SMS Pro Aviation Safety Software Blog 4 Airlines & Airports

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.

Some Human Factors can pose significant risks but generally appear as symptoms of Human Factors that are more fundamental to human action. In this sense, Human Factors are layered.

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 and 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.

Myths plague aviation SMS implementation – we’ve all been guilty at one time or another of clinging to false beliefs. It’s part of the learning curve.

Human Factors Training and Dirty Dozen Posters

How did it all begin? Today, I want to discuss with you just how Human Factors training and the Dirty Dozen posters came to be.

My father, Gordon Dupont, is known as the founder of the Dirty Dozen and the following is how it all began.

What Is Complacency in Human Factors?

What is complacency? - It’s the self-satisfaction accompanied by a loss of awareness of the dangers.

Two very experienced AMTs (one with 22 years and the other with 33 years of experience) missed 140 cracks during a 100-hourly inspection. This resulted in one fatality and 95 people experiencing a very close call when 18 ft of fuselage went missing during a flight.

The whole world screamed, how could this possibly happen? How could these 2 men miss that many cracks?

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.

Because let’s face it, “compliant safety" is not a one-size-fits-all approach, and yet prescriptive safety remains an endemic problem in the aviation industry.

Many of you reading this probably know what I’m talking about whenever you feel an SMS inspector is evaluating your organization either unjustly or too harshly in an SMS audit.

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.

That aside, I think transparency in aviation safety management systems (SMS) needs to be looked at not as the "end all be all" pinnacle of an aviation SMS,

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. Judging by the large volume of users who read blog articles about this – perhaps such as yourself – our feelings and observations are spot on.

Resistance to aviation SMS is usually more common in newer, immature SMS, and the level of resistance is a strong indicator of how healthy an SMS is.

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". These forward-thinking operators realize how corporate culture kills aviation safety culture.

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

• safety values,
• outcomes, and
• interventions.