Safety Culture, Where do we really stand?

Safety Management Systems (SMS) is gradually being embedded into all areas of Aviation particularly in Operations and Technical domains. All personnel working in these areas are exposed to SMS training and concepts is some form or the other. The entire bouquet of SMS regulations and trainings fundamentally at their core have one intention is mind - To provide a formal system to address and manage all safety issues that will impact the safe operation of aircraft.

What pitfall that Organizations can fall into is a sense of belief that if they check all the boxes i.e. follow all the regulations, define proper policies and procedures and train their staff , Safety will automatically follow.

In my opinion nothing can be further from the truth. If I take the liberty of being slightly philosophical , Safety is to Aviation how the soul (or human consciousness, if you don't believe in a soul) is to the human body. It is not the physical elements that make it up it is rather something that permeates over its physical elements. That stems from the organizational culture more than anything else. Safety culture is all pervasive over the four pillars of the SMS and is the intangible element. Establishing the right culture is one of the most challenging tasks any organization can endeavor to embark on. The question is how does one set up a culture?

At the outset one of the non-negotiable elements is set up of a Just and Fair culture. If an employee senses even a hint of a prevailing atmosphere where there are punitive consequences for honest mistakes or human errors being reported, Safety has already taken a huge blow. The management in no uncertain terms both by way of Policy and Practice must clearly demonstrate that failure and errors wont lead to punitive action. What must follow is a fair investigation, a root cause analysis and if required retraining or counselling of the staff. All possible avenues must be explored and punitive action can only be a recourse in case of willful negligence or malice intentions. It is a psychological eventuality that free reporting will suffer if staff's employment is at risk, survival is hardwired into our brains and in all probability it is that instinct that drives our response to situations. It is only in an atmosphere of free and fair reporting can Safety prevail.

Secondly, an environment needs to be created where Safety is embedded in an employee's everyday work function. Each employee must be on the look out for potential Hazards and report them. Now most organizations try to do this by putting hazard reporting forms everywhere. However, that is not enough; how many people actually pay attention and make reports? The reasons could be two fold, one is insufficient motivation to report or an acceptance that probably no improvement action will happen. This can be circumvented by highlighting and rewarding and highlighting staff who contribute to Safety ,contribution to safety could form a part of annual appraisals. Most importantly it has to be very clearly demonstrated that visible action is taken whenever something is reported. If a staff informs that something is wrong, the staff has to be informed of the action taken along with a note of thanks. That way they will feel that they are part of the process.

Every Organizations has to ensure that commercial constraints never take precedence over Safety In all circumstances only Safety should be the primary driving factor. Even if we take a purely capitalist viewpoint, the risks of an incident/accident by circumventing Safety criteria will have far more effect on finance than any delay or cancellation could ever have. Prioritization of commercial issues over Safety is a tinderbox just waiting to explode with ramifications that outweigh any justification for compromising on Safety.

Next, we have to understand that Human Factors is not something that is a module meant to be passed or part of continuation training. If we don't value human factors and push humans beyond their limits, we may manage things in the short term , however it will have consequences in the long term leading to significant reduction in safety margins . There are far too many examples of that in the industry.

Finally, the mantra should be Engage ! Engage ! Engage ! Safety should not be relegated to the domain of Occurrence reports and Newsletters only. Share lessons learnt with everyone. Hold townhalls or frequent discussions with staff on safety related matters. Management , particularly the middle management should use MBO (management by walking around) techniques to get a sense of the overall safety culture and listen to the staff.

I personally believe that even now after so may years when ICAO had first proposed the concepts for SMS in Aviation we still have leaps and bounds to go in terms of implementing the Spirit of Safety in the form of Safety Culture as opposed to just applying the Letter.