What do you or your board expect from safety audits?
Have you ever asked this question?
Many audit definitions say something like systematically evaluating activities and artefacts match defined criteria but seem to leave a lot off the table.
In our 2024 study (‘Audit Masquerade’, Safety Science), we reviewed numerous definitions & goals – and proposed 3 consolidated, but not always clearly articulated, functional elements (but there may be more):
1. Checking the activities/artefacts etc. against defined criteria – what is often stated.
2. Checking whether those processes map against reality.
3. Checking the suitability – are those processes fit for purpose and suitable, irrespective of criteria.
Focusing on any one of these will come at the relative expense of the others – and checking defined criteria may not better answer the question of whether those processes are fit for purpose.
For Hopkins (1999), safety audits should assess the adequacy of organisational systems and performance.
We extended this logic, proposing that audits should, at least those targeting critical systems, should reduce the degree of decoupling between the process’ intention vs reality – which aligns more with functional element 3 (suitability).
What are your thoughts?
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