Qualities of resilient practice

Investigators routinely attend to and consider six key characteristics of organisational safety when analysing risk. Taken together, these attributes represent the qualities of sociotechnical practice that investigators believe are essential to accomplishing safety. These six organisational characteristics are  

Ability the capability that exists in any organisational situation to comprehend, prepare for, perform and control the required work tasks. Awareness the degree of understanding in any organisational situation and the extent to which this is actively created, supported and maintained. 

Communication the quality of the processes that share and integrate relevant information and build collective understanding. 

Additional pressures and complications in such situations are regarded as eroding the ability for effective performance. In these circumstances, crews are not expected to consistently perform well. The overall ability of the work system, including crew, technology and their social interactions, is challenged. 

The introduction of a new automated system had created a performance trap that presented a challenge - albeit temporary and small - to setting up the aircraft properly. The ability of flight crew and the overall work system had been impacted by activities elsewhere in the organisation of implementing a new automated system and associated procedures. Organisational ability was therefore questioned in both these areas of activity. This is a common and repeated pattern in the analytical work of investigators. 

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