Two small things you can do in any role to improve safety
They are small, but they are important
If I can urge you to work on two things in your current role immediately, it would be to write things down and to create processes frequently. It sounds simple but these two habits are overlooked more often than you’d think, especially in startup environments.
Write things down
Please, please write down decisions and reasoning for decisions. No matter how logical a choice seems or how much time it takes to get to a decision, get into the habit of writing whats and whys down frequently. Whether you capture meeting notes, write quick email summaries or write full reports; anything is better than nothing. These notes and documents often form an organic design document that helps rationalize certain choices and directions and can only help you, your project and your company.
Here are a few examples:
A decision is made for a system design to go with option B rather than option A, based on a test or observation that makes option A less functional. Two years down the line, when the system needs to be improved or replaced, option A can be reconsidered as the primary proposal but without the first design decision documentation on the original decision (or the original test/ observation), option A would be selected. Selecting A due to incomplete information will likely cause problems in the system later on.
A HARA is created for a project and a few years later the safety engineer who created it leaves the company. Later, when a customer or regulator asks if a certain hazard has been considered, it is found that the HARA does not cover that particular hazard. Without an Item Definition document or other defined scope, the hazards of the completed HARA could be considered incomplete. In reality, a scope document might highlight why certain operational areas or functions are rightfully not considered in this HARA. The customer is concerned about something that has been mitigated in a different way, but no one can tell them this due to lack of documentation.
Create processes
For time-sensitive projects it often appears easier to just do something one time, and tell yourself that a process is not needed. In reality, capturing important things you do even once in a process can be essential for safety culture and safe design. Setting a framework for how something is (supposed to be) done and who should be informed or should be reviewing the work can help the rigor of your actual product as well as improve the credibility of your company. The more visible or impactful the work or decision is, the more important a process becomes.
Let’s look at some examples:
There is a system issue that needs fixing, and there are multiple ways of solving the problem. A meeting is organized to talk through the options with key stakeholders and to make a decision for the solution. The meeting happens, good arguments are brought to the table, and a decision is made. Now, in addition to writing down your meeting notes and outcome, you use these events as a template for a design change process. Once rolled out, all key stakeholders would always be part of design changes which improves the quality of the solution and reduces errors stemming from mismatched systems.
A series of tests is completed and a manager asks for a quick approval to get the updated software flashed on the robots. Luckily, the engineer in charge is able to highlight the existence of a sign-off process that is applicable to the situation, ensuring that key aspects of the system and the tests are carefully reviewed by specialists before approval is granted. This process protects the integrity of the product and of the company.
Both documentation and process creation take a little time to implement on every project you do, and first iterations of this work can be imperfect or even incorrect. When you notice issues, you can improve the processes (and make that into a process!), and share learnings with your team. Ideally, these small efforts grow into a full-blown safety management system and safety case in time. But if your company is not ready for that yet, incorporating these two tasks will make a large impact on the safety and quality of your project and your company.