Introducing new rules and procedures is not always the best way to prevent accidents, fires or other crises in operations. On the contrary, the critical success factor in an emergency is the ability of people to act and take initiative. Researchers at RISE are exploring and emphasising the human aspect involved in safety management.
Today’s workplace safety management focuses largely on different technical solutions for preventing incidents such as fires and accidents. Helene Degerman, who researches social safety at RISE, believes that this approach is somewhat outdated and emerged during industrialisation a hundred years ago. Instead, she wants to highlight system-oriented safety management, which employs a much more complex approach to safety.
– Solely focusing on the technical aspects of safety management – which is the norm today – poses problems. “If a business builds a barrier to protect against known hazards, the business becomes less mobile and flexible in dealing with unforeseen situations,” says Degerman. “Rules and procedures are established in such abundance that they become impossible to oversee.”
Focus on people
System-oriented safety management primarily involves understanding complex systems, and does not draw a dividing line between the technology and those who use it. Instead of seeing people’s actions as a threat to the systems that are built, one should see people as a success factor able to solve many problems. It also has to do with cultivating an understanding for the challenges in the actual work, instead of devising procedures that are not rooted in operations. According to this approach, standard solutions do not exist. It is rather flexibility and the ability to adapt to unexpected incidents that are key to success.
In the event of a crisis, you must have the option of breaking the established rules
Professionalism and creativity
In many cases, it is the professional skills and creativity of the staff that come to the rescue in emergency situations.
– “A good example of this occurred during the refugee crisis in 2015, where Swedish Migration Agency housing personnel had to deal with situations such as a queue of 250 children seeking shelter for the night. The emergency situation was resolved by personnel disregarding the usual procedures in order to achieve the ultimate goal of organising food and beds for everyone.”
Disregarding rules and procedures is not always easy to do, especially within the public sector, which is strictly regulated and must take legal certainty and legislation into account. To be able to achieve more system-oriented safety management, it is important to trust in the professionalism and judgement of employees. According to Degerman, there should be more focus on generating creativity and flexibility than on introducing new procedures:
– “In the event of a crisis, you must have the option of breaking the established rules. It’s important to discuss this in day-to-day business. A lot can also be learned from how staff handled and changed their way of working in an unforeseen crisis.”
Another important aspect as relates to this new way of thinking about safety involves visiting the actual environment and experimenting to see what works. And those working in operations must have interpretive privileges when safety procedures are formulated.
Degerman describes an investigation within a project into fire safety procedures at a hospital intensive care unit. According to the procedure, beds accommodating seriously ill patients were to be pushed to another section in the event of fire. When the project participants tried to do this in reality, it turned out that the doors were too narrow for the beds.
User perspective is central
Industry fires can present serious challenges with severe consequences for both life and property. Fire safety work is still heavily focused on materials, technology and evacuation. Things that actually worked well in situations where a fire was dealt with are seldom examined. The SEBRA project, funded by BrandForsk, studied the prerequisites for functional fire protection from a system perspective. Among other things, the project examined how production and staff interacted with fire protection solutions during the workday and how fire protection affected fire safety. It was also apparent here that an important success factor proved to be the professional skills and ability of staff to take action. To ensure that you do not place yourself in danger in the event of a machine fire, it is imperative to understand the role of the machine in the industrial process. In many cases, the knowledge of staff has ensured that mistakes were avoided by emergency personnel, such as using the incorrect extinguishing agent.
Moreover, it is not guaranteed that people will automatically act according to the established safety rules in times of emergency.
– “The procedures presuppose that everyone will have evacuated before it starts burning, but, in reality, personnel often stay behind to try extinguish the fire. People are an underutilised safety resource, but there is a legislative vacuum regarding this. There is a risk of problems arising if someone is injured,” says Degerman.
