Strategies for dealing with resistance to recommendations from accident investigations

Abstract

Abstract. Accident investigation reports usually lead to a set of recommendations for change. These recommendations are, however, sometimes resisted for reasons such as various aspects of ethics and power. When accident investigators are aware of this, they use several strategies to overcome the resistance. This paper describes strategies for dealing with four different types of resistance to change. The strategies were derived from qualitative analysis of 25 interviews with Swedish accident investigators from seven application domains. The main contribution of the paper is a better understanding of effective strategies for achieving change associated with accident investigation.

Systemic accident analysis: Examining the gap between research and practice

“…The comments of a number of participants (see Section 3.5.1) reflect the findings of Lundberg et al (2012), who suggest that four aspects of safety culture can influence the decision to implement safety-related changes: institutionalised low safety standards, prioritisation of safety, the decision making criteria to adopt changes and the level of resources allocated to implement them.…”

Resilience in Everyday Operations

“…The study is a continuation of a research project investigating the underlying theoretical models used in accident investigations in high-risk organizations in Sweden (see Lundberg, Rollenhagen, & Hollnagel, 2009;Lundberg, Rollenhagen, Hollnagel, & Rankin, 2012;Rankin, Lundberg, & Woltjer, 2011). In the study, examples of how organizations managed variations kept emerging, prompting more directed studies on this topic.…”

Comparison of different methods for work accidents investigation in hospitals: A Portuguese case study

“…The main objective of the accident investigation consists in the description of the course of events, however, is also essential to understand how the safety system failed and why the accident occurred. It is also important to provide feedback to decision makers about the causes of negative events since most organizations have implemented measures to prevent accidents [9,10].…”