Enhancing Aviation Safety: Expert Insights, Tips, and Updates from SMS-Pro

Understanding What Safety Performance in Aviation SMS Is

Safety performance in aviation safety management systems (SMS) can be difficult to fully comprehend because it involves so many moving parts. In general, we understand safety performance as involving the:

• Ability to comply with regulations of oversight agencies;
• Ability to monitor operational safety performance;
• Risk management processes to mitigate risk and monitor risk controls;

Communication Critical to Aviation Safety Managers Role

Aviation safety managers need to give feedback – both praise and criticism – to employees and management regularly. It’s an essential part of their role as a leader in driving the performance of their aviation safety management system (SMS).

Root Human Factors and Symptomatic Human Factors

The Dirty Dozen Human Factors in aviation safety management systems (SMS) are not isolated factors.

They are an interwoven set of human actions that influence each other. And they are not all created equal.

Be Aware of Your Aviation Safety Management Myths

Awareness is a great weapon for overcoming problems in aviation safety management systems (SMS). When aviation safety managers try to implement an aviation SMS while at the same time clinging to myths:

• People get hurt;
• The company loses money; and
• The SMS makes no progress.

Pros and Cons of Prescriptive vs Performance Based SMS

Performance vs prescriptive based approaches to aviation safety management systems (SMS) is and will increasingly be a hot topic in the aviation industry for years to come.

As it should be.

Decentralization of Information

Transparency boils down to a very simple issue: information.

Specifically, control over and access to information. As I have said before, it’s a hot topic these days.

WikiLeaks, Bradley Manning, Sony, the food industry – all are examples of major front-page scandals about access to information.

Overview of SMS History

It’s easy to forget just how young aviation safety management systems (SMS) are as their own defined entity. Aviation SMS has truly changed the aviation landscape, but there will certainly be more change as organizations reduce resistance to the change and continue to internalize and practice the mandated SMS regulations.

A Dependable Problem

We end up writing about resistance to change rather often because we see it often.

Resistance to change is a rather significant problem every aviation safety management system (SMS) implementation deals with.

Transparency Is a Hot Topic

Many of the major news headlines in the last few years have circled issues of transparency. From major corporations to our government, practices of secrecy always come back to bite management in their tender spots.

Aviation organizations that practice transparency tend to send a message of "non-corruption".

Safety Culture Bridges Gap between Promotion and Outcomes

A recent post about four pillars of safety in aviation discussed in part the end goal of aviation safety management systems (SMS). This aviation safety blog post drew a couple of interesting comments regarding the relationship between