A conceptual framework and practical guide for assessing fitness-to-operate in the offshore oil and gas industry

Abstract

The paper outlines a systemic approach to understanding and assessing safety capability in the offshore oil and gas industry. We present a conceptual framework and assessment guide for understanding fitness-to-operate (FTO) that builds a more comprehensive picture of safety capability for regulators and operators of offshore facilities. The FTO framework defines three enabling capitals that create safety capability: organizational capital, social capital, and human capital. For each type of capital we identify more specific dimensions based on current theories of safety, management, and organizational processes. The assessment guide matches specific characteristics to each element of the framework to support assessment of safety capability. The content and scope of the FTO framework enable a more comprehensive coverage of factors that influence short-term and long-term safety outcomes.

Proactivity towards workplace safety improvement: an investigation of its motivational drivers and organizational outcomes

“…Generally, a future orientation enables individuals to adopt more proactive strategies for goal achievement (Strauss, Griffin, & Parker, 2012). In the context of occupational safety, a future orientation directs attention to potential risk (Griffin, Hodkiewicz, Dunster, Kanse, Parkes, Finnerty, Cordery, & Unsworth, 2014), mobilizes resources to adapt to future possibilities (Hollnagel, 2014), and motivates a more flexible approach toward safety-related threats beyond simply following established plans and courses of actions (Weick & Suitcliffe, 2007). In this perspective -the earlier concept-, an improvement orientation refers to individuals' beliefs about the principle of engaging in safety improvement activities.…”

“…Continuous improvement of procedures and work conditions is part of a safety-oriented learning culture (Guldenmund, 2010;Reason, 2008), and motivates individuals to detect, contain, and bounce back from errors and, finally, to develop more adaptive strategies and approaches to cope with existing safety problems and potential work issues with implications for safety in the future (Goodman, Ramanujam, Carroll, Edmondson, Hofmann, & Sutcliffe, 2011;Griffin et al, 2014;Hollnagel, 2014;Weick & Sutcliffe, 2007).…”

Proactive role-orientation toward workplace safety: Psychological dimensions, nomological network and external validity

“…Within this framework, the conceptualization of proactive role orientation toward safety management has emerged as a broad set of psychological and motivational orientations by individuals and teams in preventing accidents, managing safety-related issues in the day-by-day individual and teamwork activities and improving workplace safety conditions (Curcuruto & Griffin, in press;Hofmann, Morgerson, & Gerras, 2003;Turner, Chmiel, & Wall, 2005;Weick & Sutcliffe, 2007). The importance of the construct and its related phenomena have been highlighted by both researchers and practitioners, considering different perspectives of analysis in organizational and industrial settings: the impossibility to predict all the risk factors and threats for health and safety (Peirò, 2008;Vogus, Sutcliffe, & Weick, 2010); organizational learning and improvement (Curcuruto, Guglielmi, & Mariani, 2014); development of human resources capability (Griffin, Hodkiewicz, Dunster, Kanse, Parkes, Finnerty, Cordery, & Unsworth, 2014); sustainability of the work experience over time (Clarke, 2010;Hofmann & Tetrick, 2003).…”

Safety Climate in Organizations

“…Without an adequate framework, important aspects of innovation and changes safety related might not be effectively integrated with existing safety climate models. Moreover, it has been recently argued that the process of proactively changing core safety systems is not well articulated in current approaches to safety management (Griffin, Hodkiewicz, Dunster, Kanse, Parkes, Finnerty, Cordery, & Unsworth, 2014).…”