Fundamentals of Human Factors and Error Management for Safety Critical Industries

About the Course

“A ship in harbour is safe, but that is not what ships are built for.” – William G.T. Shedd

Regardless of industry type or sector, accident statistics appear to be dominated by the contribution of human error. This is hardly surprising since humans are involved in the design, construction, maintenance, operation and management of complex socio-technical systems across any safety critical industry such as transport, mining, construction, oil and gas, power and water utilities, essential and emergency services and healthcare service delivery.

While human error is a normal part of our human makeup, the consequences of errors in any industry can be disastrous and the subject of public outrage, exhaustive inquiries and drawn out legal action. The cost of human error in the workplace is also considerable:

• BP estimated that the Deepwater Horizon oil spill resulted in costs that exceeded USD $40 billion.
• According to the International Air Transport Association (IATA), airports have estimated that ramp accidents cost over USD $10 billion each year.
• The Flight Safety Foundation reports that over 38,000 commercial aircraft land in an unstable condition every year, causing potential maintenance and inspection delays.
• In healthcare the direct medical costs of preventable clinical incidents arising from human error, have been estimated at $2 billion each year in Australia.

This 7-week Fundamentals of Human Factors and Error Management for Safety Critical Industries program will provide participants with a good understanding of the key factors that influence human error and practical strategies for making systems more error tolerant. Upon completion of this human factors and error management training program, participants have the option of completing a further 4 weeks for the Advanced Human Factors and Error Management for Safety Critical Industries program.

Several practical case studies presented throughout this human factors online course will reinforce generic human factors issues and management solutions across various industries. A comprehensive suite of practical tools, templates and resources are provided to take back and apply in your own workplace.

Who Will Benefit

This human factors and error management training program is designed for those individuals seeking a comprehensive understanding of applied human factors in any workplace. Expected participants include:

• Operations and Engineering Senior Managers
• Team Leaders and Supervisors
• Human Resource Managers
• HSE and WHS Managers, Investigators and Auditors
• Industry and WHS Regulators
• Quality, risk, compliance and assurance managers

Key Learning Objectives

Upon completion of this course, you will be able to:

• Understand the evolution of human factors, its current scope and how it may contribute to addressing future safety challenges
• Understand human error within the context of significant rail safety incident investigations
• Incorporate practical proactive error management strategies
• Address human performance limitations that impact effective decision-making and increase the probability of error occurrence
• Identify social and group influences that shape human performance
• Adopt a systematic human factors analysis method for incident investigations to better identify errors and error producing conditions

Course Information

Instructional Delivery Method: Scheduled Digital
Prerequisite & Advanced Preparation: Reading material will be sent prior to the course

Delivered by Dr Graham Edkins

Organisational Psychologist Dr Graham Edkins is considered one of Australia’s leading Safety Management and Human Factors experts and is regularly retained as an independent safety investigator and human factors expert witness for various civil and criminal matters.

Run this course in-house

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