Managing human factors at Qantas:
Investing in a new approach for the
future
""
B,\'Captain Jan L/lcas and Dr Graham Edkins
Following on from Captain Andrew Poulsen's article
reflecting on past and present human factors challenges
faced by Qantas, this article will outline a blueprint for
meeting these challenges. Specifically, the implementation
of a new corporate behaviour based training and
assessment program; and the need to better integrate
human factors principles into existing business and safety
systems.
According to the International Civil
Aviation Organisation (ICAO). the
management of human error within the
aviation industry is one of the
greatest challenges facing airline
managers in the new millennium
(ICAO. 1993). Human error represents
a real threat to airline safety and
efficiency and in building a motivated
workforce that understand the
challenges of today's and tomorrow's
business environment.
The need to change
Australian aviation. Qantas included.
remains the safest operating
environment on the world stage.
While these safety achievements are
something to be proud of, there is
further room for improvement. A lack
of serious safety incidents has the
potential to reinforce a culture that
Qantas is immune to airline accidents.
lt is difficult to introduce continuous
improvement strategies when
everything appears to be working.
Human factors represents one
important area where further safety
gains can be achieved.
Recent international developments in
Europe and the United States on CRM
skill assessment has led Qantas to
reconsider its approach to human
factors training. As a result of the
work conducted by the Joint Aviation
Authority (JAA) on NOTECHS (Nontechnical skill evaluation in JAR-FCL)
(van Avermaete, 1998) and research by
Bob Helmreich (Helmreich. 2000) on
the Line Orientated Safety Audit
(LOSA); individual and attitude based
training and evaluation has been
replaced by team orientated
behavioural assessment. This has
been the motivation behind a Qantas
Flight Training development program
called Advanced Proficiency Training
(APT) which was initiated in early
]999.
There is now a general acceptance
that expert performance of tasks
involves both technical and non-
technical skills. Technical skills are
typically the procedural and factual
knowledge required to complete a
task, such as the highly practiced
manipulation skills of flight crew. In
contrast, non-technical skills may
involve reasoning, judgement and
communication skills. While Qantas
has been good at defining and training
operational staff in technical skills, it
is the non-technical or behavioural
skills which need to be more clearly
speci fied.
Apart from international
developments, there have also been
some local regulatory changes, which
are indicative of the increasing
importance of human factors for
passenger carrying operators. For
example, the Australian Civil Aviation
Safety Authority (CAS A) has released
a discussion paper, Civil Aviation
Safety Regulation (CASR) Part l21A,
which proposes mandating Crew
Resource Management (CRM)/Human
Factors training for flight crew based
on nine modules. These nine modules
specify the basic training curriculum
required during initial, recurrent,
command and aircraft type conversion
stages and follow that recommended
by the JAA.
CASR Part 121 A also proposes that
flight crew should be regularly
assessed on their CRM competencies
during line flying, consistent with that
recommended by the European Union
countries. This means that the formal
evaluation of CRM behaviour will
become the norm for flight crew.
However, it is the intention of Qantas
to go much further than flight crew
and make behavioural assessment a
regular practice for all its operational
staff.
Organisational
Goals Driving Change
The challenge for Qantas is to provide
human factors training that is not only
meaningful for operational staff but
also useful for improving core safety
and business objectives. The
following goals outline the direction
12 Flight
the company is headed in regard to
human factors.
identified can be used as learning
tools by various operational areas.
Goal I. Identify the key competencies
of operational experts.
Goal 4. Enhance operational and
business outcomes through human
factors initiatives.
We need to identify and clearly define
what behavioural competencies are
representative of safe and efficient
performance within stafffrom key
operational areas of the company.
Goal 2. Develop a better
understanding of human performance
issues.
A Blueprint
The focus of most airlines has been to
collect and trend data on human
performance problems from reactive,
event based information, such as
reported safety incidents and
accidents. Given the unique human
capability to detect and recover from
error, there is a lot of information that
we are not collecting because an
incident may never have occurred.
Goal 3. Integrate hlllnanfactors
principles into existing business and
safety systems.
Human factors must not be isolated
from core business and safety
objectives. There is a need to
establish a more systematic method of
ensuring that the operational risks
--
_
CD
~
Corporate
structure
While financial imperatives should not
be the sole reason for embarking on
human factors initiatives, we need to
get smarter at identifying what has
been the return on investment.
l
for Change
The question facing many airline
managers is not if but rather how to
integrate human factors principles
with current resource management
programs. This section details how
Qantas proposes to achieve the above
mentioned goals.
A Corporate Approach
Factors
to Human
In recognition of the potential impact
of human factors on Qantas business
objectives, a Human Factors Steering
Committee was formed in April 1998 to
guide the extension of a new
generation corporate human factors
program well beyond the cockpit to
include error management across
various operational divisions. The
structure of this group is outlined
below.
for human factors development
PROJECTPAlRON
George Bsey
GGMHR
LFAD PROJECT
MANAG ER
DrGmham Edkins
MSE& HF
HFS'IEERING GROUP
Senior Manage rs fmm:
Flight 011" (Chair)
Cabin Senices
Engineering & lYbint
Opemtions Resources
Airports
Ca tering
Freigh t
BUSINESS
MANAG ER
•••• ••
~
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The role of the Human Factors
Steering Committee is to:
• approve and direct fiscal resources
at specific human factors
programs; and
•
[I
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maintain a corporate level focal
point to ensure human factors
program consistency, while
identifying and reducing costly
duplication of effort.
The committee is comprised of senior
management from various operational
divisions to ensure company wide
commitment at a high level.
Development and assessment of
expected behaviours
To provide the foundation for
corporate human factors excellence, a
behavioural training and assessment
project across various operational
divisions is proposed. This project
will be managed by Or Graham Edkins,
Manager Safety Education and Human
Factors and include Regional Airline,
Union and CAS A involvement to help
ensure commitment to this program.
This new approach to human factors
has the dual objectives of:
• providing staff with enhanced
skills to avoid, trap and mitigate
human error; and
• providing management with a
structured process to assess
specific expected behaviours
based on core safety and business
objectives.
"1
Expected behaviours are actions that
are required to be demonstrated by
operational staff to achieve a safe and
effective operational outcome.
Overall strategy
The project will identify and define the
non-technical or expected behaviours
required for safe performance within
senior operational staff across each
Division. An assessment system will
then be developed to regularly assess
and reinforce these expected
behaviours, while providing trend
information on those behaviours
posing a high potential risk to safety
and behaviours that represent highly
effective performance.
Staff affected by this program include:
• Flight Crew;
Cabin Crew;
& Maintenance staff;
Engineering
Airports staff;
Freight staff;
Operations
resources staff;
Qantas catering personnel;
and
Regional airline staff.
The successful development and
implementation of this project will
involve five stages.
Stage i. Development of nontechnical expected behaviours
Expected behaviours are developed
through a process called cognitive
task analysis, based on the Critical
Decision Methodl. This process
involves interviewing a representative
sample (10%) of experienced staff (eg,
Captains, CS Ms, Senior LAMEs etc)
in each operational area to identify the
key behaviours (non-technical skills)
that best determine effective and safe
job performance.
This process has already been
completed within Flight Operations as
a result of the Advanced Proficiency
Training (APT) project. Approximately
six categories of expected behaviours
have been developed for Flight Crew
relating to CRM/Human Factors
issues. The expected behaviours for
flight crew are shown on page 14.
Other operational divisions
progressively over the next two years
will adopt the same process to
develop their own expected
behaviours.
Stage 2. Development (~f human
factors training material to support
expected behaviours.
External human factors consultancy
expertise will be sourced to develop
human factors training material based
on the expected behaviours identified
from Stage I. New hire operational
staff will be instructed in the expected
behaviours relating to their
operational area. In addition, current
operational staff wi 1Irecei ve training
and information on the expected
behaviours through new or existing
training courses.
Stage 3. Development and trial of
behaviour based observation system.
Behaviour based observation systems
wi 11be developed so that management
can assess that staff are
demonstrating the expected
behaviours trained in Stage 2. Qantas
has for many years assessed many of
its operational staff, such as cabin
crew and airports personnel, on
customer service skills. Assessment of
behavioural skills underpinning safe
performance is seen as a natural
extension of our existing staff
appraisal systems.
Stage 4. implementation of the
behaviour based observation system.
Behaviour based observation systems
will be tailored to the requirements of
each Division. For example, flight crew
will be assessed on expected
behaviours during route checks and
Line Orientated Flight Training (LOFT)
cyclic sessions using the Flight Crew
Observation Record Form (FT 11)
currently under trial. (Shown on page
15).
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MacGreg01: D. (/989). Crith'al decision
met/lOd for elicting knowledge. / EEE
Transactions on Systems. Man and
Cyhernetics, /9: 462-472.
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Version 1.00
Comments
•
Stage 5. Longiwdinal
the program
Observation
of expected
behaviours
wi 11be conducted
according
to the
following core principles:
•
Information
Any change program
needs to be measured
on the observation
form will be de-identified.
•
Staff are assessed
ONLY
on those
expected
behaviours
that are
observed
ie; if it is not observed
is not assessed.
•
•
it
Observation
is made with respect
to crew/team
behaviour
not
individual
behaviour.
Information
recorded
on the form
will be used to continuously
of this magnitude
against expected
human factors seriously at Qantas. In
most respects, human factors is the
last frontier in the battle to work safer
a joint Qantas/University
of Newcastle
PhD scholarship
to determine
the
References
impact of the corporate
program on
individual
and organisational
safety
and business objectives.
To date the
aviation industry has yet to develop a
valid evaluation
methodology
for
assessing
the effectiveness
of human
The bridge from research to safety.
Paper presented at the IATA/lCAO
Flight Safety and Human Factors
integrated
way of life at Qantas.
Helmreich,
Regional
August.
B. (2000). Culture and error:
Seminar, Rio de Janeiro, 16-18
training.
ICAO (1993).
Conclusion
The maturity
relation
means
of our aircrew
to human
that gains
continue
factors
Qantas,
factors
areas
development,
It
within
human
A strategy
Captain
for the implementation
wide human
has been outlined.
expected
factors
years
that may threaten
human
is
but the
will be a more strategic
major
of a
program
This program
to take three
of identifying
method
risk factors
core business
objectives.
of human factors training
with safety
(
(OPERATIONAL
BASED'
INFORMATION
ROUTE CHECK
I~I
CYCLIC TRAINING
•..." , ,"
"=-:
.,
..
van Amermaete, J.A.G. (1998).
NOTECHS: Non-technical skill
evaluation in JAR-FCL. National
Aerospace
that hold the
promise.
company
payoff
body in
principles
but significant.
with less refined
greatest
Human factors digest
No. 10: Human Factors, Management
and organisation.
International Civil
Aviation Organisation:
Montreal,
Canada.
in this area will
to be small
is other operational
behavioral
data reported via safety
incidents
and accidents,
and through
scheduled
audits. The integration
of
these two historically
isolated areas
of trend information
will provide
Qantas with an enhanced
ability to
identify the major human factors risks
to safety and efficiency
across its
various operational
areas. The
organisation
of this system is
presented
below.
16 Flight
The main objective of this article has
been to demonstrate
that we take
and smarter. This recognition at the
highest corporate level guarantees
that human factors will become an
The expected behaviours
will
essentially
form a framework
to
analyse performance
at the individual,
divisional
and organisational
level,
which can then be compared
to
-
of
improvements
in operating
safety and
efficiency.
This is where academic
expertise
has much to offer. To this
end we will commence
in May this year
factors
improve training needs across
each operational
area rather than
identify training deficiencies
within each individual.
Integration
evaluation
•
EVENT BASED ,
INFORMATION
Laboratory
NLR.
Ian Lucas is the Group
General Manager Flight Operations
and Chief Pilot and currently operates
on the B767. He has held various
training and managerial positions
within Qantas including Manager Line
Training, Manager Training 8767,
General Manager B744 Operations and
General Manager B737 Operations.
Or Graham Edkins is a qualified
accident investigator
and holds
Masters and PhD degrees in
organisational
psychology. He
currently manages the strategic
development
of human factors
training, research and development
across the Qantas Group.