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

How SMS Affects Companies’ Finances

While the safety benefits are often stressed far more than the financial benefits of aviation safety management systems (SMS), this is a mistake.

First Thing to Prepare for Aviation SMS Audits

Audits can be extremely stressful. Especially if things haven't been going well in your aviation safety management system (SMS) in terms of performance or implementation progress.

At this point, there's only one thing that you need to do before anything else:

Difference Between Risk and Risk Event

Last year we released a Hazard and Risk Competency Quiz, which deals a lot with the concept of Risk Events. Overall the assessment – which was purposefully very difficult – was very successful.

Success in Aviation Risk Management?

Aviation is inherently risky, but effective risk management within a Safety Management System (SMS) transforms those risks into opportunities for safety and compliance.

Safety Risk Management Process

If there’s one takeaway for new professionals in aviation safety management, it’s that aviation risk management is a process. It is not a single, solid “thing.”

This process is cyclical and can be identified by several stages that form a systematic approach to safety risk management, including:

What Is Aviation Safety Culture

By definition, aviation safety culture is an organization’s commitment to safety. I tend to find this definition limiting.

Perhaps a better way to understand safety culture is the means of realizing safety success, in which commitment is just one part.

What Is Documentation in Aviation SMS?

In November 2006, the International Civil Aviation Authority (ICAO) mandated that all member states implement formal aviation safety management systems (SMS).

Aviation SMS Implementations Take Years to Fully Mature

Safety managers are fresh, fully motivated when starting their aviation SMS implementations.

SMS Implementations are marathons, not sprints. Initially, you will be able to have many short bursts to get you out of the starting gate.

Management Distancing Themselves From Aviation SMS

A common misperception in the aviation industry regarding safety management is that it is primarily a responsibility of the safety manager to work on all safety related matters.

Benefits of Integrating QMS and SMS

Historically, quality management systems (QMS) and safety management systems (SMS) have been implemented and managed as two entirely separate entities.