Aviation Safety Management Systems (SMS): aviation risk management

Showing posts with label aviation risk management. Show all posts

Monday, February 3, 2014

Targeted Closure Date in Airline/Airport Risk Management Software

Automatically receive alerts when reported hazards become overdue should be top feature of your aviation safety management system (SMS) software.

New Feature in Aviation SMS Software

Several airline and airport safety managers have asked about the new visual cue in SMS Pro's risk management module, Issue Manager. This feature was added without a formal announcement because we consider it a minor cosmetic enhancement. Look at the image below to see the far right column.

Far Right Column Indicates Severity and Targeted Closure Date

airline and airport risk management software enhancements

History of Aviation SMS Risk Management Software Enhancement

Since SMS Pro came onto the market in 2008, the far right column indicated the severity of each risk assessed issue. Whenever the targeted closure date was exceeded, an alert bell would appear in the far right column. Hovering over the alert bell, users would be presented with a message, such as:
"Issue Exceeded Targeted Closure Date: 1/15/2014"

SMS Pro Enhancements Often Evolve By Customer Requests

Most know that SMS Pro is considered one of the most flexible aviation SMS software packages for airlines, airports, flight schools and aviation maintenance organizations. New features have been added constantly over the past seven years based on regulatory requirements and customer feedback. Aviation SMS consultants also provide great ideas to ensure SMS Pro remains among the world's leading aviation SMS software suites.

What Does This Aviation SMS Feature Do?

This new enhancement idea came from a European airline. They wanted to be able to see the targeted closure date of issues not overdue without going into each issue. Instead of adding another column to this

web based aviation safety management software for airlines airports aviation maintenance

already crowded screen, SMS Pro developers added an image indicating:

Whether a targeted closure date was set (image is visible); and
The targeted closure date of each issue when hovering over target image.

We think this is a great enhancement because safety managers can easily see whether the targeted closure date was not yet set on issues coming into the system. As always, we appreciate your feedback and ideas to make SMS Pro the best possible.

More information about aviation SMS software can be found at:

How to best help your
Aviation Safety Management System

Become an SMS PRO

About NWDS - founded in 2003 by six software engineers, NorthWest Data Solutions (NWDS) provides custom computer programming and systems design services. NWDS creates many types of software, including e-commerce, financial, defense, engineering, logistics, aviation and more. In 2007, NWDS developed SMS Pro™ a web based SMS application that supports an organization's overall SMS through safety reporting, safety documentation, safety risk management and safety assurance. SMS Pro™ is currently used by aviation organizations in the U.S., Canada, Asia, Latin America, Africa and the Middle East to help manage their SMS programs. NWDS continues to support SMS Pro™ and add new functionality. NWDS offers custom contract programming services in the U.S. and Canada and is managed by Chris Howell, one of the founders. Their headquarters is in Anchorage, Alaska. For information on NWDS visit their website at www.nwds-ak.com and www.asms-pro.com to learn more about SMS Pro™.

Wednesday, January 22, 2014

Aviation Safety Risk Management Database

Risk Management Occurs Within a "System"

Aviation risk management remains the most crucial element of an effective aviation risk management system. Operators manage risk in everyday activities, but we don't focus formal, structured process needed in an ICAO compliant SMS risk management framework.

Aviation providers implementing ICAO compliant SMS programs are recommended to structure risk management strategies according to best practices, which are found in quality aviation risk management database software.

Phases for Managing Aviation-Related Risk

Aviation risk management strategies (or best practices), commonly possess these risk management cycle phases:

Airline and airport risk management best practices

Identify & Report Hazards: Determine whether potential risk exists and report it using formal hazard reporting tools (paper based, Web reporting forms, audits, gap analysis, etc). The SMS Pro™ Web-based hazard reporting form is a customizable solution with automatic email notifications that is recognized as best in class. Other capabilities of SMS Pro's hazard reporting and aviation risk management database software includes:

Customized forms requiring minimal costs to incorporate additional data elements;
Many predefined Web-based hazard reporting forms for flight operations, maintenance, ect. that meet most user needs;
Quick report features for mobile Web users or others who may pressured for time and need to submit a "quick hazard report;"

Assess Risk: Determine severity and probability of risk with a standard, best in class, risk matrix like SMS Pro's Customizable Risk Matrix. Whenever potential risk is minimal (low to medium severity, low likelihood of occurrence), your policies may state that no additional actions is required unless the issue repeatedly occurs. With significant or major risks, which could cause injury or damage to users and equipment, you need to implement reactive risk management processes. Based on reported issue's severity and type of issue, one may also choose to use SMS Pro™ to:

Set targeted closure dates (so issues don't remain open forever);
Inform regulatory authorities or clients (when required by contract), that the issue has occurred.

Classify Risk: The best risk management database software offers simple, flexible, customizable strategies to classify risk. One must understand risks before they can be managed effectively. Consequently, aviation providers adopt risk classification systems or create their own. Many will start with a template and modify the schema as necessary. Classifying risks (or reported issues) allows aviation organizations to identify and control risk, which is a major element of aviation risk management. SMS Pro™ offers the best system that is very comprehensive, yet flexible enough for all types of organziations, such as airports, airlines, FBOs, MROs, and flight schools. SMS Pros risk classification framework helps identify risk which is useful for generating reports to communicate risk.

Corrective/Preventive Action Plan: Control identified risks based on the risk's severity and likelihood of occurrence. Develop various alternatives and perform a cost/benefit analysis when necessary using SMS Pro™. Automatically generate a Corrective Action Plan for audits, whether they are external or internal audits.

Mitigate or Transfer: Put into action the corrective and preventive actions created in the previous phase to mitigate identified risk. Reassess risk after all corrective and preventive actions have been implemented. When risk is not within acceptable risk management levels, return to the previous phase to put further corrective and preventive actions into play. When corrective and preventive actions fail to reduce risk to acceptable levels, continue analyzing the risk to determine actions to bring the identified risk to an acceptable severity level.

Track: After mitigating risks to an acceptable severity level, track these risks' implemented corrective actions to ensure they remain effective and are controlling the risk. As time passes, ensure implemented corrective actions don't increase risks when they were implemented to alleviate the risk.These items remain the core of any best in breed risk management program. They are easily managed using aviation risk management database software.

How to best help your
Aviation Safety Management System

Become an SMS PRO

Tuesday, March 26, 2013

Best Practices for User Induction into Aviation SMS Programs

Best Practices for User Induction Into Airline Airport Safety Management Systems

Aviation SMS training is among the top elements of a successful aviation safety management system. When users lack training in SMS fundamentals, they may believe your SMS program lacks real purpose and credibility. More than once, we have heard operators state that aviation SMS requirements are nothing more than a way for government to interfere with business operations. These same operators believe the aviation industry is already safe, and operators who are not safe will not last. Below are some best practices to observe for users to become inducted into your aviation safety management system. You will also see some exciting changes and planned enhancements the SMS Pro's SMS Induction Manager. See this link for a list of other airport & airline safety modules by SMS Pro™.

Waiting to determine whether an operator has good "safety practices" can have disastrous results. Many lives are at stake in a single mission; not only the ones aboard the aircraft, but also affected family and friends should a fatal aviation accident occur. Everyone in society should have a personal interest in ensuring the aviation safety industry improves its safety record. Since your employees are on the front lines, they have a responsibility to ensuring your stakeholders enjoy the highest degree of safety possible. For this purpose, it is necessary that they both know about and PARTICIPATE in your aviation SMS program.

Web Based Aviation Safety Management SystemsSMS Pro's Web based aviation safety management system is a tool for use by ALL company members, enabling complete measurement, management and reporting of safety, security, quality, compliance and environmental issues. Think outside the box and maximize the potential of your aviation SMS program. Don't focus merely on aviation accidents and incidents. There is a great opportunity to improve customer relations, quality and reduce operating expenses when you use your aviation SMS program to its fullest potential.

By using the SMS Pro™ aviation safety management system, product and service quality, as well as responsibility is promoted. Furthermore, the best Web based aviation safety management systems help team members to recognize relationships between business performance, safety and quality. All personnel within your organization must be trained in SMS fundamentals to ensure ALL your team members recognize these often subtle relationships. This training is a requirement! How you document and prove you have satisfied this regulatory requirement can be done in various ways. SMS Pro's "SMS Induction Manager" module takes advantage of the Web and email notifications to streamline the training process and make it more efficient, thereby saving your company time and money during the required training process.

Auditors love the SMS Induction module because it demonstrates quickly that your employees understand your aviation safety system.

Functionality of a Web Based Safety Management System

When employees are being trained on SMS fundamentals, it is important they understand the principles of aviation safety management systems as well as understand the general layout and location of available tools.

As an example of an SMS Induction training message, you could start with with this template:

"Functionally, our Web based aviation safety management system has five principle categories, which include International Civil Aviation Organization's (ICAO) "Four Pillars of Safety Management" concept (marked with *):

My Dashboard (Commitment Statements, goals and objectives, assigned tasks & corrective actions)
*Safety Policy, duties and responsibilities of key personnel, org charts, and pertinent documents)
*Risk Management with Issue Manager and Reports and Charts (Financial, Performance, Trending, Executive Reports)
*Safety Assurance (Qualifications and Training management, gap analyses, performance monitoring and issue validation)
*Safety Promotion (Corporate Goals, Meeting Manager, Read Files, Surveys, Newsletters, Lessons Learned)

Depending upon the duties and responsibilities of each user, there are unique services and tools available. If you feel you need additional roles to perform a task, please contact us at...." Feel free to adjust this message to suit your needs.

Personal Commitment to Aviation Safety Program

Every user must fully understand and appreciate their personal role within an effective aviation safety management system. This understanding comes about in the form of initial SMS training, whether it be formal or informal. When users feel engaged in your company, they are more likely to take ownership and participate in advancing your aviation safety management program. This sense of ownership can be effected through regular newsletters, safety surveys that are designed to educate, and being responsive to your employee feedback.

Every user and every function is crucial to the successful working and accuracy of the system and thus overall reporting. There is total interdependence throughout all levels of this company.

Users must ensure that they meet all requirements within their assigned role(s); this includes commitment to any tasks, duties and responsibilities assigned to them.

Accuracy of data and information inputting are essential. Similarly, maximum honesty is required when users report airline & airport related accidents and incidents.

Users should always be encouraged to point out any gaps or failings to be addressed and corrected. Don't focus only on aviation incidents and accidents that center around safety. Encourage users to keep their eyes open for other types of issues, such as security, quality, compliance and environmental. There are many opportunities to capitalize on when implementing your aviation safety management system.

Before users can be inducted into your safety management system, they must be trained in how to report incidents and accidents. This is the primary responsibility of your users. Without prompt, accurate reporting, your aviation SMS program will not live up to its full potential.

Learning how your program requires reporting incidents and accidents is only one element in your SMS induction training. We recommend your users also become familiar with these following items:

Safety policy statement;
Duties and requirements of key safety personnel;
Organizational chart;
Lessons learned library;
Other relevant safety policies and procedures;

These users have been inducted into this management system on the date shown. To be inducted, they must have agreed to and answered the following questions:

I understand how our management system operates.
I'm aware of the role I play in our management system.
I understand the aim of our management system is to improve quality and not to attribute blame.
I have participated in either a formal or informal induction of our management system.

Armed with a list of users and the date that they have agreed to these items is plenty to satisfy any aviation SMS auditor. Of course, you will also provide them a view of the requirements they must fulfill before agreeing to the above safety program induction statements. These requirements are usually put on the opening page of SMS Pro™ for the Not Inducted users to see. After users have been inducted into your safety program, they no longer have the Not Inducted role and no longer see the requirements, but instead, have either the User Dashboard or Hazard / Incident Reporting module visible, which had been previously been hidden from all Not Inducted users.

Enhancements to the SMS Induction Manager - New and Planned

Recently, you may have noticed that there are now numbers in the tabs for safety managers to know whether a particular tab needs attention. See image at right. For five years, the SMS Induction Manager received no major improvements. We believe this is a great enhancement because you can add up the numbers to see percentages of users that have been inducted.

For those unfamiliar with the first two tabs, the first tab contains a list of all users in the organization. A message box appears for the safety manager to invite either all or selected users to participate in training. During training, users learn about the system and the steps necessary to become inducted.

When users request induction, an email is sent to managers alerting them that users are requesting induction. The safety manager either confirms or rejects induction request and can send a Welcome message with further instructions. When managers are being inducted, the SMS Admin will then give the newly inducted managers additional roles, such as SMS Dept Head or SMS Admin.

Planned Enhancements to SMS Induction Manager

SMS Induction manager is a great tool to demonstrate initial employee SMS training. Years have passed and many users require recurrent SMS training. The new functionality will cover new SMS training requirements and document that users have again had their recurrent SMS training.

As always, clients and civil aviation regulatory agencies drive the enhancements behind SMS Pro™. Without the support of SMS Partners and our clients, SMS Pro would not have achieve the claim to being the most complete aviation safety management system software on the market for the past three years.

Friday, February 8, 2013

Enterprise Risk Management in Aviation Safety Management Systems

Risk Management in Aviation Safety Management Systems (SMS)

Top Management is Accountable!

Top management is accountable for the implementation of airline and airport aviation safety management systems (SMS). Responsibility can be delegated to safety managers, but top management is ultimately accountable for the successful implementation. Top management delegates these responsibilities, and as part of the delegation process, top management sends safety managers to aviation safety management courses to ensure their safety managers have an adequate understanding of what is required in an aviation safety management system.

In some cases, the safety manager brings back the knowledge gained from the aviation safety management courses and disseminates the information to other managers and employees. The point to fix on is that this does not happen all the time. And top management is still accountable regardless of how well the safety manager performs his task.

Who Audits the Safety Manager at Your Airline/Airport?

How does top management know whether the safety manager is doing a good job? Who is auditing the safety manager internally? Should your airline or airport jeopardize your certificate and wait for civil aviation authorities to conduct their audit and present you with a list of deficiencies? How does top management manage the risk in their enterprises to ensure they don't get caught off guard?

How Do You Know Your Aviation SMS Program is Working?

Internal aviation safety audits are important. One important point to bring out is that your internal safety audits should not be performed by the safety manager. You want an impartial eye performing the audit and you need to ensure that your required elements are documented in a way that aviation SMS auditors can confidently agree that you have fulfilled the requirements.

Aviation SMS Software helps!

To perform your aviation SMS audit, you will need an aviation SMS audit checklist. If you don't have an aviation SMS audit checklist, you have a few alternatives:

Wing it (not the best choice);
Ask the auditor for a copy (sometimes they will oblige);
Use a gap analysis checklist (like in SMS Pro, which has several models, such as ICAO, IS-BAO, FAA, Transport Canada);
Use an implementation plan checklist (like the ones provided in SMS Pro, such as ICAO and Transport Canada).

Transport Canada put out an advisory circular that has some good checklist. Here is the link to the document.
http://www.tc.gc.ca/media/documents/ca-opssvs/107-001-e.pdf

For airlines and airports just starting their aviation SMS implementation, top management should be asking these questions, which have been extracted from this AC.

Component 1 – Safety Management Plan

Element 1.1 Safety Policy

Is a safety management system with defined components established, maintained and adhered to?
Is there a safety policy in place?
Is the safety policy approved by the accountable executive?
Has the organization based its safety management system on the safety policy?
Is the safety policy promoted by the accountable executive?
Is the safety policy reviewed periodically?
Is the safety policy communicated to all employees with the intent that they are made aware of their individual safety obligations?

Element 1.2, Non-Punitive Safety Reporting Policy

Is there a policy in place that provides immunity from disciplinary action for employees that report safety deficiencies, hazards or occurrences?

Element 1.3, Roles & Responsibilities

Checklists are tools to guide you!

Has an accountable executive been appointed with responsibility for ensuring that the safety management system is properly implemented and performing to requirements in all areas of the organization?
Does the accountable executive have control of the financial and human resources required for the proper execution of his/her SMS responsibilities?
Does the person managing the operation of the SMS fulfill the required job functions and responsibilities?
Are the safety authorities, responsibilities and accountability of personnel at all levels of the organization defined and documented?
Do all personnel understand their authorities, responsibilities and accountability in regards to all safety management processes, decisions and actions?

Element 1.4, Communication

Are there communication processes in place within the organization that permit the safety management system to function effectively?
Are communication processes (written, meetings, electronic, etc.) commensurate with the size and scope of the organization?
Is information established and maintained in a suitable medium that provides direction in related documents?
Is there a process for the dissemination of safety information throughout the organization and a means of monitoring the effectiveness of this process?

Element 1.5, Safety Planning, Objective & Goals

Have safety objectives been established?
Is there a formal process to develop a coherent set of safety goals necessary to achieve overall safety objectives?
Are safety objective and goals publicized and distributed?

Element 1.6, Performance Measurement

Is there a formal process to develop and maintain a set of performance parameters to be measured?

Element 1.7, Management Review

Are regular and periodic, planned reviews of company safety performance and achievement including an examination of the company‘s Safety Management System conducted to ensure its continuing suitability, adequacy and effectiveness?
Is there a process to evaluate the effectiveness of corrective actions?

Not Knowing Aviation SMS Requirements is not a Valid Excuse

When the aviation SMS auditor visits your airline or airport, you will not be able to plead ignorance. Top management is expected to know what is required of an effective safety management system. It is not like aviation safety management systems fell from the sky last week.

More Resources: http://www.ibac.org/is_bao/accredited-auditors-2

How to best help your
Aviation Safety Management System

Become an SMS PRO