Lagging and leading indicators for aviation safety management systems (SMS) key performance indicators (KPIs) are often confused or misunderstood.
Even various online sources have conflicting, vague, or incomplete explanations of the difference between lagging and leading indicators.
Topics: Key Performance Indicators
Safety performance in aviation safety management systems (SMS) can be difficult to fully comprehend because it involves so many different moving parts. In general we understand safety performance as involving the:
Topics: 3-Safety Assurance
The management of aviation safety is a shared responsibility among all levels (i.e., stakeholders) of an organization.
Top management has to set the basis for establishing
Middle management is delegated with tasks to ensure the organizational aviation safety management system (SMS) goals and objectives align with senior management's organizational goals . And the actual work behind an aviation SMS' risk management processes happens at the ground level with the behavior of employees. Employees are safety performance monitors, remaining ever vigilant of hazards and reporting potential safety concerns as they are identified.
From the bottom up, every employee has his/her duties to satisfy operational safety performance.
Topics: Risk Management Software
Showing employees that your SMS is effective is simply building your case for the SMS. That being said, there are several prerequisites for being able to show employees that your SMS is effective:
Topics: 4-Safety Promotion
The oil industry, which in terms of safety standards is rather similar to the aviation industry, provides a great example with its statistic that over 50% of all accidents are caused by employees with less than 1 year of experience in their current work environment.
When airlines, airports, and other aviation service providers hire new employees, those employees pose a significant risk so long as they are unfamiliar with their new:
Topics: Risk Management Software
Aviation safety managers and departments heads are tasked with delivering aviation safety management AND safety leadership capabilities.
“Leadership” and “management” are often used interchangeably both in speech and action, but contrary to common practice they are NOT the same thing.
Topics: 4-Safety Promotion
Safety teams and the accountable executive are expected to regularly review the performance of their implemented aviation safety management system (SMS). A regular review of the SMS is important to ensure that any substandard safety performance is addressed in a timely fashion.
Most aviation service providers are storing their SMS data in SMS databases. An SMS database provides the accountable executive with an efficient way to monitor SMS performance in real time. Otherwise, safety data will be in spreadsheets and paper that are not readily accessible to senior management. Consequently, senior management has little assurance that safety issues are being addressed according to policy.
Topics: Risk Management Software
Being honest about mistakes is hard.
It’s even harder to try and seek out mistakes you are making that you do not know you are making.
In aviation safety management systems (SMS), safety managers are tasked with actively exploring, understanding, and seeking out failures in the program in order to improve them. Even unknown failures are holes in the safety structure of the SMS.
In many significant ways, the success of aviation SMS implementations depends on how honestly and thoroughly such failures are addressed.
Topics: 3-Safety Assurance
Aviation safety management systems (SMS) implementation takes a long time to fully mature, usually three to five years if you are lucky.
Once there, your SMS will continually be tweaked and updated, which of course requires further implementation and monitoring.
Long story short, implementing an SMS is a leviathan of a task and needs a thoughtful, detailed plan. Of course, don't forget that persistence pays off, as there may be a few "false starts" that require backpedaling to refocus your efforts.
In addition, your SMS will be impeded by constant challenges, including:
Topics: 1-Safety Policy
Airport SMS programs and Airline SMS programs need use a formal process for ranking various risks. Risk assessments satisfy this need and, based on your Acceptable Level of Safety policy, allow you to know which actions to take next on the issue you are assessing.
Topics: 2-Safety Risk Management
These two on-demand videos offer:
