NZSA announces Covid-19 Guardian Award winner – congratulations to Anton Kritzinger

Congratulations to our Covid-19 Guardian Award winner:

ANTON KRITZINGER

Anton will receive his award for his actions in diffusing a potentially dangerous situation on an Auckland bus during Covid-19 Level 4 lock-down. The nomination from his employer Armourguard highlighted how good training and a calm demeanour are essential for security guards undertaking their work.

Allen McKinley, Amourguard’s Operations Controller said “Anton’s leadership and attention to safety has been exemplary. He has set a new level of professionalism with his selflessness and care of others that instils confidence within his peers. His actions and maturity set a high benchmark for our Guards Division”.

The nomination included this summary of the situation:

“Anton’s selfless actions protected a bus driver from a violent male member of the public. Both ATOC and GO Bus complimented Anton on his efforts to try and calm down the individual concerned, and to deescalate the situation. When Anton realised the male was likely to harm the driver he stepped forward and placed himself between the aggressor and the driver to act as a shield. The aggressor then spat at Anton, but he did not think of himself and controlled the male and the situation until police arrived on site. Even though we were high on Covid-19 alert, Anton did not think of himself, only the safety of the driver and maintaining his professional approach. After the incident was resolved, Anton contacted Healthline and was thankfully cleared to return to work. The incident was also acknowledged by AT Chief Executive Shane Allison”.

The NZSA introduced the Covid-19 Guardian Award as a way in which the wider community can recognise and say thanks to security personnel for their efforts.

Nominations for the Covid-19 Guardian Award can be submitted via the NZSA website. The nomination process is easy to complete online and will only take a few minutes.

We need you to help us with this initiative, not only with submitting nominations but more importantly, in helping us to communicate the award to the wider community. We have provided a template communication you can use to forward to your customers, suppliers and staff, to post on your social media pages or local community pages, and ask that you share the NZSA’s Facebook and LinkedIn posts with your contacts.

We want to take the opportunity to recognise and celebrate the efforts of our workers and in particular, those who have gone above and beyond all expectations. Be it acting with kindness, stepping in to keep people safe, helping the community or even just giving a big warm smile, their efforts have been appreciated.

This is a great chance for us as an industry to promote the outstanding work that our people perform each and every day, so we would really welcome your support in helping us get the message out there.

Stay safe and keep well.

From the NZSA team.