This explored whether performance variability is necessary for tree fallers to safely fell trees. 22 fellers were included in the study. Whether you buy in to the resilience perspectives or not, or rightly so challenge the state of evidence, it’s still an interesting discussion around the interactions of expertise, context and formal safety systems. Forestry… Continue reading Is Performance Variability Necessary? A Qualitative Study on Cognitive Resilience in Forestry Work
Making Sense of Ambiguity through Dialogue and Collaborative Action
ABSTRACT This paper outlines the importance of ambiguity in organizations that manage hazardous operations in a rapidly changing environment. Three kinds of ambiguity are described: fundamental ambiguity in categories and labels for understanding what is happening; causal ambiguity for understanding cause–effect relationships that enable explanation, prediction, and intervention; and role ambiguity of agreeing on responsibilities.… Continue reading Making Sense of Ambiguity through Dialogue and Collaborative Action
Mini-post: Fuel and frictions of organisational change
“Gimme fuel, gimme fire, gimme that which I desire” said Metallica. Or maybe if you want to prioritise a performance goal or change initiative, like critical risk observations, incident reporting, learning teams, work insights, pre-task discussions etc, remove the frictions more than adding extra fuel? I love the #hiddenbrain podcast with Shankar Vedantam, and they ran a… Continue reading Mini-post: Fuel and frictions of organisational change
Mini-post: Sleep and suicide: A systematic review and meta-analysis of longitudinal studies
An interesting meta-analysis of the evidence around sleep disturbances and insomnia on the risk of suicidal thoughts and behaviours (STBs). 44 studies met inclusion criteria out of about 1k studies. They found that “sleep disturbance, including insomnia, appears to be prospectively predictive of STBs, with small-to-medium to medium effect sizes for these associations” (p13). Further,… Continue reading Mini-post: Sleep and suicide: A systematic review and meta-analysis of longitudinal studies
The Hierarchy of Controls as an Approach to Visualize the impact of occupational safety and health coordination
This explored the work of HSE coordinators via the hierarchy of control. A field based observational study with 12 HSE coordinators over 107 days was undertaken. In conjunction to categorising the types of improvements identified by HSE coordinators, the study also looked at controls that were recommended by coordinators but were denied. First the authors… Continue reading The Hierarchy of Controls as an Approach to Visualize the impact of occupational safety and health coordination
Health care huddles: Managing complexity to achieve high reliability
ABSTRACT Background: Health care huddles are increasingly employed in a range of formats but theoretical mechanisms underlying huddles remain relatively uncharted. Purpose: A complexity science view implies that essential managerial strategies for high-performing health care organizations include meaningful conversations, enhanced relationships, and a learning culture. These three dimensions informed our approach to studying huddles. We… Continue reading Health care huddles: Managing complexity to achieve high reliability
Capturing challenges and trade-offs in healthcare work using the pressures diagram
This draws on Rasmussen’s dynamic safety model to understand how healthcare workers manage competing priorities. Three questions are explored: 1. ID & categorise the types of pressures faced by healthcare workers 2. Understand what risk trade-off decisions are made in response to pressures 3. Analyse the implications of trade-offs for quality & safety of care… Continue reading Capturing challenges and trade-offs in healthcare work using the pressures diagram
Mini-post: Writing plans instead of eliminating risks: How can written safety artefacts reduce safety?
Happy to share the first published study in my PhD, with co-authors Drew Rae and Sidney Dekker. (Huge thanks to Drew for his guidance and patience.) This theoretical paper outlines the key concepts and ideas that were used for studies 2 (which looked at major accident reports) and 3 (which explored internal audit reports); both… Continue reading Mini-post: Writing plans instead of eliminating risks: How can written safety artefacts reduce safety?
Pointing Fingers: Verbosity of Patient Safety Narratives Is Associated With Attribution of Blame
This explored how the length of the narrative in incident reports is connected to attributions of blame. The authors hypothesised that longer written narratives in reports would lead to higher blame, due to more opportunities for things like opinions, assumptions and accusations [and presumably counterfactual & normative language]. All safety reports related to anaesthesia services… Continue reading Pointing Fingers: Verbosity of Patient Safety Narratives Is Associated With Attribution of Blame
Major accident prevention decision-making: A large-scale survey-based analysis
ABSTRACT Decision-making under risk and uncertainty is not straightforward. This paper investigates how people make decisions when they need to choose between prevention and production investments and the decision involves risks and uncertainties that could have major negative consequences. A questionnaire was conducted among 405 students at the University of Antwerp, in Belgium. With regard… Continue reading Major accident prevention decision-making: A large-scale survey-based analysis
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