A crane rental firm takes on a manufacturers’ standard: Maxim’s route to three ISO certificates
Maxim Crane Works has been certified to ISO 45001, ISO 9001 and ISO 14001, an 18-month process that began when wind sector customers asked whether a lifting contractor could meet the same standards as their own suppliers.
Pushed by the wind sector
The idea came from customers rather than from inside the company. Troy Wagner, Maxim’s vice president of safety, said international wind developers — a large part of the company’s workload — were used to working with ISO-certified suppliers and asked whether the crane firm could do the same.
“A handful of customers in the wind sector, for which we do a lot of work, encouraged us to look at ISO 45001. Many of these companies are international, so it’s very normal for them to submit their organizations to ISO standards.”
— Troy Wagner, Vice President of Safety, Maxim Crane Works
Wagner, who has been with the company 15 years, was initially sceptical that a scheme built around manufacturing and process industries would map onto crane rental. “I really thought it was an insurmountable program that didn’t really have a lot of applicability to our industry,” he said. “But as I started to dive into it, I came to understand that it doesn’t apply to one specific business model.”
Three standards, not one
What began as an occupational health and safety exercise under ISO 45001 widened once the internal review started. Maxim also went for ISO 9001 for quality management systems and ISO 14001 for environmental management, and was certified in all three. The company credits much of that to a Lean Six Sigma 5S programme rolled out across every branch from 2022, which had already generated the documented evidence auditors needed.
What it commits the company to
Certification is not a one-off. Maxim must go through re-certification every three years, and Wagner points to field employees’ participation — including stop-work authority — as the material that supported the safety audit. He is explicit that the exercise was not about a plaque on the wall.
“I’d like to make clear, this isn’t about winning awards. This is to show our customers our commitment to quality systems, environmental awareness and the occupational safety and health of all of our employees.”
— Troy Wagner, Vice President of Safety, Maxim Crane Works
Wagner also expects competitive pressure to follow: if crane hirers start losing work to certified competitors, he argues, the standards spread across the lifting industry.
Source: Maxim Crane Works — Photos: Maxim Crane Works