SafetyInsights.org

I found this an interesting paper, exploring literature around the effects of hindsight on potential learning. Hindsight bias is also known as “I knew it all along” effect. Straight off the bat, they note that “Almost universally, the nearly 600 papers that have cited Fischhoff’s seminal work in this area have claimed that hindsight is… Continue reading A sensemaking model of hindsight bias

This assessed the contribution of design issues to the occurrence of fatal work-related injuries in Australia. Work-related injury data was sourced from a national coroners’ information system. 210 fatalities over the 2000-02 period were included. A limitation of this dataset is that it was not produced for the purposes of incident prevention (nor did it… Continue reading The Role of Design Issues in Work-Related Fatal Injury in Australia

This 2000 paper explored the role of counterfactual thinking in learning from incidents, and how organisational accountability influences learning. Two studies were used. Study 1 analysed hundreds of aviation near miss narrative events, including 89 with clear codable instances of counterfactual reasoning. Study 2 had 42 students use a flight simulator [* So, of course,… Continue reading The Lessons We (Don’t) Learn: Counterfactual Thinking and Organizational Accountability after a Close Call

Thought this attached guidance on developing checklists may be of interest (Of course, books, journal volumes, and careers revolve around checklist development.) For healthcare checklists, they offer image 1. Based on a previous systematic review of literature – just 7 articles out of 91 mentioned issues with the conception of a checklist. That is, asking… Continue reading Checklist design

This study, across five independent protocols, explored the unintended byproducts of high levels of Psychological Safety (PS). All five protocols included multi-source data at two or more point in time – assessing a mixture of individual, team and organisational performance related to PS. The protocols included: 1. 473 knowledge employees where their in-role performance is… Continue reading The limits of psychological safety: Nonlinear relationships with performance

I just summarised a 2000 paper on the role of counterfactual thinking on learning lessons from near accidents in aviation. Post in the next week or two. As per newer research, upward counterfactuals (imagining better alternative states, e.g. what actions could be taken in future to ensure a better outcome) compared to downward counterfactuals (imagining… Continue reading The ‘price of hierarchy’: how accountability can stymy learning from near accidents

On the back of the new research highlighting potential “backfiring effect” (their words) of very high Psychological Safety (PS) (see link in comments), it’s interesting to look back at Amy’s work about potential boundary effects of PS. In a 2004 paper, Amy discusses several potential ways that PS may not be beneficial to team performance… Continue reading Envisioning a team with ‘excessive psychological safety’

Can you have too much psychological safety? This study hot off the press sought to answer this question. Summary posted soon. Over 5 separate protocols, Eldor et al. found that while moderate levels of psychological safety was associated with better in-role performance (performing standardised tasks, like most of the stuff people do in organisations each… Continue reading The limits of psychological safety

Using 3 studies, this paper, with Adam Grant as co-author, explored the role of feedback seeking and feedback sharing from leaders and workers on promoting Psychological Safety (PS). Providing background: ·        Prior work highlights that when people believe they can take (interpersonal) risks without being punished, they speak up more often, generate more creative and innovative… Continue reading Taking your team behind the curtain: The effects of leader feedback-sharing and feedback-seeking on team psychological safety

This brief overview of constructing an effective rule system may interest you. It’s nothing mind-blowing, nor the latest thinking (it’s from 2003) – whole books, manuals and journal special editions focus on rule creation, but this may interest you nevertheless. One particular research thread that interests me is along the lines of the meta-rules. I… Continue reading Creating rules and rule departure types