Safer. Leaner. Unbeatable. How Waste Connections Wins New Contracts on the Strength of Its Safety Record

Waste Connections is one of North America’s largest solid waste companies, with 25,000 employees and approximately 17,000 commercial vehicles collecting everything from residential curbside waste to oilfield material across the U.S. and Canada. Operating at that scale, in dense communities and under constant public visibility, safety isn’t a department. It’s the company’s first operating value, ranked before customer service, integrity, and financial returns.

The investment in Lytx comes back in multiple ways — safer drivers, yes, but also the ability to build relationships with our frontline team members and demonstrate to insurance carriers and our own leadership that we are the differentiator in this sector."

— Shawn Mandel, VicePresident of Safety and Risk at Waste Connections

Embedding Safety Into Hiring, Training, and Leadership

At Waste Connections, safety is embedded in how the company hires, trains, and leads, and the Lytx® program is central to how that culture gets measured and reinforced. “We have 90% coaching effectiveness,” said Shawn Mandel, Vice President of Safety & Risk. “That means when one of our drivers is identified with an at-risk behavior and we go through the coaching model we’ve developed, that behavior isn’t repeated. These are core values, and our frontline team members understand that.”

Turning Safety Gains Into Insurance Leverage

With insurance rates skyrocketing, Waste Connections sought to make its safety record a bulwark against the tide of claims. Decade-over-decade behavior improvements, such as a 49% reduction in instances of driving too-fast-for-conditions and a 71% improvement in driver response, helped to reduce risk and provide the actuarial foundation to rein in premiums with a captive insurance model.

Winning New Business on the Strength of Safety Metrics

The company’s exemplary safety record also helps it win new business. Every RFP that Waste Connections responds to starts with safety metrics. Those metrics, built on more than 18 years of Lytx data, are among a core set of differentiators that allow the company to stand head and shoulders above its competition.

Lytx has been a partner of Waste Connections since 2008, And I mean partner, not vendor. We’ve been able to go to them with problems and work toward solutions. They know us. They know our expectations. And they have routinely met them."

— Shawn Mandel, VicePresident of Safety and Risk at Waste Connections