Human reliability in petrochemical industry: an action research

Abstract

This paper aims to identify conflicts and gaps between the operators' strategies and actions and the organizational managerial approach for human reliability. In order to achieve these goals, the research approach adopted encompasses literature review, mixing action research methodology and Ergonomic Workplace Analysis in field research. The result suggests that the studied company has a classical and mechanistic point of view focusing on error identification and building barriers through procedures, checklists and other prescription alternatives to improve performance in reliability area. However, it was evident the fundamental role of the worker as an agent of maintenance and construction of system reliability during the action research cycle.

Visual attention of experts and novices to a critical industrial maintenance task

“…In industrial production processes, disparities between prescribed procedures and actual work can lead workers to adopt various strategies to mitigate such gaps in practice, as shown by Silva & Camarotto (2012). Embrey (2000) also found evidence of a wide disparity between the formal prescribed procedures in an organization and how the work is actually performed.…”

“…Embrey (2000) also found evidence of a wide disparity between the formal prescribed procedures in an organization and how the work is actually performed. These gaps may compromise occupational safety because the lack of knowledge sharing and task standardization, as well as cognitive overload, may lead to accidents (Carvalho & Menegon, 2014;French et al, 2011;Ikuma et al, 2014;Le et al, 2014;Silva & Camarotto, 2012). API (2001) indicates the following factors as the main causes of increased likelihood of error in equipment maintenance activities in the chemical and petrochemical industries: insufficient knowledge, poor flagging, layout errors, excessive mental tasks, inadequate tools and ineffective procedures.…”