Developing the competency of managers in the field of safety

management 

Aidan Nelson

Director Policy & Standards

International Railway Safety Conference

October 2002

Competence……

• The ability to undertake responsibilities and to perform activities to a recognised standard on a regular basis

• A product of practical and thinking skills, experience and knowledge, which is influenced by personal attributes such as attitudes, beliefs and values

Continuous improvement……

• A person, a team of people or an organisation is competent when they work consistently to an expected level of performance.

• Expected levels of performance change over time

• Competence and a positive safety culture require aligned values, beliefs, attitudes and behaviours

Senior management teams: why?

• Past focus on competence too narrow• Assessment criteria underpinning Railway

Safety Case Regulations (2000)• Due diligence and organisational learning • Evidence of repeating management and

system failures • Ladbroke Grove Inquiry: “Where it is not

already in place, a safety management strategic leadership team should be established in each company in the industry” (part two, recommendation 14)

Research suggestssenior management teams• Are technically competent but lack general

management skills

• Constant change means they have little time for building on experience and preventing repeat mistakes

• Lack formal processes for risk assessment other than financial

• Increasingly need to be able to identify key data to make decisions / measure performance

“Strategic safety management” describes the way a senior team

• Directs how safety is managed within the business

• Sets goals for safety performance

• Sets aside the organisation’s resources to achieve these goals

• Controls safety performance

Aims

• Support improvement in the competence of senior teams to manage safety strategically

• Help senior teams deliver their Railway Safety Case commitments

• Assist the development of a progressive safety culture in individual organisations and the wider industry

• Support continuous improvement in safety performance at all levels in the rail industry

Philosophy

• Safety management is but one aspect of risk management

• Risk is inherent in business processes • Safety performance can be continuously

improved • Cultural issues must not be swept under

the carpet• What are we not doing that we should be?

Good practice guides

• Advisory not mandatory, focus is maintaining and improving safety performance, not compliance

• Self-assessment processes not external audit

• Can be tailored to meet an organisation’s needs

What’s in the SSM good practice?

• A description of what all senior teams need to be able to do

• A recommended process for self-assessment and improvement

• Guidance and tools

SSM software

• Automates SSM self-assessment process and gives senior teams the ability to….• Assess their competence and performance

from a number of perspectives• Predict team performance given its current

composition and structure• Make a range of useful comparisons

Companies are now using the results to:

• Develop senior team & company performance• Clarify the organisation’s strategic safety

management priorities and identify how best to meet them

• Test if company safety plans are fit for purpose • Decide what the team needs to do and how

individual members can contribute• Review how the team makes & acts on decisions• Identify training & development needs of existing &

prospective senior managers

Developments

• In-company ‘kick start’ briefings • Mentoring programme: confidential and

independently delivered• Closer links with other leadership initiatives• Challenging the “unwritten rules” of railway

safety • Assimilating results to enable 2nd edition

software & 3rd edition of the good practice guides to be released in December 2002

With particular thanks to:

• Competence Assurance Solutions

• Heathrow Express• Railtrack GWZ• GNER• Thameslink• London Lines• AMEC• JacksonEve• DRS

• South Central Trains• First NW• Anglia Railways• Scotrail• SW Trains• Alstom• Eurostar• Carillion• Thales

Want to know more?

www.railwaysafety.org.uk