Building a Profession From the Ground Up: The DPP Certification Story

What if the people who keep gas lines, fibre, and power cables from being torn out of the ground have never had a profession to call their own? 

Mike Sullivan talks with Coral Lukaniuk; Longtime architect of large‑scale strategic programs, engineer and facilitator with deep engagement experience, founder of coRoc Solutions, and Executive Director of the new Damage Prevention Professional (DPP) Certification Program.

They unpack a strange truth: damage prevention is named in federal and provincial regulation, yet nearly everyone in it "fell into" the work, with no curriculum, credential, or career pathway behind them. 

Coral explains why a nonprofit like Utility Safety Partners is the right home for the program, why it's emphatically not "just an Alberta thing," and why building a profession is a decades-long project worth starting now. 

The conversation lands on a simple test of success: a day when DPP certification is a job requirement, and a damage-prevention pro is recognized as readily as an electrician at your door.

Listen for:

2:59 Why has no one ever built a career path for the people protecting what's buried beneath us?

7:25 Why does it matter that a nonprofit — not a company — is behind this certification?

13:58 Why would a board chase a goal that comes with no guarantee of success?

26:12 Why do so many people wrongly dismiss this as "just an Alberta thing"?

30:53 What does success actually look like for a profession that has never existed?

 Connect with Guests:Coral Lukaniuk,Executive Director | coRoc Solutions

LinkedIn | Damage Prevention Professional Certification

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Transcript

Announcer (00:02):

You're listening to The Safety Moment Podcast by Utility Safety Partners. Safety is always a good conversation and it's a click away. Here's your host, Mike Sullivan.

Mike Sullivan (00:16):

Hi everybody, and welcome to the Safety Moment podcast. I'm Mike Sullivan, your host. Thanks for joining us again. My guest today is Ms. Coral Lukaniuk. Coral is well known within the Canadian energy pipeline industry and the US as well, but in her current role she's providing, she is, I should say, the executive director for the Damage Prevention Professional Certification Program that's essentially being underwritten by utility safety partners. The DPP certification program is brand new and we are only six months in, but already it's generating a lot of interest. Let's get into it with Coral right now. Hey, Coral. Good to see you and thanks for doing this. This is not something we do every day and I know it's a little different, but really appreciate you doing this and joining me on the Safety Moment to talk about the Damage Prevention Professional Certification Program.

(01:10):

That's a mouthful, so we're just going to call it the DPP. How's that?

(01:14):

That sounds great, Mike, and thanks for having me.

Coral Lukaniuk (01:17):

Oh, this is pretty exciting. As you know, I wanted to do this for a while. We've been talking about this for a while and here we are. We're already six months into the time where you joined Utility Safety Partners to lead this program. Well, I'm really impressed at how much track is behind us already and how much you've accomplished, but we're really still at the beginning stages. So before we even get into any of that, where we are and where we're going, maybe just explain to the billions of people who are going to be listening to this podcast. What is the DPP?

Mike Sullivan (01:56):

Yeah. The Damage Prevention Professional Certification is going to provide consistency across damage prevention. It's going to advance and recognize the professionals. And that's really what it is. It's bringing consistency, recognition and elevating these professionals that work in damage prevention day in and day out. Everyone that I know and that I have talked to have land, they've landed in damage prevention by happenstance. There's

Coral Lukaniuk (02:34):

No career- Me included.

Mike Sullivan (02:36):

Oh yeah, me too. But there's no career pathway out there. So that's what the damage prevention professional is going to do. It's going to provide that pathway for those that are working in this space, which is really critical considering they're protecting the safeguarding those utilities that are beneath us.

Coral Lukaniuk (02:59):

Yeah. And don't you find it interesting that after all this time this hasn't happened yet?

Mike Sullivan (03:07):

Yeah. It's actually a bit mind boggling why it hasn't happened because it has happened in so many other areas. And I come from the pipeline industry and it's a regulated area and yet there's still no professional pathway.

Coral Lukaniuk (03:26):

No. And the words damage prevention is mentioned in regulation and we're at the federal level, the provincial level, not just here in Alberta, but across the country in different regulatory bodies. And you're right, it's a little bit mind boggling that it doesn't exist. And I'll go back to my days with the National Energy Board and as an inspection officer, I did inspection site inspections, but I also did safety audits. I remember when I was very young and working in that capacity, one of the audits I had to do was public awareness audits. The public awareness was a requirement of the, at the time, the pipeline crossing regulations and now part of the damage prevention regulations. And so we would go out and we would audit pipeline company awareness programs and they would provide us with their public awareness program. We would gauge that, "Okay, show us the program, show us what you're doing and are they actually doing what they say they're doing?" And it occurred to me as I went out to different pipeline companies that everybody's trying to do the same thing, but they're not working together.

(04:37):

And then we had a ... My boss at the time, he supported the idea of a public awareness workshop and I think the first one was 1997 in Calgary and then 98 in Vancouver. And it was after that that

(04:56):

I began to notice pipeline companies hiring people as a public awareness coordinator. Prior to that, the role didn't seem to exist. So it was like, okay, this is good. And now years later, we see the role of damage prevention manager, damage prevention coordinator, ground disturbance coordinator. And there's so many other roles, exactly what we're talking about. There are so many roles out there that contribute to the efficiency, the efficacy of the damage prevention process. They support it. Whether it's people working at utility safety partners or info excavation or BC1 call that receive the locate request and process it all the way to the engineer who is designing a new asset or securing rights of way the land agents, everybody doing that work is supporting the damage prevention process. But you're absolutely right and not even yet when we're still working towards it, these people haven't had a home and I just find it, first of all, it's time.

(06:09):

It's time that this happens. And so I mean, I know the answer to this, but I want to talk about it with you. Why utility safety partners? I mean, we're not just doing this for Alberta, right? We are doing this to set the bar and to introduce the concept of DPP certification,

(06:31):

Not just in Alberta, but as far as we can take it. So how does that work?

Mike Sullivan (06:37):

Yeah. So I think with utility safety partners, during this whole development and moving into our implementation, it's a great home for the program. USP is credible, it's recognized, it's recognized not in just in Canada, but it's recognized abroad, which is really important as we do want to move this program globally. But most important, it's a nonprofit. So having that nonprofit status, people are going to see, or we hope people see we are doing this genuinely because we believe a career pathway is needed. It is not about making money. So I think that's a really key point of USP providing that home for the program right now.

Coral Lukaniuk (07:25):

I agree and I'm going to take this back quite a ways pre- COVID and where did this idea come up? I

Mike Sullivan (07:33):

Have to kid with you. Quite a ways now is pre- COVID.

Coral Lukaniuk (07:37):

I know, which is good. If

Mike Sullivan (07:39):

You had one back like 20 or 30 years when it

Coral Lukaniuk (07:42):

Was like pre- COVID.

(07:43):

But time does fly and at some point it will be 20 or 30 years. But no, pre- COVID, I'm going to say it was 2017 or 2018 and I was in Edmonton and I know you've heard this story before, but I was sharing a cab with Jeff Mulligan and who was the executive director for Aztec Safety. And Jeff has given a lot of his time to the training standards committee under the Alberta Common Ground Alliance and now Utility Safety Partners. And I can't remember what we were talking about and I said, damage prevention needs its own support system in terms of training and education and a curriculum, if you will, to get some kind of certification. Very similar, maybe same to the certified registered safety professional. And that's the parallel that I've always just had in my mind. It's not perfect, but it's the only one I can think of.

(08:41):

And Jeff at the time, he said, "Yeah, maybe there's something there." And that was kind of it. We would come back, we'd talk about it and then we had the unification with Alberta One Call and the ABCGA and where's the line? And that took a lot of horsepower to get that going at a time during COVID when not a lot was happening and we had limited capacity to get out there and work with people and collaborate. And then slowly the idea began to come back. And so I'm really glad we're doing this. I'm really glad that we are, my board of directors supported this. They've been asking me for a stretch goal for a long time and I can't think of a stretchier stretch goal than this. And there's no guarantees, right? There's no guarantees, but you've been in this space in damage prevention and I want you to talk a little bit about your career.

(09:38):

You've been in this space for a long time. I mean, you were an engineer with TC Energy and you worked many years at CEPA, the Canadian Energy Pipeline Association, and you've been on your own now with Core Ox Solutions for quite a while and quite successful at it. But take me back first of all to TC Energy and how long ago did you join TC?

Mike Sullivan (10:01):

Well, I'm going to take you back a little bit more than that. So I graduated from engineering school, I almost said the year, but I'd give my age away a little bit, but it's okay. But even before I graduated, I'd landed my first role with Nova Gas Transmission and I was spent time in the field and I think that's important being out in the field. I have a good understanding of operations out there. I then moved into the office. I was a materials engineer and then as you know, TC or TransCanada at the time and Nova merged and I actually left that shortly thereafter I wrote a lot of the new specifications like all the merger type documents

Coral Lukaniuk (10:56):

And

Mike Sullivan (10:57):

Went upstream for a bit. Then I came back to TC and in that, it was really exciting. I was part of pipeline integrity when I came back to TC as opposed to being in more of a specialty area. And I first became aware of damage prevention when, through pipeline integrity, threat management is what pipeline integrity, what everyone is trying to manage. And mechanical damage is one of those threats and that's how I first became involved in damage prevention. It has now been woven in and out of my career when I was at TC developing a holistic public awareness program, spanning three countries when I moved-

Coral Lukaniuk (11:49):

No small feat.

Mike Sullivan (11:51):

No, you probably know I like these big challenges.

(11:55):

When I moved into the Canadian Energy Pipeline Association, another challenge, sustainability program for pipelines across Canada. And of course, damage prevention was one of those key areas. It was one of the priority areas. So it has been woven in and out and I just think it's really important and I think damage prevention, what's unique about it maybe compared to some of the other threats or two pipelines is the third party component. It adds a huge twist that corrosion or geotech or other things don't have. This third party component really adds this layer of complexity making it very challenging. I think companies are all doing the right thing. It only takes one person in the public or outside of the company to decide to take things in their own matter and cause damage, which is really unfortunate.

Coral Lukaniuk (12:56):

And so fast forward to, well, about a year ago, actually right away, about a year ago when I was about ready to present the 2026 business plan and budget to my board of directors, I had been working with the training standards committee, the leadership there to say, "I want to bring this in. It's time we do this. It's tough. No guarantees the board's going to agree." And the training standards committee said, "You know what? We want to support this. " And the TSC said, "We will subsidize or we will pay half of the first year of this program." And that meant a lot because they recognize the value and not only the leadership, but everybody on that training standards committee recognized the value of doing this. And so I was really thankful that the board of directors supported this. As I said, there's no guarantees, but there's a guarantee of no guarantee if we don't do it.

(13:58):

So if we do it, now we have a chance to make a mark. And when we went out and we put the job out there for executive director for this role, we had over 200 applicants and many were great applicants. And I was very happy to see your name and very happy that you saw the value, the potential, I guess, of what we're doing. And going back to what you said, the work you did at TC Energy, the work you did at the Canadian Energy Pipeline Association, those were big thinking projects. And again, you know what the outcome is supposed to look like. It's the getting there and that's the hard part. And this is where we get back to the DPP, but I'm still having ... I have a pretty good idea of what the end result should look like, but I really have ... I struggle and this is why you're there.

(15:01):

I struggle with how to get to where we I think the end is. And so right now, and just to describe, if you don't mind, describing the project, we have a three-year window commitment from utility safety partners to deliver something and right now we're six months in. So maybe just take me on where you see that, well, where we've done, but also where that journey is going to take us.

Mike Sullivan (15:29):

Yeah. It's exciting. It's exciting to be on this journey. Every day right now is different and I love it. I'm just energized by so much happening. So you and I, we could speak for hours and I can tell you what we're doing. But to sum it up, we do have three core pillars that we're working toward or that are guiding the direction. So that's helping a lot. We have our values in place, which are really, really key. And I've developed two groups. This truly is for industry by industry. And to make that happen, we have two groups in place. One's our community of volunteers. I use the word community because I really want people to talk and be a part of everything. The word volunteer has been a bit challenging because people see volunteer and everyone's tired. They have a lot on their plates, whether it's through company activities, family activities, you name it.

(16:40):

So what we've established here for the DPP with our community is people that are interested, join the community and then I can tap into you as needed when I need guidance. I actually did that this morning. I'm preparing a new survey and tapped into someone who's a locator and said, "Hey, can I review some of these questions with you? " So we did that. That's where that community can be really valuable. The other group that I've established for this program, we have an advisory council and our council is invitation or was by invitation. They're senior leadership folks from across the globe, really. And you mean that sincerely, we have someone from the UK, someone from Australia, we have several folks from Canada, several folks from the United States and one of our folks from Canada, she finished her career off in Mexico. So they're going to really help us in things around geopolitics, culture, company adoption, those sorts of things.

(17:52):

So really excited. So that's how we're going to go there is that guidance of our working, or sorry, having our strategic foundation ground us and then using these groups to move us forward in different areas.

Coral Lukaniuk (18:10):

And you've had a lot of success doing work very similar to this. I mean, not creating an entire certification program, but really working with various groups across multiple jurisdictions, time zones, cultures, countries, you name it. So you've had that experience and you know that the path is never straight, right? It meanders. Your destination doesn't necessarily change, but how you get there will move and be influenced by the people you're working with. Why I go back to the work you did with TC Energy to, you had three countries, Canada, USA and Mexico where TC Energy has assets and then to create an integrated public awareness program that would cover all three countries. And that doesn't sound easy and I know it wasn't, but if I look at, for example, Mexico and I did a little bit of work in South America many years ago and the cultural influence, just the demographics, technology availability, that all influences how you can get your message across, but also influences how much your target audience is going to know and absorb.

(19:34):

So in similar fashion here, I mean, we'll actually may go back to that TC energy work. How did you work around that? Because we're so used to working within the environment we're familiar with, but then you have to understand the environments where you have to work and that maybe in that case were very different. How did you do that?

Mike Sullivan (20:03):

Well, I think a big part of it, people just working with the people. Processes, technology, they're pretty easy. People are challenging. So developing really good relationships with all the community relations folks across the entire system played a very big role and listening. And same thing here, because it's going to be global, being open-minded, listening, because we can't take something that is developed here and think it's going to immediately be perfect in another country. That's why a big part of this, we're designing flexibility within the program to make it so other organizations or associations or whatever it may be may be able to adopt the DPP through that.

Coral Lukaniuk (21:04):

And so when we look at the end result, and again, I draw the similarity of the parallel, if you will, and I know it's not perfect, but again, it's the only one I can think of to the certified registered safety professional, or maybe even environmental work, right? Going back 40, 50 years, there was very little emphasis on the environment. Safety, yes, it was considered, but it wasn't governed. It wasn't regulated. It wasn't even a core value as it is today. And because of the emphasis over time that was placed on, I'll focus on safety, I'm more familiar with that, but because of the emphasis that was placed on that and then securing best practices, better practices that eventually get written into standards or get written into regulation or legislation, that's the progres that ends up bringing us to the place where we are today that safety is paramount.

(22:12):

Safety is beyond a core value. It's just how we work. That's what I see and what I anticipate and what I hope we are beginning to go down a path towards with damage prevention certification, but it takes a long time and I don't know, but I think what's different in this case is we have the value of hindsight and seeing for, and I'm going to focus on safety again. We have the value and hindsight of seeing how it evolved at some point during that evolution somebody or somebody's, they said, "You know what? We need to push this. This is where we need to be in five years, 10 years, whatever, and we need to start pushing this. " And I see that with this EPP certification, we're trying to wrap our arms around all of those functions and positions and tasks and jobs that contribute to the efficiency and the success of the damage prevention process and give them that thrust like we have for safety.

(23:34):

This is not an overnight or a three-year success. This is going to take a long time. I won't see the end of this. I mean, there is never an end, but I won't see ... I'm 60 years old, I won't see the end of this in my career. How do you communicate that to somebody? And now you've talked to a lot of people in Canada, the US and beyond about this program to be perhaps on that community of volunteers or the stakeholder advisory group. How do you communicate this? Because let's face it, a lot of them are like me towards the end of their careers, right? We've seen a lot, so that's beneficial. We have a lot to add, but how do you communicate that to these people saying, "I need your help and I have a two and a half year window This is going to be solved in two and a half years, but we're going to have a solid foundation." How do you communicate that?

Mike Sullivan (24:37):

Yeah. Well, a big part of that is this is a program right now how I'm communicating it is I first start with, how did you end up in damage prevention?

Coral Lukaniuk (24:49):

Yeah.

Mike Sullivan (24:50):

And when people start to think about it, I'm like, "Yeah, there's no career pathway out there for it. " So that helps a bit, but then I might get into the timeline piece. And so we're really focused in 2026 on development. We'll move that into 2027. 2027, we're looking for those early adopters to move into implementation, but all part of that is continual improvement and that's why this will always be ongoing. Every program should continually improve and you should learn. So when people, at least the people I've reached out to, they all get that, which is really helpful. And so they see one, it's needed and two, we have a good pathway to bring this forward.

Coral Lukaniuk (25:41):

Yep. I want to look at this from a different angle and you spoke recently with the Canadian Common Ground Alliance Board of Directors. The CCGA board was meeting in Ottawa and you came in via Teams and you spoke about the program. We did an exercise and there's that misconception that I heard around the table and say, "Okay, I'm sure how this is misconceived," but people think, "Oh, it's just an Alberta thing." No. So talk about what is this not?

Mike Sullivan (26:12):

Yeah, right. We do bump into that. I bump into that quite often about Alberta. And I think a big part of it, a USP is well known out there and has driven a lot of great innovation in different areas. So it's known for that. So I think some people because they know USP, they just think this is just another one of those really great programs that USP is doing.

(26:41):

So to get around that, a big part of it is we are reaching to try to get individuals from all over to be a part of our community, but our advisory council, our advisory council is very global in nature and even some of our community members are global. So later on today, I will be meeting with someone by Teams to talk about the survey that's in draft right now and he's from the United States. We really have to push forward that this isn't unique to Alberta or Canada. This doesn't exist in other areas too. So making it global is the right thing to do and I think with time people will start to see more and more how it is bigger than just Alberta.

Coral Lukaniuk (27:36):

Now there have been, I should say, there have been some other forays into this area and we've talked about that ourselves in our meetings and that's okay. That's good actually. The way I see it is good, but those programs that have, or groups that have worked in this area to date, it's been somewhat specific, right? It's on, we're creating a training for whatever it might be. How does the DPP certification complement or collaborate with those existing initiatives?

Mike Sullivan (28:17):

You mean like a locate program or?

Coral Lukaniuk (28:19):

It could be a locate program. For example, Jiva has done the unauthorized activities training.

Mike Sullivan (28:25):

Oh yeah.

Coral Lukaniuk (28:26):

So things like that.

Mike Sullivan (28:28):

Yeah. Well, one of the things, that's what this new survey is about is to figure out what does core look like? What should every damage preventional professional have? And once we understand what core looks like or that foundation looks like, then we can start looking at, well, how does this match up to what's currently out there? And there is lots of complimentary stuff, but I'm being very mindful that we're not trying to fit the program into what's existing. We're trying to develop a program that is best to meet the needs and then look for those complimentary areas, partnerships, whatever it may be huge on collaboration, reached out to a lot of different groups and really emphasizing, we don't want to compete in this area at all. We want to make sure that we're working together for the greater benefit of the entire damage prevention area in all industries.

Coral Lukaniuk (29:33):

And that's the key I think is we need to collaborate, we need to work with, we need to compliment what others have done and what others are planning to do. And that's where the volunteers, the stakeholder advisory committee, that's where all of this I think begins to take shape and where utility safety partners isn't doing this to weigh The USP flag. We're doing this because as I said earlier, it's time. As you said, we are a nonprofit organization. In that regard, I do agree with you and I agree with others who've said it before as well that if we were a for- profit organization, it brings a different context. Okay, they're doing this for profit or whatever down the road. And that's not the case here. And what I am hopeful is that for me, what does success look like? I'm going to ask you the same ... I'm going to ask you first, actually, then I'll tell you what I have in mind.

(30:44):

So for you, what does success in this endeavor look like?

Mike Sullivan (30:53):

I think adoption in different parts of the world, for sure, Canada, the United States and UK and Australia would be absolutely perfect. But for me, what success looks like is when a damage prevention professional sometimes comes to your door, whoever answers the door goes, "Oh, okay, I get that. " Just very much like if an electrician showed up or a plumber, bringing that recognition right to every household, but really seeing these professionals that work really hard get the recognition they need and for companies to have confidence that everyone they bring on that's a damage prevention professional or that they support to be a professional, they know what that means. That's consistency across the board. So I'm not sure if I answered that very well, Mike.

Coral Lukaniuk (31:49):

No, you did. I love that. And you hadn't said that before and we do talk a lot. You had mentioned that before, but I love that. And for me, what it is, and I don't know if I mentioned this before to you, but if I'm, I don't know, on LinkedIn and I see that company X, Y, Z is seeking a manager of damage prevention and I scroll through it, not that I'm looking to change jobs tool for that. And I look through that and to me, success would be that in the qualifications it would say, among other things, that the person has successfully secured or achieved damage prevention professional certification.

Mike Sullivan (32:33):

Absolutely.

Coral Lukaniuk (32:33):

And that's a curriculum requirement, right? A requirement of the role. Because as you said earlier, so many of us, I mean, probably all of us who are in damage prevention roles fell into it or came into it based on, well, yeah, they have this, they have that. Yeah, they'll work in this role, it'll fit. But there's nothing that really says, "Yeah, you know damage prevention." No, it's experienced. Yeah. Mike worked at the NEB, worked at Alliance Pipeline, he's done this, he's done that. Yeah, his experience kind of fits, but I can't waive a certificate saying, "Yeah, this is what I've got." And that's to me what success looks like and it allows a person or allows a person a pathway, right? When I look at my colleagues who are the frontline agents, they're receiving locate requests or processing locate requests and knowing what I know of the land administration work, they are essentially akin to a junior land administrator.

(33:41):

And I've said that for a number of years and that's been supported by some of those agents going on to work in land administration, being hired by contract agencies or utility companies, or they go on to do triage, locate request triage for major utility companies and then from there they move on. But there are so many contributing elements of that role that they are learning. They have no idea. I've learned all this. Yeah, you have a lot of knowledge just by doing this work. You came here because you met the requirements of the job, but nothing said damage prevention certification, but in being here and doing the job well and learning and being reliable, you've learned a lot and that can be applied elsewhere. So this is what my hope is, is that we can identify all those roles that support the efficiency, the completion of the damage prevention process and map them out, if you will, for a person who has a career desire in damage prevention and they can be certified to move on.

(34:55):

And as you said, this is ongoing. You never achieve, okay, we're done and move on to the next. No. No, this will have a life. And so I really hope that's what my vision is. That's what my hope is. And I hope I was able to convey that to not just my board, but anybody who asked over the years, I hope that's what I was able to convey because as you said, you're absolutely right. I mean, you're an engineer and you came into the damage prevention career or niche. And even for me, when I was hired in this role, I just had experience. I had never done this job before. I was familiar with it. I had a pretty good idea what it would entail, but it's a challenge that, yeah, I mean, for the board, the executive that hired me, they were taking a leap of faith and you always do, you always do no matter what.

(35:59):

But I think it would've been a little bit easier if they said, "He's got all this experience, but he's also got this certification because that tells the person who's hiring me they not only have experience in these core areas, but they have knowledge of all the contributing factors that support the damage profession process." So anyway, that's kind of what we're getting at.

(36:26):

As we move along, like I said, we're only six months in and you've done a tremendous amount of work. I do know that we are the Utility Safety Partners website is about to- Have a webpage. Have its own webpage just for DPP. And so people can go there soon. Tell me about that.

Mike Sullivan (36:46):

Yeah. I end up in many conversations as you do and it's a lot of talking and

(36:55):

That won't change, but it'll be exciting to be able to share like, "Ooh, come check out things on the webpage." We've also started writing articles. So I'm doing a monthly article for newsletters, started that in April, State Dig Month. So yeah, we have April, May. I'll be getting ready to write an article for June. So those articles, those monthly articles allow people to come on the journey with us and I hope they do. I hope we get lots of readership and those articles will also be on the website. But yeah, the webpage really highlights our values, our purpose. It highlights the articles. There's a little place on there where you can see us live. So I'm going to be doing a presentation and a workshop at a conference in the US in August. So it highlights that and highlights the other conferences we're involved in.

(37:50):

So we invite everyone to connect with us on the DPP, whether it's through the website, reading the articles, come see us in person, have coffee, whatever it may be. It's just the website or the webpage is just another way of sharing all the things that are happening.

Coral Lukaniuk (38:08):

Yeah. And I'm really glad we're getting that done and that's the right time. We've done a lot of groundwork. We, I said you, but you ... We as there's a greater we here, but- Yeah, it's a greater we. Yeah, for sure. The royal we. But there's been a lot of work that's been done and

(38:27):

I'm glad. I'm really glad we're getting this information out. You can find information about, as Coral said, about the DPP certification on LinkedIn as well. Utility Safety Partners has its own LinkedIn page. I tend to repurpose things, you repurpose things. And obviously our newsletter, as you mentioned, so the newsletter is clicked to know what's above and below and it circulates to about 160,000 recipients every month. And the open rate, I'm blown away. We often have a 50% open rate, which is phenomenal for a newsletter. So the reach is very good. And the last thing I want to talk about is at some point there's going to be call it political or government relations interest here and we're not there yet because again, this is all in its infancy, but what do you see that looking like? Because I know it's there, but right now it's foggy for me.

(39:33):

How is that going to work? Do you have any ideas what that might look like?

Mike Sullivan (39:41):

Not exactly. I have learned if you get sort of a designation in a province, it tends to be leveraged across the country. Things like that. I'm learning a little bit about this right now, Mike, is the government piece, but we need to be farther along. What I'm afraid of, if we work too quickly with government, it may skew it in a different way than what industry is seen. And this really does need to be for industry by industry. Now, oddly enough, I had a conversation with one of the state governments down south and it was fantastic. Coral, let us know how we can do. Oh, would you mind sending ... Absolutely. I'll send out the survey. We will fan that out. Made mention of different state government groups that might be involved and they're going to be meeting, so might be able to go to that.

(40:47):

And I know that's all new to you, Mike, because we haven't talked about that yet.

Coral Lukaniuk (40:50):

No. We haven't talked in 24 hours, right?

Mike Sullivan (40:52):

It was a really good conversation. So we have to think of government as in a variety of different ways. At some point we're going to see them about bringing the professional on more formally, but looking at them right now as a partner or a collaborator to help build the program. They're vested in damage prevention very much like anybody is and making sure people are safe, the public's safe, the environment is unharmed and workers are safe.

Coral Lukaniuk (41:28):

It's a tremendous journey that we're on. And at this point in my career, I didn't anticipate something this big happening and the amount of work doesn't surprise me, but I think what ... I don't know if it surprises me, but it makes me quite happy, is the amount of interest it's generating and the concept of what we are talking about, that is generating a tremendous amount of interest. And it also tells me back to what I said a few times already, it's time that this happens. So Carl, thanks for doing this and I'm really glad obviously, but I'm very glad to have you on board. We've worked together in a variety of ways, parallel and directly over the years and this has been a really ... It's a great relationship that we have and I'm really looking forward to where this is all going to go.

(42:31):

And yeah, I'm very glad to have you on board. So thanks for doing this.

Mike Sullivan (42:35):

Thanks for having me, Mike. And I hope there's another opportunity to give all the listeners an update where we are in what, maybe six months or something.

Coral Lukaniuk (42:45):

The billions that are listening are on the edge of their seats. Can't wait. No, I see. Yeah. And I think we need to go back every six months or so and talk about this. So yeah, we will. Thanks.

Mike Sullivan (42:55):

Sounds great. Thank you.

Coral Lukaniuk (42:59):

That's going to wrap things up for the Safety Moment Podcast. I want to thank our producer stories and strategies and of course our guest today, Coral La Canya, for joining me to talk about the Damage Prevention Professional Certification Program. Thank you for listening. You can find us on any service where you find your podcasts. And if you have a episode idea, feel free to reach out to us at info@utilitysafety.ca. And remember, one click costs you nothing, not clicking, that could cost you everything.