Safety Veteran Joins ABC as Senior Director of Health and Safety

Associated Builders and Contractors has hired Joseph Xavier, a safety and workforce expert with more than 30 years of experience, as its senior director of health and safety. Xavier will lead and contribute to the development and deployment of the overall health, safety and environment strategy for the association, its 69 chapters and its more than 21,000 member companies.

Xavier will lead a multidisciplinary national team to execute an aggressive health and safety strategy; provide expertise on compliance with federal, state and local safety and health laws; create world-class resources and educational programs and develop strategies that help ABC’s members meet the health and safety needs of the future workforce.

“It is vital that construction industry workers feel safe and are safe on the job and in the office, and that requires a daily commitment by leadership to decisions, routines and business models that prioritizes safety as a core value and builds a culture of total human health,” said Greg Sizemore, ABC vice president of health, safety, environment and workforce development. “Joe will be instrumental in ensuring safety continues to be in the DNA of our members and chapters, and that the leaders across ABC cultivate strategies that focus on total human health. We are thrilled that Joe brings to ABC more than three decades of safety experience to this role; our association, members and industry will be safer and healthier for it.”

Xavier has served in leadership, quality, health, safety and compliance roles since 1992. Most recently, Xavier was the CEO of Summit Sustainability Solutions, advising construction, manufacturing and hospitality clients in the mid-Atlantic region on safety and health risk control and prevention. His company was a member of ABC of Greater Baltimore and facilitated the chapter’s Safety Professional Peer Group.

He also served the H&S Bakery family of commercial bakers as director of safety and workers compensation, where he led the safety and health program and educated managers, supervisors and front-line employees on safety standards and how to apply that knowledge to reduce workplace hazards. Those efforts also improved product quality and scores on supply chain audits. Xavier returned to the construction industry with Tate Engineering and then a Caterpillar dealer.

“Safety and total human health are fundamental to every person, task and job, and I look forward to strengthening these foundational pillars for ABC and its member companies,” said Xavier. “The industry has made great strides to make our workforce physically safer. We now have an opportunity to integrate mental health and occupational safety, launching the total human health era of construction safety.”