How to become a Certified Safety Professional in Canada

Ensuring or enhancing safety in the workplace is a major concern for businesses that have inherent safety risks. In those that engage in heavy industry, it’s not always as simple as providing safety equipment or PPEs, conducting seminars on workplace safety, or leaving the matter to be handled solely by your employees.  

To ensure there are real safety protocols and a good safety culture is in place, it's advisable to hire a Certified Safety Professional. This is essential if your business engages in construction, manufacturing, oil and gas, agriculture, mining, and other activities that have safety hazards or a high risk of incidents at the workplace.  

That’s why in this article, Canadian Occupational Safety discusses relevant topics about the Certified Safety Professional, including:  

• What is a Certified Safety Professional?  
• How do you earn the Certified Safety Professional designation?  
• What are the roles of a Canadian Certified Safety Professional?  

We’ll shed light on these and more questions.  

What is a Certified Safety Professional?  

A Certified Safety Professional is someone who has earned their designation from the Board of Certified Safety Professionals (BCSP). Someone bearing this certification has a comprehensive understanding of safety and learned the skills for their practical application in the environmental, health, and safety (EHS) fields. Note that this designation is not a Canadian one, as it is governed and issued by the BCSP, an American organization – however, they are an important designation in Canada for good reason (more on this later).  

Certified Safety Professional (CSP) requirements 

To qualify for the CSP designation, candidates must fulfill certain prerequisites, including:  

Educational requirements 

The formal education and educational requirements for the CSP title consist mainly of having a bachelor’s degree of any course at the minimum.  

Work experience 

Candidates need a minimum four years of safety experience; 50% of this experience should be preventative in nature, and at a professional level with breadth and depth of safety duties 

Credentials 

They must have a BCSP-qualified credential such as:  

• Associate Safety Practitioner (ASP) 
• Graduate Safety Practitioner (GSP) 
• Transitional Safety Practitioner (TSP) 
• Certified Industrial Hygienist (CIH) 
• Chartered Member of the Institution of Occupational Safety and Health (CMIOSH) 
• Canadian Registered Safety Professional (CRSP) 
• Professional Certificate in Safety and Occupational Health, U.S. Army Combat Readiness Center (ACRC) 
• Certified Safety Engineer (CSE), as administered by the State Administration of Work Safety (SAWS), People’s Republic of China (PRC) 
• Master’s in Occupational Safety and Health, International Training Centre of the International Labour Organization (ITC-ILO) 
• NEBOSH National or International Diploma in Occupational Health and Safety 
• Professional Member of the Singapore Institution of Safety Officers (SISO) 
• Diploma/Certificate in Industrial Safety, as issued by the State Government Departments Boards of Technical Education, Government of India 

CSP examination 

Candidates must pass the CSP exams. The test consists of nine sections designed to assess their knowledge on health and safety and risk management systems. 

Background check 

Candidates must also pass a background check. The BCSP investigates each candidate if they were convicted of a crime or have had other professional licences or credentials suspended, revoked, or placed under review. Should the BCSP discover any of these, the information is kept confidential but can be used as grounds to deny the candidate’s application.  

What is a Canadian Registered Safety Professional (CRSP)? 

Meanwhile, the CSRP is the designation governed and issued by the Board of Canadian Registered Safety Professionals or BCRSP. This is the benchmark certification for health and safety professionals in Canada.  

Canadian Registered Safety Professional (CRSP) requirements 

Educational experience 

To obtain this certification, candidates must have a bachelor’s degree or complete a two-year course in occupational health and safety. Candidates can take these OHS courses offered by:  

• The University of Alberta 
• The University of Calgary  

Work experience 

As for the work experience requirement, candidates for the CRSP title must have at least four years of professional-level OHS experience obtained within the last 72 months. This means they should have a minimum of 900 hours/calendar year of practice in the OHS field. For a more detailed description of the CRSP designation requirements, you can look at their guide for applicants.  

As with the CSP designation, the Canadian Registered Safety Professional designation shows that an OHS professional has successfully obtained a nationally recognized certification within the OHS field. 

What is covered by the CRSP exams? 

The CRSP examinations cover a diverse range of topics, including:  

• Auditing 
• Applied Safety Fundamentals 
• Ergonomics 
• Fire prevention and protection 
• Health and wellness 
• Law and ethics 
• Management systems 
• Occupational hygiene 
• Risk management  

CRSP examination structure 

The CRSP exam covers diverse topics that can equip successful candidates with the skills and knowledge necessary to ensure safe workplace practices.  

The exam consists mainly of questions in a multiple-choice format that tests candidates on their knowledge and comprehension, application of OHS theories, and critical thinking skills. The CRSP exam is designed to provide a comprehensive assessment of each candidate’s capacity to serve in the OHS field. Candidates that take and pass the exams are expected to gain a thorough understanding of the theoretical and practical aspects of occupational health and safety.  

What is the significance of the CSP and the CRSP? 

As explained earlier, the Certified Safety Professional title is from the United States’ Board of Certified Safety Professionals while the Canadian Registered Safety Professionals is under the Board of Registered Canadian Safety Professionals. Why is this relevant? 

In a nutshell, a reciprocal agreement in the form of a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) was forged between the BCSP and the BCRSP sometime in 2013. That MOU stated that because both organizations’ processes and standards have many similarities, both agreed that:  

• Individuals who have met the certification standards of the BCSP and BCRSP and remain in good standing with either body are deemed to have met the certification standards of the other body. 
• A person with the CRSP designation from BCRSP who meets the eligibility criteria of the CSP will no longer be required to take the BCSP Associate Safety Professional (ASP) exams, although they must pass the CSP exam. 
• A person with the CSP designation from BCSP who meets the eligibility criteria of the CRSP will not be required to complete the BCRSP interview but must pass the BCRSP examination.  

Technically speaking, at least between Canada and the US, the Certified Safety Professional and the Canadian Registered Safety Professional are considered the same – but only if the individual titleholder meets the eligibility requirements and passes the exam for the other designation. This effectively means that CSPs in the US can work as CRSPs in Canada and vice-versa. 

The roles of the CSPs/CRSPs in organizations 

Before hiring a CRSP, it’s important for your staff to be aware of the many roles that the designation demands. After all, the job of a CRSP is crucial, as it is essential to ensure workplace safety. Here’s what’s expected of a CRSP:  

1. Enhancing workplace safety 

A CRSP on staff is mainly tasked with bolstering workplace safety. They accomplish this by implementing safety management systems within the company. CRSPs are trained to:  

• Assess risks 
• Evaluate safety measures 
• Develop emergency response plans 

By doing this, CRSPs minimize incidents and promote a culture of safety within the organization. Part of this process is procuring the right safety equipment for the industry that organization is in.  

2. Ensuring regulatory compliance 

There are regulatory bodies that oversee safety and risk management in Canada. One of the foremost organizations is the Canadian Centre for Occupational Health and Safety (CCOHS). Safety experts like CRSPs ensure that your company complies with important rules and regulations, such as Part II of the Canada Labour Code. 

In that section, employers are mandated to protect the health and safety of employees at work. This is achieved by ensuring that employee complaints, including refusals to work due to safety concerns, and accidents and injuries are properly investigated. 

CRSPs are tasked with ensuring compliance with these standards by developing and implementing the appropriate safety policies. There may also be updates to certain standards, like updates to standards in PPEs manufactured in Canada. Doing so not only provides employees with the safety they need, but also helps the company avoid workplace accidents. It’s the safety professional’s job to remind employees of the importance of using their PPEs, so not only do they avoid injuries, but the company also avoids legal liability or fines.  

3. Promote company credibility and employee morale 

The presence of a Canadian Registered Safety Professional can enhance a company’s image in the eyes of its employees and the public. A BRCSP-certified safety professional within an organization can boost employee morale, resulting in improved employee retention, and increased productivity thanks to improved safety practices.   

Here’s a video made by the BRCSP extoling the benefits of having seasoned safety professionals on board in industrial companies. See how some companies place a premium on having CSRPs.  

Maintaining the certification 

The Continuing Professional Development (CPD) requirements for keeping the CRSP title are meant to ensure that safety professionals maintain their competencies and remain current in occupational health and safety (OHS) practices. What this mainly involves is engaging in cyclical professional development activities, which are conducted in a five-year cycle.  

Those who have earned the CSRP designation must accumulate a total of 25 CPD points during a five-year cycle. These points are earned via various learning activities, including:  

• Continuing education: this entails taking OHS-related seminars, courses, and workshops. 
• Practicing professionally: this involves conducting activities in a professional capacity, related to OHS duties. 
• Instructional activities: teaching or lecturing OHS-related topics.  
• Doing research and publications: this includes writing OHS-related papers or publications and conducting formal research on OHS-related topics or issues. 

Note that each of these activities have corresponding point values based on their nature and the time needed to complete them. For example, 10 hours of continuing education is equivalent to 1 CPD point. For more details on maintaining the designation, you can refer to the BCRSP guide on recertification.  

Ethics course requirement 

Apart from the CPD activities, maintaining the CRSP title involves completing a minimum of two hours of ethics training in every CPD cycle. The course stresses the importance of having ethical knowledge and incorporating it into the practice. This process can help ensure that CRSPs continuously conduct their duties responsibly and with a high standard of integrity.  

Documentation and reporting 

Another aspect of maintaining their title is extensive documentation. Detailed records of their CPD activities are required as part of recertification. Safety professionals are required to submit records of their CPD activities for evaluation and verification by the BCRSP. These documents and other recertification requirements must be submitted by the end of the CPD cycle, or they risk losing their title.  

Canadian Registered Safety Professional salaries 

A safety professional with the CRSP title can receive competitive compensation. Depending on their skills, experience, expertise and geographical location, they can expect an average salary of $100,000 or more per year. As of 2023, a BCRSP survey affirmed this, and that 58.6% of over 5,000 respondents reported receiving these salaries. About 89% of the respondents also expressed high to very high job satisfaction. 

Having a CRSP or CSP in your organization is essential to safety management, especially if it’s engaged in high-risk industries or business activities. Their presence is not only an effective means of ensuring regulatory compliance, but these safety professionals also reduce or eliminate workplace hazards and injuries. A workplace with high safety standards and a good safety culture can translate to more profit, as it’s been proven that safer workplaces are more productive workplaces. 

A CRSP can also be a great boon to employers, since workplace safety can also be an effective tool for attracting top talent and keeping them. Employers not only avoid workplace injuries but also avoid the prospect of legal liability and fines with better workplace safety facilitated by a CRSP. Comparatively speaking, the salaries of these certified safety professionals can be more than compensated by the benefits they can bring to your company. To reap these benefits, it’s just sound business practice to hire a capable safety professional.  

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