Safety Specialist - Facilities Management

Overview

The Safety Specialist role supports the Safety Lead in deploying and upholding occupational health and safety initiatives across KAUST facilities, operational tasks, maintenance jobs, construction activities, and ongoing projects. This position emphasizes hands-on field work including inspections, audits, assessing risks, investigating incidents, managing safety documentation, coordinating with contractors, conducting training sessions, tracking corrective measures, and ensuring adherence to ISO 45001 standards, HSE policies, and relevant legal regulations.

Key Responsibilities

• Assist the Safety Lead in rolling out and continually enhancing safety programs focused on risk management across facilities, operations, maintenance, construction, and projects.
• Perform site safety inspections, audits, compliance checks, and direct field verifications to confirm HSE compliance.
• Conduct hazard identifications and risk evaluations, ensuring that adequate control actions are in place and functioning effectively.
• Assess and verify safety documentation such as risk assessments, method statements, safety plans, permits-to-work, lifting and excavation plans, confined-space protocols, electrical work procedures, and Management of Change documentation.
• Lead or aid investigations into accidents, injuries, incidents, and near misses, determining root causes and suggesting corrective and preventive measures.
• Track the progress of corrective and preventive actions from inspections, audits, and incident investigations, ensuring timely resolution and escalating overdue items.
• Design and deliver safety training programs including toolbox talks, workshops, and permit-to-work training to raise safety awareness among employees and contractors.
• Offer practical HSE advice to facility managers, project teams, contractors, and service providers to guarantee safe work execution.
• Gather, analyze, and report HSE data, KPIs, inspection and audit findings, incident trends, and status of corrective actions, providing insights to management.
• Advocate a robust safety culture by addressing unsafe behaviors, sharing lessons learned, maintaining precise HSE records, and supporting compliance with ISO 45001, regulations, internal policies, and industry best practices.

Qualifications and Requirements

• Bachelor’s degree in Occupational Health & Safety, Engineering, Science, or a similar safety-related field.
• Mandatory ISO 45001 Lead Auditor certification.
• Certification or formal training in Incident Root Cause Analysis.
• At least 5 years of experience in occupational safety, particularly within facilities safety, construction safety, contractor oversight, project safety, compliance auditing, or related HSE roles.
• Proven capability in hazard identification, risk assessment, risk control, and applying risk-based safety strategies.
• Hands-on knowledge of safety protocols for high-risk activities including work at height, lifting operations, excavation, confined space entry, hot work, electrical tasks, and permit-to-work procedures.
• Practical familiarity with ISO 45001, safety management systems, audits, inspections, incident investigations, and managing corrective actions. Familiarity with ISO 19011 and ISO 31000 is advantageous.
• Preferred additional certifications such as CSP, CHST, NEBOSH Certificate or Diploma, IOSH, or equivalents. Train-the-Trainer certification is a plus.
• Strong verbal and written English communication skills capable of producing professional HSE reports, inspection documents, investigation findings, presentations, and safety manuals.