Has WHS Legislation & Risk Management Standards stopped people thinking?

In this episode of Risk! Engineers Talk Governance, due diligence engineers Richard Robinson and Gaye Francis discuss whether the WHS legislation and Risk Management Standards have hindered critical thinking in organisations. 

They observe that some organisations have become stagnant and resistant to change, relying on third-party consultants to handle risk management instead of actively engaging in the process themselves. They emphasise that risk management should be a line management function and that organisations need to adopt processes and procedures rather than simply outsourcing them. 

They also discuss the importance of curiosity in risk management and the need for organisations to embrace a variety of tools and techniques to gain different insights into risk issues. They caution against relying solely on single processes and techniques, as they may not capture all potential risks, particularly rare critical ones. 

If you have any feedback, please email the team at admin@r2a.com.au.

For more information on Richard & Gaye’s consulting work, head to www.r2a.com.au.

Transcript

Megan Barrow (00:03):

Welcome to Risk! Engineers Talk Governance. In this episode, due diligence engineers Richard Robinson and Gaye Francis discuss whether the WHS legislation and risk management standards have stopped people thinking. We hope you enjoy their chat. If you do, please give us a rating. Also, don't forget to subscribe on your favorite podcast platform, and if you have any feedback or topic ideas, get in touch via admin@r2a.com.au.

Gaye Francis (00:43):

Hi Richard. Welcome to another podcast session. Today we're going to talk about has the WHS and risk management standard stopped people thinking?

Richard Robinson (00:55):

Yes, and that is a big subject and it's one which has actually puzzled us greatly because we've been watching a lot of organisations go into a form of stasis, which apparently is a word which Gaye doesn't use very often, but by stasis I mean they've actually got a fixed process and they're not going to change it even though there's evidence to say they possibly should.

Gaye Francis (01:16):

Or it's not being as useful as it could be in giving the results that they needed to deliver.

Richard Robinson (01:21):

And we've wondered why this might be the case. And we've noticed with a couple of large organisations that what seems to have happened is that this whole risk area has become so important to senior management that they've basically said, well, look, this is all too hard for us, so what we're going to do is employ people, put a process in place and it'll all happen and we won't have to think about it anymore.

Gaye Francis (01:40):

But when you say employ people, you mean third parties as in consultants or advisors that give the advice and then walk away?

Richard Robinson (01:46):

Well, they actually try to, yes. And they walk away. And our observational, the whole point of the WHS legislation and environmental legislation and company law is to say, no, you can't walk away if you are the decision maker, if you are the mind of the corporation, you have to actually be responsible. And this whole thrust of legislation the last 10 years has been hammering that point harder and harder and harder.

Gaye Francis (02:07):

And I think we've covered it in another podcast, is that risk management is a line management function.

Richard Robinson (02:14):

It's always been that.

Gaye Francis (02:15):

And that's where the reliability.

Richard Robinson (02:17):

That was that point I failed to mention in another session because I do remember going to an AREMA (American Railway Engineering and Maintenance-of-Way Association) conference, it must've been the late 1990s, and I was listening to all these insurance people and they'd expanded themselves into risk management because that's how that sort of area came from where the risk management came from. My question was, when are you going to drop the insurance term and just make it risk management and make risk management the line management function? If you've ever asked a question at a large conference and the speakers have just looked back at you, the panel, and it's been a stony silence, that was the one that was the stony silence.

Gaye Francis (02:50):

Right. So you didn't get a response?

Richard Robinson (02:52):

I did not get a response!

Gaye Francis (02:56):

Now you've lost my train of thought. Okay. So yeah, it's a line management function and the organisation has to adopt the processes. And the one thing that we have seen fail is that you can get third parties to put in processes and procedures to do things, but unless the organisation adopts it, then it's useless.

Richard Robinson (03:21):

Yeah. It's got to be something people want to embrace in the first place. We're seeing people just try to force people to do things and that doesn't work. They've got to want to do it. And the other thing we've noticed with the risk management standard is people just push the risk management standard approach. And remember, we sort of hammered this point before, the point is that all reasonable practical precautions - ALL - so you've got to go through all the different ways ideas can be found. I mean, the legislation, for example, tries to do the generative thing saying, you must talk to people, you must consult widely. But that doesn't mean to say you can't have technical process where you've got technical experts looking at the core issues and things like that. And indeed, senior management should know about some of these things and should think about these things. Our frustration with senior execs not knowing the hazards, I mean, I shouldn't pick on lawyers, but I do remember meeting a lawyer of a very large underground mining company back in the 2000s; he'd never been underground, he'd never seen the dangers and the risks that the people who generated the wealth that were supporting them were actually involved in. And I never quite understood that. I mean, we have the same thing with marine pilots. You've got marine pilot boards who've never been out on a pilotage to see what the marine pilot's actually doing.

Gaye Francis (04:28):

And I think that's one of the key things, isn't it? They should know about those things and if you're a member of the board, you have a responsibility to inform yourself to do that and make sure you're getting the right information from your senior executive to make sure you can make informed decisions.

(04:45):

But just going back to the tools and techniques, and I think that's one of the ways that R2A is different and we often come unstuck when a client comes to us and asks for something that this is the way we want things done. And even though it doesn't quite make sense to us. So there's a whole lot of different tools and techniques. As you said, there's generative techniques; there's the technical hazops, and fmeas; there's threatened vulnerability studies. And I always say at the end of Richard's courses, which we do through Engineering Education Australia, is be aware there's a whole lot of tools and techniques out there. They will all provide insight for you.

Richard Robinson (05:20):

And none of them are wrong.

Gaye Francis (05:21):

None of them are wrong, but they do provide different insight. You need to be aware of the pros and cons and you got to pick the tool that works best to solve the problem. And I think some organisations are getting unstuck or becoming unstuck because they have a process that you do for risk management.

Richard Robinson (05:39):

Often the risk management standard.

Gaye Francis (05:41):

Which is the way to do all risk management tasks and it's not providing the value for money, it's not providing the insight that they need to make their organisation safe.

Richard Robinson (05:52):

It's worse than that. They're spinning the wheels at great costs than expense to the organisation. And what's probably worse is that the really competent people who are actually trying to think this stuff through it causes a blockage and stops those competent people from actually making substantive and useful change.

Gaye Francis (06:07):

So yeah, I think some of those processes have stopped people thinking, haven't they?

Richard Robinson (06:12):

Yep. I mean, one of the things people ask me at different times, what makes a competent risk person and the answer I usually give them is very Rudyard Kipling answer: insatiable curiosity. Again, Gaye always looked at me strange when I say that because that's from my point of view, it's one of your underlying characteristics. It's the kind of person... They're doing something, and we've hired lots of engineers over time, so you and I have watched different engineers doing things in different ways, for example, and some of them get so focused inside the thing that they don't sort of become aware of what's happening around them. Whereas the one that looks up and sees other things happening and wonders, well, I'm doing this, sure, but that's happening over there and that's not quite consistent with what's going over there. Should I have a way of aligning this? And that's what I mean by a satiable curiosity. It's that nosiness. After watching your program of life, I've got a funny feeling that may be genetic as your daughters have the similar traits, but that curiosity is something, and not all people have it. I haven't quite understood this one. It's almost like a childlike nosiness.

Gaye Francis (07:19):

It's an ability to question, isn't it? And not being afraid potentially of the consequences that come that way, speaking up, but also being aware of the bigger picture.

Richard Robinson (07:30):

But an organisation that can let people like that prosper is a complex organisation.

Gaye Francis (07:35):

Yes.

Richard Robinson (07:36):

And I think that's where one of the things that our society is doing and this formalisation of risk management, particularly with the WHS legislation and the ISO 31000, I'm not sure in many ways it's actually doing, it's achieving the success people think it should. I mean, we spent a fair part of our life overturning Australian Standards because the difficulty we've got is that it's not an Australian Standard that's right. The standard isn't recognised good practice. It's the worthwhile ideas contained in the Standard. And very often there's a lot of good ideas and a lot of Standards, but not all the ideas and all standards are worthwhile.

Gaye Francis (08:12):

But you have to think with that. And I think a couple of courses that we've done recently with some transport organisations is you have to solve it from first principles first, come up with the best solution and then you go and check against the Standard. Whereas some of the engineers were saying, oh, but we just designed to the Standard. And the chief engineer was sort of saying, no, no, no, no. What are we trying to solve? What is the best solution that we can get.

Richard Robinson (08:37):

In order to achieve the outcomes that we want? And then we check back against the Standard. That's that quote I always give from that 1939 Chairman of Victoria Division of Engineers Australia: "Standards have two purposes to prevent fools from their folly and rogues from their roguery". Because you're meant to work at from first principles how it's supposed to be, and then you test back against the Standard, make sure you haven't stuffed something up. And likewise, if somebody, a contractor's done the work and it's wrong, the simplest way to hang the poor sod is to generally say you haven't complied with the Standard, you're toast. But I've seldom found a Standard that applies in all circumstances, in all ways. That's not the case, not a technical standard.

Gaye Francis (09:14):

And they're also lagging indicators as well. They're often five and 10 years old. And technology is improving at pace at the moment. And what was reasonable, what may not have been reasonable five years ago certainly should be considered again now. And with the technology that's available and the ideas that are available.

Richard Robinson (09:37):

Well, that's like underground mining in the shipping business where you're watching the changes. I mean, the first time I went underground, which was a long time ago now, but people are still talking nostalgically about air leak miners. That's where some guys have got a jackhammer basically supported on the leg hammering away, and they dug the rock out and then they put the chargers in, they lit it themselves, and then they came back and mucked it out themselves and did the whole thing by themselves. These were all lean people. There was never a plump air leak miner that I've ever seen. When I turned up, pretty much that was all gone and people were driving vehicles underground with giant machines doing various things.

Gaye Francis (10:18):

And now it's all remote control from above the surface.

Richard Robinson (10:22):

They're on Perth airport, just drive it remotely.

Gaye Francis (10:24):

Which is quite incredible.

Richard Robinson (10:26):

And that happened in about 30 years ago, I think.

Gaye Francis (10:28):

Yeah, it doesn't take long at all. I think one of the other things that is potentially happening is that the corporate memory is failing safety. So by having these really structured processes, it's stopping people talking within the organisation across different departments and projects across an organisation of all the studies that have been done. Some of the work and the questions that we've been asked recently; Richard and I've been in business for 25 years or a bit more together is: "Oh, we didn't know you did that study for us". And they've been done for different parts of the organisation and it's really a technique or a methodology that would help solve the current problem that they're coming to talk to us about and they don't know. So it's really interesting that the corporate memory in safety doesn't seem to be being shared and propagated throughout the organisation.

Richard Robinson (11:25):

Well, it's certainly more than that because R2A's modus operandi has always been: We'll train you to get it done and then you keep doing it. And that obviously works for a while until that person or people or that team moves on. So it's probably about a five year cycle the way it's going, because people don't seem to be lasting. It is not a career in the way in which things used to be these days.

Gaye Francis (11:48):

No. People are moving on from jobs and the turnover's quite high - two to five years.

Richard Robinson (11:53):

Correct. In fact, we still keep coming across people. Now, remember we did some lecturing at different universities at different times and 10 years later there's guys just looking at us going, ah, I remember you.

Gaye Francis (12:06):

So yes, we are the exception, Richard, we're still working together after that long.

Richard Robinson (12:11):

It's curious. Anyway.

Gaye Francis (12:13):

So all of these things is sort of making safety and the subject of risk management, I guess, in organisations, the management of safety, more complex and harder.

Richard Robinson (12:27):

Well, the one that I've noticed particularly is this Monte Carlo simulation for project risk. And people are signing off on that. And yet our experience has been, and you just commented at the recent risk conference you went to, you gave a paper at, what, eight weeks ago now or something? Not long ago. The ones that bite you is the big rare ones that you didn't think about. And that wasn't in your probability distribution. And that's why the big projects are failing.

Gaye Francis (12:50):

People aren't using a whole lot of techniques.

Richard Robinson (12:53):

We're not saying don't do Monte Carlos, by the way, because that'll tell you the most likely projects outcome, which is well worth knowing.

Gaye Francis (12:59):

But I think you need to do more than one. I think what we're finding now is one risk technique is not sufficient to find all of the risk issues just because they're such a merit of them.

Richard Robinson (13:12):

And hazops, for example, is not the only way to do it in the chemical industry. It never has been.

Gaye Francis (13:19):

So what we would suggest to you is, I guess that there's a whole lot of tools and techniques out there. They provide different insight into different risk issues. But if your organisation's doing only a single or using a single process and technique, then you're probably missing, particularly, the rare critical items.

Richard Robinson (13:41):

And when you're trying to address all issues of concern and demonstrate that all reasonable practicable precautions in place, you need to think generally more widely than most people we see are currently doing.

Gaye Francis (13:56):

I think we might leave it there. We could talk about this topic for quite a while and we might go into some depth on some of these topics a little bit further.

Richard Robinson (14:04):

It's not exactly a chat on Chatham Rules thing too. We might say something we shouldn't say.

Gaye Francis (14:10):

We do have that issue sometimes. So thanks for joining us again. Hope you found this episode interesting and we hope you can join us next time.

Richard Robinson (14:18):

Thanks, Gaye. Bye.