High reliability organizations

Roberts K.H., Bea R., 2001. Must accidents happen Lessons from high-reliability organizations, Academy of Management Executive Vol. 15 (3), pp. 70-79. 

ANCDF Anniston Chemical Agent Disposal HRO high reliability organization... 

The consequences of error in chemical weapons demilitarization are potentially large, and any involved organization must maintain a consistently low error rate over extended time periods to ensure public safety and public confidence. The committee observed that some of the principles that apply to high-reliability organizations were evident at all sites visited. 

Roberts, K.H. 1990. Some characteristics of one type of high reliability organization. Organization Science 1(2) 160-176. 

This assumption is one of the most pervasive in engineering and other fields. Hie problem is that it s not true. Safety and reliability are different properties. One does not imply nor require the other A system can be reliable but unsafe. It can also be safe but unreliable. In some cases, these two properties even conflict, that is, making the system safer may decrease reliability and enhancing reliability may decrease safety. The confusion on this point is exemplified by the primary focus on failure events in most accident and incident analysis. Some researchers in organizational aspects of safety also make this mistake by suggesting that high reliability organizations will be safe [107,175,177,205,206]. 

So far the discussion has focused on safety versus reliability at the physical level. But what about the social and organizational levels above the physical system Are safety and reliability the same here as implied by High Reliability Organization (HRO) advocates who suggest that High Reliability Organizations (HROs) will be safe The answer, again, is no [124]. 

La Porte, Todd R., and Paula Consolini. 1991. Working in practice but not in theory Theoretical challenges of high-reliability organizations. Journal of Public Administration Research and Theory 1 19-47. 

Leveson, Nant G., Nicolas Dulac, Karen Marais, and John Carroll. (February/March 2009). Moving beyond normal accidents and high reliability organizations A systems approach to safety in complex systems Organization Studies 30227-249. 

Roberts, Karlene. 1990. Managing high reliability organizations. California Management Review 32 (4) 101-114. 

Rochlin, Gene,Todd LaPorte, and Karlene Roberts.The self-designing high reliability organization. Naval War College Review 40 (4) 76-91,1987. 

The legacy of the high reliability organization project , Journal of Contingencies and Crisis Management, 19 9-13. 

Klein, R.L., Bigley, G.A. and Roberts, K.H. (1995) Organizational culture in high reliability organizations An extension , Human Relations, 48 771-793. 

Design and standardization Protocols and guidelines Information technology Technical solutions Culture of high reliability organizations Mindfulness and hazard awareness Training in anticipation and recovery Teamwork and leadership... 

Baker P.D., Day R., Salas, E., 2006. Teamwork as an Essential Component of High-Reliability Organizations , Health Serv Research 2006 August 41(4 Pt 2) 1576-1598. 

Sutcliffe, K.M. 2011. High reliability organizations. Best Practice and Research Clinical Anaesthesiology, 25, 133-44. 

The study of patient safety is the study of complexity. The study of complexity invites us to understand key concepts that can be applied to patient safety. Basic concepts from the fleld of patient safety are sharp and blunt end active and latent failure the Swiss Cheese Model of Accident Causation slips, lapses, and mistakes and hindsight bias and the fundamental attribution error. Key concepts from organizational analysis, such as normalization of deviance, diffusion of responsibility, tightly coupled work processes, and sensemaking, introduce practical lessons from high-reliability organizations. Application of specific lessons to health care are explored in Chapter Five. 

The second minicourse described the concept of high-reliability organizations and how health care can learn from them to improve safety performance. John Nance, aviation expert and author, was the invited faculty member. 

There are numerous examples of how health care organizations have begun to successfully adapt concepts from high-reliability organizations, but there are considerable forces that present barriers to achieving high reliability performance. As health care leaders begin to apply the lessons from HROs, they need to anticipate these barriers and plan to address them. 

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