SMS Pro Aviation Safety Software Blog 4 Airlines & Airports

Why Is Teamwork Important?

Teamwork is a word used often in the workplace. We’ve all heard that it’s important to work together. Why cover the same ground again?

Lack of teamwork can have serious safety consequences. In aviation, our jobs affect others. Even when we seem to be working on our own, our work ties into other parts of the operation.

Safety is part of being a good teammate and teamwork plays a key role in safety. As such, we all take on responsibility for being good teammates and keeping each other safe.

Safety Management Systems Bore Most Employees

Unlike those who study and create safety management systems (SMS), to the average employee these programs can be boring.

It’s not that the average employees don’t value safety, it’s just that they need to see how these programs are beneficial to them personally.

So how can we change our safety culture and encourage participation in aviation safety management systems? Below are six ideas on how to get people involved:

Understanding What Aviation Safety Culture Is

“Safety culture” is a phrase that gets thrown around a lot in aviation safety management systems (SMS) as a vague reference to different aspects of safety.

Understanding the meaning of aviation safety culture is less a practice in philosophy as it is recognition of what it looks like in actual practice for:

• Safety management’s responsibility;
• Employees’ responsibilities;

Certification vs. Qualification

Last year my wife went to the dentist to have a filling put into one of her teeth. She had severe pain for several days, went back to the dentist, and found out that he had put the filling in backward. He replaced it with a new filling but the next day it fell out of her tooth.

We chose a different dentist this time around.

Definition of Safety Culture in Aviation Risk Management

Safety culture in aviation safety management systems (SMS) is usually defined as being the safety attitudes, beliefs, behaviors, and values of employees in an organization. Unfortunately, such a high-level, conceptual definition of safety culture does not help safety manager address core personnel challenges in your organization's SMS.

In much of the SMS guidance material pushed out by regulatory agencies and standards-setting bodies, such as ICAO's document 9859 Safety Management Manual,

Aviation SMS Require Regular Safety Communications

Routine work may dull your alertness.

Careless or inattentive attitudes may soon replace the caution that existed when your job was new and interesting.

Without some periodic reawakening to the ever-present hazards in the aviation environment, lethargy deepens, and chances of accidents occurring increase without us even being aware of the risk.

Risk Attitude Is the Informal 13^th Human Factor

When analyzing the types of actions and behavior to address during implementing an aviation safety management system (SMS), you have to consider the risk management attitudes of:

• individuals,
• groups (e.g., departments),
• managers, and
• the organization as a whole.

Safety Promotion Places Safety Into Our Conscious Zone

An aviation safety management system (SMS) can encompass many different elements but has one overarching goal: improve aviation safety.

The best way to achieve that goal depends on what kind of SMS you participate in. Not all SMS implementations are equal. Some operators merely want to check the box. Others may have a distrustful attitude toward management. Consequently, the type of SMS implementation, as well as the "potential" effectiveness of the SMS will be dependent on:

Building on Basic Human Factors Training

Lack of preparedness is a serious concern for aviation safety.

Uninformed actions can quickly result in devastating safety and financial consequences.

Considering human action accounts for approximately 90% of incidents, preparedness in aviation safety is a matter of preparing humans to identify and understand their own actions.

Why Managers Struggle With Safety Promotion

Safety Promotion is definitely the least appreciated of the 4 Pillars of SMS.

Almost without fail, promoting safety takes the “back seat” in most aviation safety programs because civil aviation authorities and auditors are significantly more interested in seeing that you comply with:

• Safety Policy,
• Safety Risk Management, and
• Safety Assurance.