To understand how to work with Risk within our Aviation Safety Management System, what we should do with this “Risk” and who should do it?
To first consider the difference between a Hazard and a Risk. A hazard has the potential to cause harm in some way, whether it is to the person, the system or the business, this does not mean that it will, simply that it has the potential.
When we consider Risk within our Aviation System we should agree what we are relating to and how we are measuring this perceived “Risk”.
We use the term perceived risk because it is a subjective interpretation of the exposure. In fact the more competence we have in determining the risk the more accurate will be our assessments and ultimately the more beneficial to the organisational systems.
A Risk may be considered as the possible consequence of a perceived hazard providing a range of outcomes from negligible to very serious.
There are various factors which lower the risk in any given set or exposures.
In some case it may be that we have latent exposure which are actually unknown within the system possibly even until it becomes a “visible event”.
Effective communication within the organisation will have a positive effect on the identification of Risk and therefore raise awareness which may provide for the opportunity to mitigate the perceived exposure.
Training, Knowledge, Background, Competency, Existence of Strong Process and Procedures which are fully understood, Cultural Behaviour within the Organisation all play a role in limiting the exposure or risk.
Effective process to deal with Change encountered by the organisation will also lower the risk of adverse consequences impacting the organisation.
So the process maybe distilled into the following – gathering hazard and other exposure related data – analysing this data and using organisational tools to determine the degree of exposure – developing proposed mitigations which will serve to lower the exposure – finally to implement the solution with the concurrence of the business area owner.
An essential element then of successfully understanding the risk within our aviation system becomes the ability of the safety practitioner to understand the various inputs, evaluate in the most effective way and produce the most cost effective mitigation consistent with the appropriate level of safety.
Sofema Aviation Services offers an expanding range of Safety Management System (SMS) and Aviation Regulatory Training, for additional details please visit www.sassofia.com or email office@sassofia.com
