Safety-critical behaviors

Reduction of the disadvantages of unsafe behavior discouragement of safety-critical behavior... 

The first step in closing any safety gap is to clearly specify the leadership-critical and safety-critical behaviors that define it. As indicated in the last chapter, the LDI can help with this task. So can a behavior analysis of incidents and close calls as well as focus groups aimed at identifying such gaps. Once we understand the behaviors that constitute the gap, we need to be clear about our objective. What do we mean by behavior change ... 

The percent conformance to proactive safety-critical behaviors and processes ... 

Which implies previously having identified the inventory of safety-critical behaviors and having established regular means of observing and reporting their frequency of occurrence. 

Model new, safety-critical behaviors and best practices. 

The human factors literature is rich in task analysis techniques for situations and jobs requiring rule-based behavior (e.g., Kirwan and Ainsworth 1992). Some of these techniques can also be used for the analysis of cognitive tasks where weU-practiced work methods must be adapted to task variations and new circumstances. This can be achieved provided that task analysis goes beyond the recommended work methods and explores task variations that can cause failures of human performance. Hierarchical task analysis (Shepherd 1989), for instance, can be used to describe how operators set goals and plan their activities in terms of work methods, antecedent conditions, and expected feedback. When the analysis is expanded to cover not only normal situations but also task variations or changes in circumstances, it would be possible to record possible ways in which humans may fail and how they could recover from errors. Table 2 shows an analysis of a process control task where operators start up an oil refinery furnace. This is a safety-critical task because many safety systems are on manual mode, radio communications between control room and on-site personnel are intensive, side effects are not visible (e.g., accumulation of fuel in the fire box), and errors can lead to furnace explosions. 

Detecting migration toward riskier behavior starts with identifying baseline requirements. The requirements follow from the hazard analysis. These requirements may be general ( Equipment will not be operated above the identified safety-critical limits or Safety-critical equipment must be operational when the system is operating ) or specifically tied to the hazard analysis ( AWACS operators must always hand off aircraft when they enter and leave the no-fly zone or Pilots must always follow the TCAS alerts and continue to do so until they are canceled ). 

Due to the importance of hardware testing on test tracks during development, a common practice for the evaluation in safety-critical situations is introduced here. In order to achieve a subjectively realistic but objectively uncritical situation for active safety functions, so-called targets are used on test tracks instead of real traffic participants. Whereas most targets are designed for sensor or system testing, some are also suitable for behavioral studies. Many targets represent vehicles, or what a sensor or driver can perceive of a vehicle. For radar this means that a triple reflector made of... 

Building on these principles, PIRATe is a systemic proactive approach for identifying operational risk. It enables potential or hypothetical safety occurrences to be analyzed, drawing on the collective experience and knowledge of operational persoimel about unsafe conditions and behaviors in their woriq)lace. These risk factors are understood imphdtly by frontline operators in safety-critical roles, but are seldom made explicit and are often not apparent to those at higher levels of the oiganization. 

Identifying problem areas The safety mechanism that is geared for performance measurement and feedback takes its cue from the facility inventory of critical behaviors. Problem areas can be defined as those workplace behaviors that deviate from the expected critical behaviors. 

Critical behaviors are those behaviors that have been identified as being critical to safety performance in the workplace. These behaviors can be identified using one of four different sources incident reports, employee interviews, job observations, and review of work rules and procedure manuals. 

A traditional Behavior-Based Safety process identifies critical behavior, then establishes management processes that reinforce positive behaviors. 

Critical behaviors are those behaviors that have been identified as being critical to safety performance in the workplace. 

At-risk Behavior Actions increasing the potential consequence of injury or illness. The term was coined by Deborah Pivaronas as a way of describing critical, safety-related behaviors without the associated negative connotation (Krause, 1997, p. 10). The term is more neutral and less evaluative than unsafe behavior. 

Applied behavior analysis methods are useful to achieve continuous improvement in safety. Krause (1997, p. 3) explains, These methods include identifying and operationally defining critical safety-related behaviors, observing to gather data on the frequency of those behaviors, providing feedback, and using the gathered data for continuous improvement. ... 

Developing an Inventory of Critical Safety-Related Behaviors... 

Behavioral safety involves measuring safety-related behaviors. Krause notes that the behavioral inventory is how we measure behavioral safety performance. Benefits of using a Critical Safety Behavior inventory for continuous safety improvement include ... 

Critical behaviors are those actions that contribute to good safety performance or, conversely, that lead to injuries. Krause observes, In most accidents at-risk behavior is the final common pathway. Each facility, characterized by particular production processes, products, and workforce, has a characteristic cluster of these final common pathways that are responsible for a highly significant percentage of its safety incidents (1995, p. 113). 

The challenge is to (1) identify the specific safety-related behaviors for a particular site, (2) establish an inventory of operational definitions for these behaviors, and (3) prepare a checklist based on these critical behaviors for observers to use. Developing this critical behavior inventory serves the following purposes ... 

Safety Process Managing Involvement for an Injury-free Culture (Krause, 1997). Ultimately each site should develop their own inventory of critical behaviors, and the list is usually not that long— perhaps 15 to 25 behaviors that are genuinely crucial to safety performance. Earnest advises that the list be kept to five or ten critical behaviors (1994, p. 3). 

The only empirical approach to improving safety that has proven to be effective is a behavioral safety process. Behavioral safety is the only approach that has routinely produced significant reductions in incidents in well-designed research studies. The approach involves employees using a systematically developed checklist as the basis for feedback on critical safety practices observed in work areas (1998, p. 49). 

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