A Decade of Lessons on Risk, Responsibility, and the Real Meaning of Safety
When I joined Grace Technologies ten years ago, I didn’t know the first thing about electricity. I came from the plumbing field. I knew flow, pressure, and valves, not volts, amps, and resistance. Phil Allen, Grace’s founder, was the one who explained electricity to me in a way I’d understand: “Think of it like plumbing.”
Electricity flows like water through pipes. Voltage is the pressure, current (AMP) is the flow, and resistance (OHM) is the restriction. Too much pressure and something bursts; too little flow and nothing happens. That simple analogy changed how I saw not just electricity, but risk itself. Electricity is invisible, but it behaves predictably, and that predictability is exactly what safety is built on.
1. The Most Common Violation Is the Most Human One
When I started in plumbing, safety wasn’t top of mind. We worked fast, cut corners, and did what we were told. I didn’t even know what OSHA was until later. Looking back, I probably violated more rules than I could count, not because I wanted to, but because I didn’t know better.
That’s where most injuries come from, not malice, but misunderstanding. The control of hazardous energy is consistently one of OSHA’s most cited violations, year after year. It’s not that workers don’t care. The culture around them often doesn’t support it. And that’s where change has to start.
2. Safety Is the Reduction of Risk — Not the Absence of It
When I first walked into Grace, I saw a sign in the lobby that read: “Safety is the reduction of risk, not the absence of risk.”
That line has stuck with me for a decade. No environment is perfect. Sometimes you’re working from outdated schematics. Sometimes the last person didn’t document a change. Sometimes the job site doesn’t cooperate with what the codebook says.
That’s why our products exist to reduce risk when compliance alone isn’t enough. Permanent Electrical Safety Devices (PESDs) and the Proxxi Band fill the gap between human error and human safety. Because zero harm and zero unplanned downtime aren’t just goals, they’re a mindset.
3. Compliance Doesn’t Equal Understanding
You can follow every procedure and still not understand why it exists. Compliance is universal, but it’s also universally misunderstood. I’ve seen companies working from safety programs that haven’t been updated in decades.
NFPA 70E updates every four years. Every revision represents thousands of hours from experts trying to make sure you go home safe. If you’re not reading that new edition, you’re not just behind, you’re at risk. Electricity doesn’t change, but the way we interact with it should.
4. Human Error Is the Constant Variable
Even the best procedures can fail if the people following them are rushed, tired, or complacent. We like to think safety is a matter of training, but in reality, it’s a matter of human nature. People make mistakes, and in electrical work, even a small mistake can have life-altering consequences.
That’s why engineering controls like PESDs and Absence of Voltage Testers (AVTs) matter so much. They take the most dangerous steps of Lockout/Tagout (LOTO) and move them outside the enclosure, away from where the risk lives. They take the guesswork out of safety and make compliance something you can see, touch, and trust.
At Grace, that’s always been the goal: to engineer out human error before it becomes a statistic. Because no matter how good the training, how strict the checklist, or how experienced the worker, everyone is human, and the best safety programs are built around that truth.
5. Culture Is the Hardest Circuit to Close
You can buy all the right tools, but if leadership doesn’t prioritize safety, they’ll collect dust. Culture is the invisible wiring of an organization, and when it’s not grounded in safety, everything built on top of it is at risk.
A culture that values speed over safety is one spark away from disaster. I’ve seen teams that treat safety like an afterthought, and I’ve seen teams that make it a shared responsibility. The difference is night and day.
When people understand why safety matters, not just what the rule is, something changes. Conversations shift. Workers start looking out for each other. Procedures stop feeling like red tape and start feeling like a promise. That’s when safety becomes contagious.
Building that culture takes time, patience, and consistency. It doesn’t happen with posters or slogans. It occurs in toolbox talks, in honest conversations after near-misses, and in leaders who practice what they preach. Because when safety becomes part of the culture, compliance follows naturally.
6. Technology Augments Awareness
I’ve watched the evolution of safety technology from voltage indicators to ChekVolt, and each one has pushed safety forward. But no device replaces the awareness between your ears.
That said, technology now helps extend that awareness beyond what we can see or sense ourselves. The Proxxi Band puts awareness on your wrist, alerting you when you’re too close to energized conductors, even before you realize it. Technology doesn’t replace awareness; it augments it. Because when it comes to safety, every extra sense matters.
7. Predictive Maintenance Is Preventive Safety
Working alongside the GraceSense team taught me that electrical safety and predictive maintenance are two sides of the same coin. Both are about knowing before something fails, preventing downtime, injuries, and guesswork.
Predictive maintenance used to be seen as an efficiency tool, but it is just as much a safety tool. A failing connection, an overheating component, or a bearing trending toward failure is not just an equipment issue. It is a potential hazard that could lead to an arc flash, fire, or mechanical failure. The data you collect, trend, and act on can stop those incidents before they happen.
Prevention is not glamorous. It may not make headlines or show up on a profit and loss report. But it is the mark of a facility that values people as much as production. When you invest in systems that monitor continuously and warn early, you are investing in lives, not just assets. That is what real progress looks like and that is the mindset that defines Grace.
8. Documentation Saves Lives
Every procedure you record, every update you log, every voltage you verify matters. What feels like paperwork is actually protection for the next person who opens that panel or touches that line.
Many electrical accidents do not happen because someone was careless. They happen because someone before them did not leave a clear record. Outdated schematics, missing labels, and unlabeled breakers can all turn into hazards for the next person down the line.
Safety is a relay race, not a solo event. Every note you make, every update you enter, and every tag you leave behind keeps the next person safer. When we document clearly, we are not just protecting ourselves. We are protecting the person who comes after us. That is what real safety culture looks like.
9. You Don’t Have to Be an Electrician to Make a Difference
One of the most powerful things I’ve learned at Grace is that safety belongs to everyone. Whether you are an engineer, a technician, or someone like me who started in marketing, understanding risk and caring about safety make you part of the solution.
You do not have to be the one holding the meter to make an impact. Safety starts in the way we communicate, the way we design, the way we train, and even the way we tell the story of why safety matters. Every department plays a role. When marketing focuses on education, when leadership supports training, when engineering designs safer systems, and when workers speak up about hazards, that is when a true safety culture takes shape.
10. You Have to Be the Change
After ten years of writing, learning, and sharing what I’ve learned, this is what I want to leave you with: Be the change.
Educate yourself. Challenge complacency. Show your leadership the statistics and the stories. Prove that safety and productivity don’t compete; they complement. Never sacrifice your well-being for speed. Because if something happens, it’s not just a number, it’s you, or the person next to you.
Final Note
It’s been an honor to share what I’ve learned through this blog to help spread awareness about electrical safety, compliance, technology, and our innovations in IIoT. Grace’s mission has always made the message simple: Safer. Smarter. More Productive.
This will be my final blog, but the show will go on. Stay subscribed, stay tuned, and stay SAFE! It’s been an honor writing for you all, and thank you for making this decade one I’ll never forget.
