Building an Occurrence Reporting Culture in an EASA Maintenance Environment

Whilst we all recognise the importance of safety in particular within “our” Maintenance Environment we face as an industry the problem of (Some say) Chronic under reporting of safety incidents.  Please consider when was the last time YOU filed a safety internal report?

What is the reason?

Is it the fear of reprisals or is it a case of fundamental disconnection from the responsibility to accept a personal obligation to report?

Whatever the reason the reality is that there is without doubt insufficient occurrence reporting, which results in “open” not closed loops ineffective closure and a reduced ability to deliver proactive safety improvements. (If at all !)

EASA has introduced a new EU Occurrence Reporting Regulation which is one key step in this direction as it sets a new framework to encourage and protect safety reporting by aviation professionals.

The Regulation (EU Reg. 376/2014 became applicable as of 15 Nov 2015, and requires aviation organisations in the EU to both adopt and maintain a proactive Just Culture to facilitate the collection of key safety data and information and to protect the reports as well as the information.

Easier said than done you may comment?

Well in fact the new regulation creates two complementary reporting flows say mandatory & Voluntary.

Through the mandatory reporting system, all occurrences, which may represent a significant hazard to aviation safety and fall into well-defined categories, must be reported.

If an event is not in the mandatory occurrence reporting list, but you do consider it might have safety implications, it can be reported voluntarily through a dedicated and separate system.

As a rule of thumb – report every time, when in doubt.

Organisation Responsibilities

Internal company rules need to be developed to implement a Just Culture Environment:

Just Culture-related provisions constitute a central element of the new reporting system.

What is  ‘Just Culture’ – What does it entail?

‘Just Culture’ means creating an environment in which an employee feels confident to be able to speak up and raise a concern.

A genuine mistake, or error is potentially valuable information that should be shared with the rest of the industry to drive changes in aviation safety.

But to share this information, aviation workers need to trust the organisation to be confident that there contribution is valued and that they will not be ultimately disciplined for doing so.

Just culture is often mistakenly referred to as a “no blame culture”, which is very different from immunity, as gross negligence and wilful misconduct are not tolerated.

What EASA Says about Just Culture -

“A culture in which frontline operators or others are not punished for actions, omissions or decisions taken by them that are commensurate with their experience and training, but where gross negligence, wilful violations and destructive acts are not tolerated.”

Sofema Aviation Services www.sassofia.com and SofemaOnline www.sofemaonline.com provide EASA Compliant regulatory and Vocational Training.

Please see the website or contact office@sassofia.com or online@sassofia.com