Our Approach

We partnered with a high hazard operation to evaluate their critical control design and effectiveness using our Control Health Assessment framework. Our approach evaluates control design by categorising controls as permanent, exposure-triggered, technical, or procedural. It also assesses control function in preventing or minimising hazards, preventing or mitigating energy or hazard releases, ensuring separation to provide protection, and detecting and minimising impacts.

At a glance:

• Categorised the full control register and control architecture using our Control Health Assessment Framework
• Cross-referenced control verification performance with inherent control effectiveness
• Conducted detailed analysis of behavioural errors, task complexity, and procedural reliance

Research and Insight

Our key findings highlighted critical areas for improvement, particularly around behavioural dependencies and procedural controls:

• 65% of non-conforming work involved human errors, linked to insufficient supervision, a need for procedural refinement, and outdated practices for high-risk tasks
• 63% of critical controls were procedural, and 96% of absent or failed critical controls in SIFp incidents relied entirely on worker behaviour and decision-making
• 9% of simple routine tasks are likely to involve a human error which increases to 17% when tasks require high levels of skill
• Two-thirds of control failures involved the worker using their, cognitive and/or physical capabilities, while one-third stemmed from  ineffective or absent technical controls

Tangible Outcomes

In response, the organisation:

• Developed targeted strategies to improve control reliability
• Redesigned vulnerable controls to reduce dependence on human behaviour
• Enhanced supervision and refined procedures for specific high-risk tasks
• Provided data analysis and insight to inform and coach Risk Owners
• Enhanced critical control verifications and supervision in controls that had greater exposure due to over reliance on human behaviour.

This structured, data-driven approach helped uncover systemic weaknesses, ensuring controls were more robust and less prone to failure. The results continue to guide critical control improvement strategies, reducing reliance on perfect worker execution and enhancing overall safety outcomes.

To find out more about our what Controls Health Assessment can do strengthen your your critical control systems, contact the Incident Analytics team.

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