then we were, let's see here, through our, what, first year or so when the pandemic hit.

Jill James:

Oh, wow then, okay.

Lisa Blotsky:

So we all-

Jill James:

This is a pretty new in terms of your earning your degree, but you had been working in the field for quite a long time.

Lisa Blotsky:

I had, and that was such an excellent program because we did have people that were straight out of grad school in cohort, literally straight out of school. They went high school, college, grad school, and they were coming in and they were learning from someone like me who was, I'll say what, I'll guess midpoint in my career. And then you had folks that had always wanted to go to a grad school program, but something had not really worked with them. We had folks that were in their sixties and seventies that were getting their masters, and we had so much to learn from them because they had just an absolute wealth of knowledge and practical application of safety.

Lisa Blotsky:

Whereas a lot of the stuff you would learn in a school is theoretical. And so you're able to put that together. And we all came from different aspects of industry, even though it was a small group. I think we were 20 something in the cohort. Everybody came from different areas. So we were all able to learn from each other on a fairly intimate level. I have no experience in construction. My only experience is if we added onto the processing facility or pulled equipment in. But then having folks that actually did that on large scale projects, that was really gratifying. People that worked in textiles.

Jill James:

Did you keep your job at Tyson while you were in grad school?

Lisa Blotsky:

I did, yes.

Jill James:

Wow. Okay.

Lisa Blotsky:

Yes. And I had two young kids at home at the time.

Jill James:

That's a big job.

Lisa Blotsky:

And I look back and wonder how I did it.

Jill James:

Adrenaline.

Lisa Blotsky:

Yeah, right. And no sleep. And I probably was not a very nice person to live with, but.

Jill James:

So from a practitioner's standpoint, as an EHS professional, CSP, what do you love about Ag? Because my gosh, did you say you were in the Ag field for 24 years?

Lisa Blotsky:

Yes. It was just shy of 24 before I came over to insurance.

Jill James:

And was it poultry the whole time?

Lisa Blotsky:

It was. It was Tyson, it was poultry the entire time. And then I guess you can tack on another four years of collegiate experience for what that's worth.

Jill James:

Yeah, of course.

Lisa Blotsky:

So, oh my God, now that I think about it, that's close to 30 years, which is nuts.

Jill James:

That's where I'm at, sister 30 years this year. And also with experience in the poultry industry, but not as long as you have.

Lisa Blotsky:

It's just crazy. I think there is, let's go back to that initial I mentioned. I mentioned my coworker who was like, "You're not going to make it." I remember that, immediately putting a grit into me, like, "Oh my gosh, I've got to make it." And agriculture is its own beast, but poultry is different. I mean, there's a whole lot to it. It's fast-paced. Every piece is interlocked. You are part of the whole natural world. And that vibrancy and the energy that comes with that, it's always moving forward. An animal keeps growing. It has to. It logically does. And that energy pushes the process, the actual poultry process. It's time bound and it moves you through it. And you're like, if you don't grab on, you're just moving along with it. So

Jill James:

So is this where I'm supposed to ask you what came first, the chicken or the egg?

Lisa Blotsky:

I think they actually, don't have a scientific answer for that now, and I don't remember what it was.

Jill James:

I don't know.

Lisa Blotsky:

I think I read an article and now of course, it didn't stick in my brain.

Jill James:

It just seemed to fit at this moment because yes, okay.

Lisa Blotsky:

Yeah, right. But I love the vibrancy of the people that I will admit. That's one thing I miss. I was telling a peer just yesterday that I was like, I went from 1200 people wanting something or needing something, or just even if it wasn't safety related from that to working remotely. And yes, I'll go to a facility, but it's not an everyday occurrence. So that energy level, I miss a little bit of that, but I love the family environment, and that can be a problematic word in the workplace because there's a lot of sacrifice that comes with family. So I hate to say, "Oh, we're a family." But there are so many families at the workplace that I think they feel-

Jill James:

In agriculture, specifically?

Lisa Blotsky:

In agriculture. Yeah, in agriculture specifically, that as I remember telling people in orientation classes, "Look around, you're going to work with somebody's brother, somebody's sister, or somebody's cousin, and what does that say about the place and the culture itself? Would you bring your auntie to come work with you at a facility that you didn't think was safe, that you didn't feel like it was a good place to work, that you didn't feel validated in the product you're producing?" And I love that sense of it.

Lisa Blotsky:

I love seeing little communities of people that would sit together at the lunch table and they all would care for each other. I love the baby showers and the bridal showers and literally passing a bucket around if family's on hard times, that energy that I don't know that you see in other industries, because we worked with family farms. People would pass these farms down for generations. And seeing that investment carried through that it was ingrained. I'm caring for the land. I'm caring for these birds. I'm caring for the process. I'm invested in my farm's reputation. I'm the top grower. I loved that about it.

Jill James:

That was my experience too. It's wonderful to hear, Lisa, you have a special word that you made up, what was your word? Ag something.

Lisa Blotsky:

Agvocate, maybe?

Jill James:

Yes, that's the word. That's the word.

Lisa Blotsky:

For a second I was like, "Where is she going?"

Jill James:

Agvocate, explain what that is because I think you're headed in that direction right now.

Lisa Blotsky:

I consider myself an agvocate. So agriculture advocate, and you just smoosh them together. Not only do I, obviously we're here talking about safety, not only do I care about safety, but I care a lot about the perception of agriculture in the world. I care about the fact that 2% of this nation is feeding the other 98%, and that other 98% in large part, doesn't know where their food comes from, doesn't understand, has had no exposure, and not necessarily any fault of their own. It's just the way society is these days. We live in the city like I did, bringing it back full circle, and there's just not an exposure to it. And even there's a sanitization, I think that's a word, of how our food is made. And therefore, when people are confronted with any little snippet of anything that's stinky or messy that they don't understand it, they shun away from it.

Lisa Blotsky:

They don't ask questions. And I guess it's from being an Ag Ambassador and being welcomed into that community and educated myself, that I feel a desire to advocate for that industry and for the people that are feeding us. And so yes, advocate, ag advocate, agvocate all day long. And in fact, the other day I was like, "I got to find a T-shirt. I need to make myself a T-shirt of that." Because there is just so little out there. And I live in a community, so I'm north of Atlanta. I say Atlanta, it makes sense to people. But I'm north of Atlanta in a community that when I was in college, when I was in high school, this is the area where Smoky and the Bandit filmed, literally the car is riding through the hills and there was a dirt road.

Lisa Blotsky:

When I was in high school, I interned at a vet out here, and it was a dirt road to get to it. By the time I was in college, it was paved. Currently, the community is considering welcoming a national Hockey League arena to our area. Urban Sprawl is here, it's left Atlanta and it's made it 30, 45 minutes up the interstate. And we have always in this area, for the 25 years that I was at Tyson, we've always, because down the road from where I still live, we've always thought the, "Oh God, the chicken plants in the middle of town." And many people do not know that this community would not have survived if it wasn't for poultry coming in in the thirties and forties.

Lisa Blotsky:

The people in this community had no source of wealth. They had no source of income, and there wasn't a rail line to bring anything to them. And the community started to have, agriculture started to have at the time, the veterinarian that actually I go to now, he'll tell me about the good old days and how poultry came in and started to create jobs. And Wilson Foods, I believe it was, was the facility here in town. It got bought by Holly Farms, and then Holly Farms was bought by Tyson. And We are not the only, I say we like I still work for Tyson, but the facility here is not the only one in town. There's others. We just happen to be the one that's more prominently visible.

Jill James:

Sure. The largest one.

Lisa Blotsky:

Right, the largest one.

Jill James:

So Lisa, when you decided to leave poultry and now you're with insurance, why did you make that shift or how did you make that shift and what's it like?

Lisa Blotsky:

So that shift was a combination of different things. I mean, I'll admit you start to expand your worldview a little bit like I did. I got the masters and was exposed to other things, and you start to think, :Do I want to do this forever?" Obviously, clearly agriculture is in my blood and I'm stuck with it. But honestly, with my networking with the ASSP, with the Women in Safety Excellence Group, specifically, one of my peers, Christina Roll, she actually had come over to AXA XL and they knew that they were expanding the role, that there was just too much work for her to handle alone. And she reached out to me and said, "Hey, have you thought about doing something else?" And I was like, "What you got?" And then just went, "Huh?"

Lisa Blotsky:

I will say talking with everyone through the informal interview process. I mean, yes, there's a formality to it, you set up meetings and so on. But the conversations were very informal and I felt very comfortable, like I mentioned all these different times in my life where I felt psychologically safe and comfortable. I felt very comfortable, and I felt that all of this hard work that I had done to educate myself was of value to someone, and it was of value to insurance. And specifically they saw that, oh gosh, we were able to take people that have specific knowledge. So some of the, I should say my incoming class, my freshman classmates at AXA XL, we had folks that had done amazing research in genetics and chemistry, people that had worked in the automobile industry.

Lisa Blotsky:

I mean, just all these different experiences that they didn't have official degree in safety. They had had all of these experiences that then was seen as beneficial to the insurance industry because they understood, again, that process. So just like I understood how a bird is processed and therefore can address the safety hazards of the process, here were these people and their individual industries, and that was seen as a benefit. So it has made for a comfortable process in coming in, and they've definitely honed in on my experience with food and beverage and agriculture. They've definitely used me for that. And I feel I'm so happy to be able to do that because those are my people. That's the process I understand. But then I've also had to learn some of the jargon in insurance. That's foreign to me, but I'm being given plenty of opportunity to learn.

Jill James:

And it sounds like you really like learning.

Lisa Blotsky:

I do. I do. I'm a nerd. I'm a professional nerd.

Jill James:

Yeah. Yeah. So you're a professional nerd, but what about in your volunteer time? Because I think you might dip your toe. I mean, I'm interested to hear what you do in your volunteer time, in your community time. I mean, I teach breath and meditation and yoga, but what do you do, Lisa?

Lisa Blotsky:

Oh, wow. That's a good one. I need that for my singing ability. It's my good breath support. So I do some volunteering at church. I think that not yet dipping into the safety field, but I was a musical theater person in high school. And so I do some singing and that sort of thing at church. Currently, that's on hiatus because of my little ones. My husband also does musical theater and the music program at church. So currently I am a wedding coordinator. So my organizational skills and my event planning and making things happen on time, I use it for that. But I am using my safety skills at a local charity haunted house called Fore Sights, which is the county. We live in foresight. So it's a plan on words, and I have been doing that two years now, and I am so sucked in. I love it.

Jill James:

So you mentioned at the beginning of the show that you like scary things. So you are volunteering at a haunted house doing safety stuff?

Lisa Blotsky:

Safety. I am, believe it or not, because you imagine when you go into a haunted house, any of these professionally organized, haunted houses, there is an aspect of safety. You have fog, you have dim lights, you have maybe some sort of pyrotechnics you might have, obviously you've got electrical things, so you have fire hazards, and you have people hazards. So part of my job, along with the rest of the security and safety team is we actually walk the facility to make sure that there are not trip hazards, because our particular haunted house is not a permanent installation.

Lisa Blotsky:

It's erected at a fairground just for the spooky season, just for October. And then it's taken down. So we'll go through and we inspect the facility, We do safety walks. We work with the fire functional and the police department to make sure that the actors are safe during the time that they're there. And then the part that I particularly enjoy is working the cameras where we get to watch everyone in the community come out and get spooked. And that is phenomenal. And it's especially fun when I get to watch my now former teammates from the chicken plant come through, these maintenance guys I can recognize on the camera. Well, there is Carlos, and I watch him go through and just being spooked, and it's hilarious, it's fantastic.

Jill James:

Oh my gosh, that's awesome. That's awesome.

Lisa Blotsky:

Yeah. So I get to get my spook on at the same time that I'm being useful with my particular skillset.

Jill James:

Oh, man. Yeah. So our job for listeners, in case this is a first for you, can also include haunted houses, because I mean, a hazard exists in every place that a human body works, that's for sure.

Lisa Blotsky:

Or the undead.

Jill James:

Yes, or the undead, the zombie safety. Yeah. Yeah, you mentioned earlier ASSP and your connection to it, and why specifically, what has ASSP and being part of a chapter and how has that helped your professional career?

Lisa Blotsky:

Oh, it's been excellent. I would say firstly, I would not have known about the opportunities for further education at all if it wasn't for ASSP, because locally, most states, most big cities will have a chapter and have regular meetings, if not in a local area on a regional level. So being able to be in those sessions, I've been exposed to either further education in the meeting itself, further education outside of that. So whether it's at the collegiate level, then if there have been special classes, "Oh, I didn't know that I could be an OSHA outreach trainer. Oh, that's cool. Tell me more about that." Because obviously I, as we already discussed, I like learning. So any opportunity to expand on that.

Lisa Blotsky:

And then our chapter, our Georgia chapter, gosh, I wish I could remember what year it was, but we started an actual chapter of the Women in Safety Excellence. And Christina, who I mentioned before, was part of starting up that chapter of WISE. And there were a group of four of us women who were part of the steering committee and started really getting it active and rolling and doing our own separate things outside of the ASSP meetings. And I was able to build this really fun and empowering group of women, that community build that up. And then shocker of shockers, we actually had gentlemen that decided to join because our content was so much fun and we had so much to offer, and they wanted to lift us up just like we wanted to be part of the community. And that was so gratifying, and I really loved it. And man, we were rocking. And then the pandemic hit and-

Jill James:

Dang pandemic.

Lisa Blotsky:

I think there's some silver linings out of it. I will say.

Jill James:

There is, yes.

Lisa Blotsky:

My silver lining was at the end of my collegiate career, my graduate school career there were no other distractions, and I could study and I could ace it, and I could get out of there with those grades that my inner nerd really wanted to get, but it killed some of those social organizations. So sadly, we are working to build that organization back up. And even the chapter itself, we're building that chapter back up. I shouldn't say we, the chapter is being built back up. I'm just a side note to that. But we're trying to build the Home and Safety Excellence group back up locally. Obviously it's still going nationally, but we're trying to build that up locally again as well.

Jill James:

Yeah, yeah. Lisa, you and I met at a trade show this year. We were at National Safety Expo in Congress, I believe. Yes.

Lisa Blotsky:

Yes. National Safety Council Congress, yes.

Jill James:

Yes. And so what does your year look like for further education, conferences? How do you approach your continuing it? What does that look like for you?

Lisa Blotsky:

Oh, that's a great question. I am currently self-studying for the associate in risk management. So that's my own personal thing, and I can do that on my own personal time, some work time, computer based. So that's my own personal thing, but then also still involved with the local ASSP and getting some further education there. In the way of conferences, our Region Four ASSP meeting is coming up, I believe in April, the end of April, beginning of May, and that will be in Orlando, Florida. And then continuing with ASSP, we will be having that conference in the fall in Denver, Colorado. And I will be working with the Women in Safety Excellence to put on the runway show for the PPE that is inclusive of women's body shapes and styles and not just pink and smaller. So I will be helping out with that and then think National Safety Council as well. The Congress, again will be later in the year. I don't have the dates off the top of my head.

Jill James:

Yeah. Right, right. I'll see you at both of those shows.

Lisa Blotsky:

I'll be at that for sure. But definitely encourage people to come on out to the Women's Fashion PPE Runway Show at ASSP Safety 2024. And if there's anyone listening to the podcast that's interested in sponsoring that as being part of it, then I'd be happy to provide them with more information for sure.

Jill James:

Wonderful. Lisa, what keeps you going in this? I mean, now we've identified the shocking length of each of our careers. What gets you out of bed every day to keep working on this, other than the internal nerd, but what is it in that inside nerd that keeps you going?

Lisa Blotsky:

Oh, if I have to go down to the core, the sanctity of life, I believe that life has value and is intrinsically must be taken care of and loved and nourished. And part of that is staying alive and being safe, psychologically, physically safe, and there is work to be done. I will tell people I will always have a job, whether for good or bad, there's always hazards. Life is hazardous, life is risky. But if we can reduce that and we can continue to be productive members of society, and if I can support people in that mission, then I am happy to do it. I feel like I was led down a path to get me the skills so that I could do the work that I'm doing now. And I never would've been exposed to that world where I was as a child or a young adult that was not part of the community that I was in. And the path that I was taken on gave me those skills to get me to that point.

Jill James:

Beautiful, beautiful. As we're wrapping up our time today, you knew what you wanted to do since you were three years old and actually have a memory of it and it includes agriculture and animals. How are animals still part of your life today? If they are?

Lisa Blotsky:

They are. We have a menagerie in our home. We currently have two dogs of our own, and currently I have two foster dogs. I work with a Georgia, English Bulldog rescue, even as a graduate of two programs that are diametrically opposed to having bulldogs in your house. Both Auburn and Georgia Tech are rivals of University of Georgia. But here I am, I have this skill set, so I'm happy to help. And that's a dog that's definitely in need, so we help out with that. And a different story for another day. My husband and I were brought together by a bunny, again, story for another day, but we're happy to currently have a rescue bunny and some fish, and if I get my ways about me one day, we'll probably have a snake or something scaly in the house. We're just not currently there yet.

Jill James:

Oh my gosh. Well, when we see one another at ASSP or NSC, I'm going to ask you for that bunny story.

Lisa Blotsky:

Oh, yes, I'll definitely share.

Jill James:

Lisa, this has been such a pleasure, and thank you for sharing your story and your Agvocacy for all things agriculture. That's beautiful. That's beautiful.

Lisa Blotsky:

I'm happy to.

Jill James:

I share that passion. Yeah. Thank you. Thank you so much. And thank you all for spending your time listening today. And more importantly, thank you for your contribution toward the common good. May our employees and those we influence know that our profession cares deeply about human well-being, which is the core of our practice. If you aren't subscribed and want to hear past and future episodes, you can subscribe in iTunes, the Apple Podcast app or any other podcast player you'd like. Or if you prefer to read the transcript, you can listen and read at hsi.com. We'd love it if you could leave a rating and review it on iTunes. It really helps us connect the show with more and more health and safety professionals like Lisa and I. Special thanks to Emily Gould, our podcast producer, and until next time, thanks for listening.