Construction sites present unique safety challenges for suppliers and technical advisors. Unlike controlled production environments, risks shift daily, standards vary between contractors, and every site visit requires a fresh risk assessment. At Xella, we're exploring how we can become active partners in construction safety – and we're sharing what we're learning along the way. 
Pilot initiatives in Serbia and Denmark are testing new approaches to strengthen safety awareness among our sales and technical teams who visit construction sites daily. Both focus on equipping employees to protect themselves while opening meaningful conversations about safety with customers.

Learning Through Experience in Serbia
In Serbia and neighboring countries, we conducted two workshops for sales and technical teams. The first explored incident investigation and safety thinking through realistic scenarios – showing how accidents typically develop through multiple contributing factors rather than single moments.
“It provides a very quick way to understand how the incident actually unfolds, rather than seeing it as a single moment where something suddenly happens,” says Dragan Lazić, CEO South East Europe at Xella Group.
A second workshop, held months later, addressed the dual responsibility our employees carry on site: their commercial role as sales and technical representatives, and their personal responsibility for their own safety. 
Sessions encouraged employees to actively assess risks, use appropriate protective equipment, and consciously decide whether conditions allow safe entry. This personal competence became the foundation for credible safety conversations with customers. 
 

Safety as Common Ground
One unexpected outcome: customer receptivity.
"They were very open to discussing safety – even more than we expected, "Lazić says. When approached respectfully and without judgment, safety became shared territory that often strengthened working relationships.
The approach also reinforced our own teams' awareness."If you engage in a safety discussion with the client, it's also reminding you as an employee where you stand regarding safety," Lazić adds. 
 

A Different Starting Point in Denmark
Denmark's pilot emerged from a distinct challenge. The team initially questioned their credibility to discuss safety and the Danish market's large-scale projects added complexity. Rather than attempting to instruct customers, the Danish team began with internal development. Employees carried out safety walks on construction sites, using structured observations to identify risks and reflect on real conditions.

The aim was to build internal competence first. "Our goal is to educate our people together with our customers and, in the long run, make safety a value we bring to the table," says Fredrik Johansson, CEO Scandinavia at Xella Group.
Safety as Shared Value
The Danish initiative, though early-stage, reflects a growing opportunity in the industry: suppliers who can engage constructively on safety – without positioning themselves as authorities – may find new ways to add value and strengthen partnerships. "It moves us closer to the construction sites – and closer to our customers," Johansson adds. 

Open question for the industry
These pilots don't offer a finished model. They raise questions: Can building materials suppliers play a more active role in construction safety? How can companies build credibility as safety partners? What happens when safety moves from a compliance topic to partnership value?

What started as two local pilot initiatives in Serbia and Denmark may, over time, offer valuable insights for other countries – and mark an important step toward integrating safety more deeply into everyday interactions on construction sites.

At Xella, we believe safety awareness can protect employees, strengthen customer relationships, and create differentiation beyond products. We decided to share our initiatives as they might contribute to a broader industry dialogue on this challenge.