Jeffery Lyth is a Canadian safety leader, author, educator, and organizational learning practitioner with more than three decades of experience helping organizations improve safety, operational performance, and leadership in complex, high consequence industries. Over the course of his career he has worked across construction, manufacturing, municipal government, transportation, logistics, healthcare, emergency response, infrastructure, longshoring, mining, utilities, and major public events. His work bridges traditional occupational health and safety with contemporary approaches including Human and Organizational Performance (HOP), Learning Teams, Safety-II, Resilience Engineering, organizational justice, and operational learning.
Jeff began his professional career as a first responder, serving as a paramedic with the British Columbia Ambulance Service while also working as a lifeguard and ski patroller. Those early experiences developed a practical understanding of human performance under pressure, emergency decision making, and the realities of complex work that continues to influence his approach today.
He later built an extensive career in construction and industrial safety, progressing from field safety officer to Director of Corporate Health and Safety for the ITC Construction Group. During this period he led the development of an award-winning safety management system while supporting operations throughout British Columbia, Alberta, and Washington State. Under his leadership the organization achieved significant reductions in claims costs, regulatory orders, and insurance costs while implementing innovative technologies, including Canada’s first computerized tower crane anti-collision system.
Jeff subsequently served as Regional Safety Manager for the Vancouver 2010 Olympic Winter Games, responsible for safety across Vancouver competition venues, the International Media Centre, and Olympic accommodation facilities. He also represented Canada internationally through the Department of Foreign Affairs on the Canada-China Migrant Labour Occupational Health and Safety Project, participating in technical exchanges in China and hosting visiting delegations in Canada.
From 2012 onward Jeff became Senior Safety Advisor with the BC Construction Safety Alliance, where he helped introduce transformational leadership development, mental health initiatives, the Safety Climate Tool, the Prime Contractors Technical Advisory Committee, and the Silica Dust Control Tool developed with the University of British Columbia and WorkSafeBC. He also represented the Canadian Construction Association during Canada’s transition to the Globally Harmonized System for hazardous materials and served on several industry boards and committees.
Following a series of serious workplace incidents in British Columbia, Jeff increasingly focused on understanding why conventional approaches often failed to explain real work. This led him to the work of Erik Hollnagel, Sidney Dekker, Todd Conklin, David Woods, Brent Sutton, Brent Robinson, and others whose research fundamentally reshaped his professional practice. Since then he has devoted his career to translating contemporary safety science into practical methods that frontline organizations can actually use.
Today Jeff is the founder of QSP Leadership Inc., a Principal with Learning Teams Inc., and the owner of SafetyDifferently.com. He works internationally with organizations seeking to strengthen leadership, operational learning, critical risk management, investigations, and organizational capability. His clients include organizations in energy, construction, mining, transportation, healthcare, manufacturing, utilities, and government throughout North America and beyond.
Jeff is widely recognized for making advanced concepts accessible to operational leaders. He has trained executives, supervisors, safety professionals, and frontline workers in Learning Teams, the 4Ds, operational learning, critical risk conversations, work-as-done, psychologically informed leadership, and modern approaches to incident learning. He has coached organizations through cultural transformation initiatives, safety management system modernization, ISO 45001 implementation, and leadership development.
As an author, Jeff co-authored the international best seller ‘4Ds for HOP and Learning Teams’ and has written additional books including ‘Learning From Everyday Work’ and ‘HOP Beginner’s Guide to Doing Safety Differently’ series. His writing emphasizes practical application over theory and focuses on helping organizations build learning capability rather than compliance alone.
Throughout his career Jeff has supported major incident investigations, organizational reviews, executive coaching, conference presentations, and professional development programs. His work consistently emphasizes that operational excellence emerges through curiosity, respectful dialogue, learning from everyday work, and understanding how people create success under varying conditions.
Although he previously held both the Canadian Registered Safety Professional (CRSP) and Certified Health and Safety Consultant (CHSC) designations, he voluntarily retired those credentials to focus on the evolution of the profession rather than professional titles. His reputation today is built on practical experience, thought leadership, and his ability to connect contemporary safety science with the realities of operational work.
Jeff continues to work internationally with organizations seeking to improve safety, quality, reliability, and organizational performance through operational learning, leadership development, Learning Teams, and Human and Organizational Performance. His work is grounded in the belief that people are not problems to control, but essential contributors to resilient and successful operations.