The Development and Testing of SAfER

Abstract

Major industrial accidents still occur. Recent research suggests that to improve industrial safety we must design work systems that better support operators as they seek to control unexpected and unprecedented situations. A novel human factors technique called SAfER—Strategies Analysis for Enhancing Resilience—has been developed to help practitioners identify the range of strategies that human operators might use to manage expected, unexpected, and unprecedented situations. SAfER also helps practitioners identify design changes that should promote the selection of successful control strategies, as well as design changes that should prevent or tolerate the selection of any potential unsuccessful control strategies. Tests revealed that participants found SAfER to be a useful method capable of helping them identify novel insights and identify design changes that could help operators as they control systems across different operating situations. In future work, the usability of the SAfER method and software will be improved, and they will be tested in further industrial contexts.