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While researching some BPIR.com related subject matter, I came accross this interesting bit of information which I thought was worth sharing on the Blog:

Ian Sutton [1] a process risk manager with U.S. AMEC Paragon believes that the root causes of safety and environmental problems are often economic. Managers can be subjected to relentless pressure to cut costs, while at the same time being expected to increase production rates, implement new initiatives, and to install new technology. This can lead to a mindset which crosses acceptable safety thresholds. The following six indicators are flags that thresholds are being challenged:

1. Unrealistic stretch goals.  If an organization is stretched far enough major system failures are certain to occur.
2. Excessive cost reduction demands. Managers being expected to "do more with less" can, over the long term, lead to the unsafe conditions being created.
3. Belief that "it cannot happen here".  Catastrophic events are very rare and this contributes to an “I'll chance it" syndrome. Often managers and employees fail to distinguish between occupational safety and process safety.  In fact the actions needed to improve occupational safety, as measured by the number of lost-time accidents, are quite different from those needed to prevent catastrophic, low probability and low frequency events. Organisations that have often reported excellent day-to-day and month-to-month safety figures have been surprised when one of their plants has experienced a major incident.
4. Overconfidence in regulatory compliance. Well crafted regulations, rules, codes and standards can also induce a false sense of confidence. These rules cannot anticipate the combinations of events that lead to catastrophic incidents most of which are unusual, even bizarre. Standards merely provide a framework for successful operational integrity. Detailed analyses must be also be carried out by facility managers and workers.
5. Ineffective information flow. A recurrent finding in disaster research is that information concerning potential problems was actually available within an organisation but this was not communicated to the relevant decision-makers. One reason for this is that most people do not want to be the bearer of bad news. This leads to information being more and more diluted as it travels up the management chain.
6. Ineffective auditing.  Good audits should attempt to identify the root causes behind any findings. Senior management should follow up the audit findings by reviewing the audit, the audit process, and the audit follow-up in detail. This also provides an opportunity to examine improvements required within management systems.

Economic and business factors commonly exert pressure on an organisation’s leaders; however this must never be allowed to interfere with its proactive safety culture.
[1] R10830 Sutton, I., (2009), Should Your Organization Fly Warning Flags?, Chemical Engineering Progress, Vol 105, Iss 12, pp 22-26, American Institute of Chemical Engineers, New York

 Members may read the full article which provides further excellent advice concerning process safety management.

Hello all,

http://www.surveygizmo.com/s/140713/initiative

Best regards,

Musli Mohammad
PhD Student
Centre for Organisational Excellence Research (COER)

PhD Student
Centre for Organisational Excellence Research (COER)
Massey University

Hello all

Thanks to all those BPIR members/supporters that participated in the Global Benchmarking Network's survey on "Business Improvement and Benchmarking." 

In total over 450 people responded from over 40 countries. It was the most comprehensive survey to date on the use of business improvement tools and,  in particular, on benchmarking. Key insights were revealed into this increasingly popular technique and how organisations were applying it and using it to improve their performance.    

Key findings were:

• Mission and Vision Statements and Customer (Client) Surveys are the most used (by 77% of organisations) of 20 improvement tools, followed by Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities, and Threats (72%), and Informal Benchmarking (68%). Performance Benchmarking was used by (49%) and Best Practice Benchmarking by (39%).
• The tools that are likely to increase in popularity the most over the next three years are Performance Benchmarking, Informal Benchmarking, Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities, and Threats, and Best Practice Benchmarking. Over 60% of organizations that are not currently using these tools indicated they are likely to use them in the next three years.
• When Best Practice Benchmarking is done well significant benefits are obtained with 20% of projects resulting in benefits worth $250,000.
• Respondents indicated that the external help/service that they most want (out of 8 services) is access to a best practice database!  This is obviously good news for the BPIR.com and means we are on the right track with our collection of 1,000's of best practices.

BPIR members can read the full report here, once logged in, and non-members can read Excerpts from a Report on the Global Use of Business Improvement Tools and Benchmarking.

Join now to read the full report.

II hope the report's findings will assist you all in undertaking benchmarking more effectively. 

Best regards

Robin

Dr Robin Mann, Commercial Director and Part-Owner, BPIR.com Limited.