The ICAO Safety Management Manual (ICAO Document 9859) stipulates that individual CAAs are required to formulate a State Safety Program (SSP) which is an integrated set of regulations and activities aimed at improving safety.
An effective safety management system uses risk and quality management methods to achieve its safety objectives and is a systematic approach to managing safety, including the necessary organisational structures, accountabilities, policies and procedures. In addition, SMS also provides the organisational framework to establish and foster the development of a positive, corporate safety culture. The implementation of an SMS gives the organisation’s management a structured set of tools to meet their responsibilities for safety as defined by their regulator.
The ICAO Safety Management Manual (ICAO Document 9859) stipulates that individual CAAs are required to formulate a State Safety Program (SSP) which is an integrated set of regulations and activities aimed at improving safety. All service providers within the aviation industry are required to establish their own Safety Management Systems (SMS).
The SMS is an enterprise-wide undertaking and should be considered as part of the normal business processes. It is established using four main components:
Risk is probably the most important management process to understand. All airline organisations must accept that they are exposed to risk but what is important is the recognition of those risks and then how they are controlled to an acceptable (tolerable) level. Of course, unless there exists a healthy and robust reporting culture, management will be unaware of the many hazards that may be present in their operation. The reporting culture will make or break the SMS.
A Vistair Insight
This Vistair Insight provides an essential guide to aviation safety management systems that will help to outline guide key areas of ICAO’s safety guidelines, the benefits of a proactive safety culture and its role in enhancing an organisation’s safety management.
Over the past 70 years, our approach to safety management has changed. Back in the early 50s, safety was concerned primarily with the investigation of accidents; a very reactive process. Eventually, there was the recognition that humans and human performance were a significant contributor to aircraft accidents; to this day, human factors influence some 80% of events.
Other factors influence the human condition such as the effects of organisational policy (cost cutting, fatigue inducing roster patterns etc.). Furthermore, the general company culture could result in adverse human performance especially those with a “why fix it if it is not broken” attitude. An airline must embrace and promote an enterprise-wide safety culture.
Modern safety systems will assess all potential root causes of an incident including a thorough drill upwards through the company to determine if there are other organisational or cultural factors at play. Clearly, management have to conduct a careful balancing act between protection and commercial production as shown in the diagram below (Source: James Reason). To much focus on protection can limit the operation to the point of bankruptcy, whereas overstretching limited resources to achieve high levels of production can cause mistakes and errors which may lead to serious incidents. By carefully balancing financial and safety management, managers can confine their operation within the "Safety Space".
In order to allow management to make defensible and correct safety-based decisions, they need to be presented with appropriate information to determine the risk landscape to which their organisation is exposed. This can only be achieved by the establishment of a robust reporting culture in which employees are fully engaged in the management of safety.
Since its first publication in 2013, ICAO Annex 19 requires all States to establish a State Safety Program which, in turn, suggests that all service providers within the airline industry must formulate their own safety management system (SMS) that not only encapsulates the requirements above but also includes the definition of a ‘Company Safety Policy’ and the active promotion of safety throughout the business.
The four required processes are Safety Risk Management, Safety Assurance, Safety Promotion and Safety Policy. All of these components in the SMS are underpinned by “Management Commitment” which is a fundamental requirement to establish a robust SMS within the business. The SMS will underperform if the management team fail to engage their workforce and encourage a healthy and robust reporting culture.
A good organisational culture is often the prime catalyst for the effectiveness of a safety management system and indeed, SMS implementation. An effective safety management system can only be achieved by the establishment of a good reporting culture, and this can only be delivered if an airline has an enterprise-wide approach to safety and a positive, supportive human resource management structure.
The effectiveness of an airline’s safety management system (SMS) is often measured by the number of reports it receives, therefore, providing an environment and the right technology that encourages voluntary reporting is a critical dynamic in a fully functioning SMS.
The problem some airlines face is how to develop such an approach when voluntary reporting has traditionally been low. Although a difficult thing to achieve, it is possible with appropriate management commitment and communication; and it is acknowledged that the safest airlines in the world have a higher than average level of voluntary reports. One thing in common to all of these airlines is that Safety is taken seriously at an enterprise-wide level.
There are three main areas that can have a material effect upon a good reporting culture:
In general a failure to understand or address the culture element within an organisation, will mean that the safety management system will not perform as intended. As a consequence, the number of reports will be low, the level of hazard identification poor and the risk of incidents much higher. This in turn can have a dramatic effect upon the commercial effectiveness of the organisation, the ability to allocate limited resources effectively to reduce areas of potential safety and, at a corporate level, an impact upon the balance sheet. Culture is at the heart of an effective, efficient and commercially successful business.
Further reading:
How to improve your safety management system by maintaining a good reporting culture
Why apply the ASAP Approach to your airline’s safety management
The SMS culture dilemma: safety management systems need the right people with the right mindset
How to encourage voluntary reporting to support a safet management system
Safety Performance Management is a key requirement for a functioning SMS. Implemented properly, it will give management an indication of how the business and its processes are performing in terms of meeting its safety objectives. Furthermore, the safety information provided will enable management to make informed and robust, data driven decisions. This is achieved through the identification and monitoring of SPIs that are (ideally) linked to the organisation’s safety objectives.
The diagram below (From ICAO document 9859) shows how safety performance management fits within the overall SMS of an organisation.
In order to achieve effective safety performance management (SPM), safety data has to be gathered, sorted, stored and recovered via the Safety Data Collection and Processing System (SDCPS). ICAO Annex 19 requires all service providers to develop and maintain an effective method for the collection, recording and formulation of actions for hazards in their operation.
This data is turned into useful safety information by completing various processing and analysis tasks, part of which is the recovery of useful information to determine whether or not the various SPIs are on track to meet their respective targets.
Clearly, each organisation will have differing requirements and priorities when it comes to safety data collection. Identifying and collecting the safety data should be aligned with the organisation’s need to manage safety effectively. In some cases, the SPM process will highlight the need for additional safety data to better assess the impact of a reported hazard and determine the associated risks.
Of importance for an SMS the collected safety data should be of a high quality and, ideally, in a format that allows for the easy dissemination to national authorities (for example the E5X format for ECCAIRS in EASA).
Equally it is essential that the hosted database is cyber secure, managed appropriately by a skilled IT services function and follows distinct principles around confidentiality, integrity and availability.
Further reading:
How-aviation-safety-management-software-helps-reduce-safety-incidents
How-automated-safety-alerting-can-support-your-aviation-safety-management-system
How-safety-performance-indicators-help-airlines-improve-their-safety-management-system
A practical example of a safety management objective and its associated SPI and SPTs
The effect of practical drift on safety management in aviation
The importance of selecting the right SMS software or software supplier should not be underestimated. Both the right supplier and software can enhance and support the entire approach to safety management whereas incorrect selection can severely disrupt and tarnish the safety objectives of an organisation.
There are a huge number of software suppliers in the SMS market and they all want your business. The internet is full of very glossy looking web pages and many of them claim to offer the “answer to a maiden’s prayer” in the form of a fully integrated suite of products that will not only provide a full SMS but also allow you to become almost predictive. Where do you start?
The most obvious place to begin your investigation is to decide on a suitable reporting package that is backed up by a robust and secure safety database.
In addition, it is worth at the outset, understanding the heritage of the supplier. An aviation-focused supplier is better able to not only understand the aviation environment but can usefully provide benchmarking information and networking between your airline and their other clients.
Safety management software should include the following:
From a usability perspective there are a number of salient features that merit consideration, here are just a few:
A saying often quoted is that the airline industry is data rich but information poor. This is often because information gathered by the reporting system is then stored in an inefficient or poorly constructed database.
Failure to ensure that this aspect of data management is efficient will result in a number of unintended consequences including:
The selection of a partner that understands the issues faced by aviation organisations in today's busy and dynamic commercial environment is a prerequisite for any business that is focused upon the safety of its operation.
Selecting safety management software that is right for your airline need not be a burden. The advice we have provided on this page and in the free eBooks should give you the information you need to source a software solution that enhances your safety culture.
In short, a good software application should be able to improve the way you organise and review data, report and investigate incidents and, finally, support safety promotion.
A good safety management software system must be effective at providing a much-improved reporting culture as a result of its easy to use and accessible interface. Additionally, it must facilitate the analysis of reports to identify trends and prevent future incidents – transforming your airline into a more predictive organisation.
SafetyNet is a robust safety management reporting system and investigation solution that has been designed specifically to facilitate the submission of safety-related reports in a consistent and cohesive fashion. The application has been designed by taking input from some of the UK's leading airlines to address issues identified in their operations.
By incorporating a set of feature-rich workflows, SafetyNet will meet the reporting needs of all organisations from the very small to the very large and complex.
It is an enterprise-wide system that can be compartmentalised for each department and user-access rights are controlled by use of Vistair’s UserNet application.
Once submitted, the report is assessed and can either be closed on receipt or forwarded for investigation. In either case, the reporter is informed by automatic email. Results of any investigation are also sent to reporters so that they can observe any subsequent management actions.
Resultant safety recommendations can be tracked in a separate workflow which allows the initial report to be closed. This helps to avoid a large build-up of dormant reports pending the implementation of safety recommendations.
Included in the workflow is an automatic distribution engine (ADE). This is a powerful feature that can be programmed by administrators of the system. ADE can, for example, automatically distribute high risk reports immediately to selected managers so that any remedial actions can be implemented with minimal delay. The aim with a correctly developed ADE process is to avoid overwhelming the Safety Office.
For reporters, SafetyNet includes a number of useful features that eases report completion. This includes the use of:
As well as providing an intuitive user interface, SafetyNet also incorporates some excellent features to smooth the administration and analysis of submitted reports:
In summary, SafetyNet is an intuitive and feature-rich application that has been designed specifically for the aviation sector based on feedback from the industry. Combining multi-platform utility in a cloud format with the ability to automate report distribution to internal and external parties, SafetyNet will support an increased reporting culture throughout your organisation.
A key requirement for any functioning SMS is the establishment of a continual process of hazard reporting and risk control. Unless the safety management team are provided with regular hazard reports from the front line of the operation, it is highly likely that they will fail to understand and appreciate the true nature of the risk profile faced by their organisation.
Provision of an easy to use reporting system that is readily available and accepted by the workforce will help to improve the submission of voluntary reports.
The following list summarises the benefits provided by SafetyNet:
A versatile and feature-rich application, SafetyNet will enhance the reporting culture in your organisation whilst also providing a compliant, important component of your SMS.
Further reading:
Vistair is an aviation focused provider of world-class aviation technology currently working with over 30 airlines across the world. Our SMS solution is currently deployed in a number of leading airline organisations including Delta Air Lines, DHL, easyJet, Norwegian, TAG Aviation and the Military Aviation Authority.
easyJet saw a 60% increase in incident reporting by implementing SafetyNet
Developing a system that is intuitive, simple and quick enough to use...is where the challenge lies
Read our frequently asked questions below to find out more about safety management and SafetyNet
The ICAO Safety Management Manual (ICAO Document 9859) stipulates that individual CAAs are required to formulate a State Safety Program (SSP) which is an integrated set of regulations and activities aimed at improving safety.
Discover how SafetyNet is able to support the management, publishing, distribution and viewing of all mission-critical documents. If your airline wants to improve its document management system, and improve both safety and compliance, then request a demo with our experts to learn more.