ECJ EUROPEAN Cleaning Journal

The Royal Society for Public Health (RSPH) in the UK has awarded accreditation to Rentokil-Initial’s in-company training course Hygiene Within our Environment.

The RSPH is the oldest public health body in the world, an independent organisation dedicated to the promotion and protection of collective human health and wellbeing. Its accreditation process involves assessment of the planned objectives and outcomes of the programme, the content, mode of delivery and the technical content related to hygiene awareness.

Rentokil Initial is one of the largest service companies in the world, with a workforce of around 60,000 operating across more than 60 countries. Its training programme is designed to provide front line staff with hygiene awareness and practical knowledge for risk mitigation of microbes’ spread and transmission of disease.

Global hygiene category director Mark Reader is responsible for washroom services, hardware, consumables etc. He told ECJ how the programme came about: “We found the knowledge our sales force had was quite generic, they didn’t have the specific knowledge about hygiene often required when interacting with businesses and suppliers.”

Knowledge and tools

Hygiene Within our Environment is designed for those sales forces - its start coincided with the launch of the company’s Signature washroom dispenser range. “We wanted to give our sales force the optimum knowledge and tools,” continues Reader. “The training programme is designed to equip our staff to survey premises and identify hygiene risks – we can then offer the solutions to minimise those risks.”

There are five RSPH-approved modules in the programme:

• Awareness and basics of hygiene – transmission of bacteria both to surfaces and other people

How to assess

• Hygiene tools and how to assess hygiene – presence of bacteria and how to test for it. Sales force uses ATP, for example, and humidity gauges when assessing buildings

• Survey – helping a business to see potential risk areas. Rentokil Initial staff help business owners to assess and how perceive risks

• Solutions – this encompasses consumables, tools and services. “Here we have tried to link our services to the risks being experienced by clients.”

• Sectors module – specific business types and how their risks can be different. Hotels, for example, are very different to offices. This module also covers the business implications of hygiene failures.

All training is carried out face-to-face and Rentokil Initial is currently in the process of training the trainers. Six months after initial training there are online refresher modules.

Reader explains the benefits already seen by implementing the programme. “It gives the individual more pride in what they are doing, and real knowledge about the subject. Staff are no longer simply selling products, they are offering advice and expertise to our customers.

“This clearly has a beneficial impact on business in that we now have a much better equipped sales force – which in turn means we are offering an enhanced service to our clients.”

It was always the intention for this to be an international training programme, which involves almost 1,000 Rentokil Initial employees around the world. 

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