• Skip to primary navigation
  • Skip to main content
  • Skip to primary sidebar
  • Skip to footer

Safety Risk .net

Humanising Safety and Embracing Real Risk

  • Home
    • About
      • Privacy Policy
      • Contact
  • FREE RESOURCES
    • FREE SAFETY eBOOKS
    • FREE DOWNLOADS
    • TOP 50
    • FREE RISK ASSESSMENT FORMS
    • Find a Safety Consultant
    • Free Safety Program Documents
    • Psychology Of Safety
    • Safety Ideas That Work
    • HEALTH and SAFETY MANUALS
    • FREE SAFE WORK METHOD STATEMENT RESOURCES
    • Whats New In Safety
    • FUN SAFETY STUFF
    • Health and Safety Training
    • SAFETY COURSES
    • Safety Training Needs Analysis and Matrix
    • Top 20 Safety Books
    • This Toaster Is Hot
    • Free Covid-19 Toolbox Talks
    • Download Page – Please Be Patient With Larger Files…….
    • SAFETY IMAGES, Photos, Unsafe Pictures and Funny Fails
    • How to Calculate TRIFR, LTIFR and Other Health and Safety Indicators
    • Download Safety Moments from Human Resources Secretariat
  • PSYCHOLOGY OF SAFETY & RISK
    • Safety Psychology Terminology
    • Some Basics on Social Psychology & Risk
    • Understanding The Social Psychology of Risk – Prof Karl E. Weick
    • The Psychology of Leadership in Risk
    • Conducting a Psychology and Culture Safety Walk
    • The Psychology of Conversion – 20 Tips to get Started
    • Understanding The Social Psychology of Risk And Safety
    • Psychology and safety
    • The Psychology of Safety
    • Hot Toaster
    • TALKING RISK VIDEOS
    • WHAT IS SAFETY
    • THE HOT TOASTER
    • THE ZERO HARM DEBATE
    • SEMIOTICS
    • LEADERSHIP
  • Covid-19
    • COVID-19 (Coronavirus, Omicron) Health and Safety Slogans and Quotes for the Workplace
    • Covid-19 Returning to Work Inductions, Transitioning, Safety Start Up and Re Entry Plans
    • Covid-19 Work from Home Safety Checklists and Risk Assessments
    • The Hierarchy of Control and Covid-19
    • Why Safety Loves Covid-19
    • Covid-19, Cricket and Lessons in Safety
    • The Covid-19 Lesson
    • Safety has this Covid-19 thing sorted
    • The Heart of Wisdom at Covid Time
    • How’s the Hot Desking Going Covid?
    • The Semiotics of COVID-19 and the Social Amplification of Risk
    • Working From Home Health and Safety Tips – Covid-19
    • Covid-19 and the Hierarchy of Control
  • Dr Rob Long Posts
    • Learning Styles Matter
    • There is no HIERARCHY of Controls
    • Scaffolding, Readiness and ZPD in Learning
    • What Can Safety Learn From Playschool?
    • Presentation Tips for Safety People
    • Dialogue Do’s and Don’ts
    • It’s Only a Symbol
    • Ten Cautions About Safety Checklists
    • Zero is Unethical
    • First Report on Zero Survey
    • There is No Objectivity, Deal With it!
  • Quotes & Slogans
    • Researchers Reveal the Top 10 Most Effective Safety Slogans Of All Time
    • When Slogans Don’t Work
    • 77 OF THE MOST CLASSIC, FAMOUS and INFAMOUS SAFETY QUOTES
    • 500 BEST and WORST WORKPLACE HEALTH and SAFETY SLOGANS 2021
    • 167 CATCHY and FUNNY SAFETY SLOGANS FOR THE WORKPLACE
    • COVID-19 (Coronavirus, Omicron) Health and Safety Slogans and Quotes for the Workplace
    • Safety Acronyms
    • You know Where You Can Stick Your Safety Slogans
    • Sayings, Slogans, Aphorisms and the Discourse of Simple
    • Spanish Safety Slogans – Consignas de seguridad
    • Safety Slogans List
    • Road Safety Slogans
    • How to write your own safety slogans
    • Why Are Safety Slogans Important
    • Safety Slogans Don’t Save Lives
    • 40 Free Safety Slogans For the Workplace
    • Safety Slogans for Work
You are here: Home / Risk Homeostasis / Are You Risk Intelligent?

Are You Risk Intelligent?

November 1, 2016 by Dennis Millard Leave a Comment

Are You Risk Intelligent?

risk intelligentRisk is all around us, not all risk is bad risk. If we don’t take risks in life, not only do we not learn, we miss opportunities for business success. Preventing people from taking risks can stop them from learning how to make calculative decisions to manage the risk, if it ever arises.

While businesses strive to develop attributes such as agility and resilience, without applying Risk Intelligence, neither is achievable.

What is Risk Intelligence?

Risk Intelligence is a concept that generally means beyond risk management. Risk Intelligence is knowing how to identify the key indicators (Alarm Bells) that indicate risk, it is then knowing how to manage what is found, effectively enough to prevent failure. Risk Indicator Clues

What are the type of risk ‘Risk Indicator Clues’ we need to consider?

  • Bounded Rationality – Also known as Tick and Flick or Flooding, this idea was first introduced by a researcher Herbert Simons. What bounded rationality means is, people cannot retain information, particularly in their short term memory. When we flood people with lots of data & documentation, we tend to bound their rational thinking, so they begin to tick and flick to get it out of the way. A lot of time they automatically revert back to what they feel is the right way, which majority of the time is not a calculated and rational decision. An example of this might be when a worker is provided a checklist with a whole range of things to check off, along with, procedures, JSA, behavioural observations, take 5 / step backs and added with the unforeseen time pressure.
  • Pace and Flow – Also known as rushing, a person who is engrossed in creating something or is just working continuously, tend to get in the flow of things. When we get in the flow, we tend to become oblivious to the things going on around us and even become blind to our surroundings. When things are going well in the workplace and we are in the flow of things getting done, it could very well be that we are in the energy of rushing where we see things less. Pace and flow is something we should be looking for as a risk indicator.
  • Preoccupation with Failure – Also known as Crosschecking. Karl E Weick came up with the term Preoccupation with Failure, which in other words means we should entertain doubt. When we are rushing, in the flow of things, doing the same things over and over day in day out and things are going well, this is the time where we are more likely to be unable to see something that is about to go wrong. This is a time where we should perhaps stop and entertain doubt, and re-look at what we are doing and try to discover what we may have become blinded to. By using crosscheck in our day to day activities allows us to keep at bay the little issues that may become big issues. Crosscheck is respecting that humans are fallible, having a separate set of eyes checking over what we are doing helps to prevent errors. This is a critical step that can help prevent disasters. When many little issues go unnoticed they start piling up and usually become the big failure, bit like looking at the Swiss cheese model. The aviation industry uses crosscheck on all their routine flights as a measure of managing risk.

Is Common Sense common?

  • Sense-Making – No Common Sense. The phrase ‘common sense’ is one that cops a lot of flak. Sense-making is not common, so no there is no common sense. Hearing the words common sense is an indication that we believe everyone should see and be on the same page, yet we are not. An example, Johnny believes it is common sense to vote for the Greens political party, yet this does not make sense to others, so sense making is therefore not common. It is critical to meet with teams in your workplace and gather their sense-making around risk, it will not be common. Good Leaders know that the critical part of managing risk, is asking the individuals in their team how they make sense of the risk. Let’s stop asking for common sense, or expecting common sense, let’s start asking people how they make sense of the things in front of them.
  • Hubris – Also known as Overconfidence, the word Hubris derived from the Ancient Geeks. An indicator of Hubris is someone who is blinded by their own overconfidence to the point they stop listening, observing or even communicating or working with others (form of arrogance). We may hear it or see it in the workplace, if so, we need to understand that Hubris will make people blind to healthy decision making to manage risk.
  • Risk Homeostasis – Also known as Desensitisation, the meaning of Risk Homeostasis was proposed by Professor Gerald Wilde. When we have something new to be aware of we become more aware of it and its potentials, however after working with it or doing it for a long period of time we become desensitised. Sometimes we tend to think a person with more experience is the best person to deal with risk, when in fact it could very well be the opposite. The more experienced we become at something, the longer we do something, the more we become bored with it, and the less sensitive we are to the risks associated with the task / process. When we hear or notice Risk Homeostasis in peoples work we should be aware they are far less sensitive to risk.

Are you ready to become Risk Intelligent?

READ THE REST OF THE ARTICLE AND FIND OUT HOW  >>>>>>

  • Bio
  • Latest Posts
  • More About Dennis
Dennis Millard

Dennis Millard

Owner & Principle Consultant at Human Rysk
Dennis Millard

Latest posts by Dennis Millard (see all)

  • Are You Risk Intelligent? - November 1, 2016
  • Honey they get me! They get me at work! - June 19, 2016
  • Lost money in safety? - April 12, 2016
  • Free Safety and Risk Lunch n Learn - March 12, 2016
  • Strategic Business Plans, hierarchically driven - November 2, 2015
Dennis Millard
Throughout my career of 20+ years, I have had broad exposures in industries as a Labourer, Site Leader, Safety Advisor, Safety Manager, State Safety Manager, & Safety consultant. My extensive experience in safety comes from working across a range of different industries, including building industry, quarries, harbour and marines, refineries, manufacturing, construction, CSG mining, food industries, and studies of Social Psychology of Risk, and also including my personal support to community in Voluntary roles such as, Air Sea Rescue, SES, community sports and charity fund raisers. Currently establishing my own business which specialises in effectively supporting organisations to improve their language and culture, Risky Options will do this by better understanding people and their thinking space, understanding how and why people make decisions and judgements when working with risk. Risky options also specialises in learning of effective leadership in the workplace.

Please share our posts

  • Click to print (Opens in new window)
  • Click to email this to a friend (Opens in new window)
  • Click to share on LinkedIn (Opens in new window)

Related

Filed Under: Risk Homeostasis, Risk Management Tagged With: risk homeostasis, risk intelligence

Reader Interactions

Leave a Reply Cancel reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

Primary Sidebar

Search and Discover More on this Site

Visit Count – Started Jan 2015

  • 24,007,353 Visitors

Never miss a post - Subscribe via Email

Enter your email address and join other discerning risk and safety people who receive notifications of new posts by email

Join 7,420 other subscribers

NEW! Free Download

How we pay for the high cost of running of this site – try it for free on your site

Please take our 2 minute zero survey

Recent Comments

  • Roel on Free Workplace Health and Safety Downloads
  • Rob Long on Safety Silences – Video Series
  • BRENT R CHARLTON on Safety Silences – Video Series
  • Rob Long on Sleep Dysfunction, Dreaming and Safety
  • Rob Long on Working Out What Makes Sense in Safety
  • simon cassin on Working Out What Makes Sense in Safety
  • Rob Long on The Safety Trifecta and Nothing Changes
  • Aneta Parker on The Safety Trifecta and Nothing Changes
  • Rob Long on How to Tackle Risk You Can’t See
  • Andrew Thornhill on How to Tackle Risk You Can’t See

FREE eBOOK DOWNLOADS

Featured Downloads

  • Free Health and Safety Manual (72075 downloads)
  • Preventing Heat Exhaustion (17574 downloads)
  • Abdukadirov_UnintendedConsequences_v11.pdf (1376 downloads)
  • Manual-Handling-Checklist.doc (6497 downloads)
  • Parking Lot Safety Moment (10214 downloads)
  • WHO Risk Assessment (1020 downloads)
  • Professional-Challenges-for-the-Safety-Industry (19550 downloads)
  • Seven-Essential-Safety-Reminders.pdf (1773 downloads)
  • Supervisor-Induction-Checklist.docx (1006 downloads)
  • Manual Handling Risk Assessment Template (1707 downloads)
  • hazard-database.xls (5636 downloads)
  • Real Risk by Dr Rob Long (1441 downloads)
  • Safety_Training_Needs_Analysis6.doc (7290 downloads)
  • SAFETY-SLOGANS-LIST.docx (62341 downloads)
  • Hazardous Substances Risk Assessment Form (1740 downloads)

Recent Posts

  • Culture Silences in Safety Symbolism
  • Culture Silences in Safety Mythology
  • The Safety Trifecta and Nothing Changes
  • Sleep Dysfunction, Dreaming and Safety
  • Working Out What Makes Sense in Safety
  • How to Tackle Risk You Can’t See
  • Study Reveals an Unexpected Side Effect of Traffic Safety Messages
  • Human Factors is Never About Humans
  • Where to Start in Humanising Leadership in Risk
  • Humanising Leadership in Risk, Shifting the Focus from Objects to Persons

What is Psychological Safety at Work?

Footer

Subscribe to Blog via Email

Enter your email address and join other discerning risk and safety people who receive notifications of new posts by email

Join 7,420 other subscribers

AUTHORS

  • Alan Quilley
    • Heinrich–Industrial Accident Prevention
    • The Problem With ZERO Goals and Results
  • Bernard Corden
    • After the goldrush
    • The Internationale
  • Bill Sims
    • Employee Engagement: Chocolate, Vanilla, or Strawberry?
    • Injury Hiding-How do you stop it?
  • Craig Clancy
    • Task Based vs Activity Based Safe Work Method Statements
    • Safety And Tender Submissions
  • Daniel Kirk
    • It’s easy being wise after the event.
    • A Positive Safety Story
  • Dave Whitefield
    • Safety is about…
    • Safety and Compliance
  • Dennis Millard
    • Are You Risk Intelligent?
    • Honey they get me! They get me at work!
  • Drewie
    • Downturn Doin’ Your Head In? Let’s Chat….
    • How was your break?
  • Gabrielle Carlton
    • All Care and No Care!
    • You Are Not Alone!
  • George Robotham
    • How to Give an Unforgettable Safety Presentation
    • How To Write a Safety Report
  • Goran Prvulovic
    • Safety Manager – an Ultimate Scapegoat
    • HSE Performance – Back to Basics
  • James Ellis
    • Psychological Core Stability for Wellbeing in Workers Comp
    • In search of plan B in workers’ recovery
  • James Parkinson
    • To laugh or not to laugh
    • People and Safety
  • John Toomey
    • In it for The Long Haul – Making the most of the FIFO Lifestyle
    • Who is Responsible for This?
  • Karl Cameron
    • Abby Normal Safety
    • The Right Thing
  • Ken Roberts
    • Safety Legislation Is Our Biggest Accident?
    • HSE Trip Down Memory Lane
  • Mark Perrett
    • Psychology of Persuasion: Top 5 influencing skills for getting what you want
  • Mark Taylor
    • Build a Psychologically Safe Workplace by Taking Risks and Analysing Failures
    • Enculturing Safety
  • Max Geyer
    • WHS Legislation is NOT about Safety it’s about Culture
    • Due Diligence Is Not Just Ticking Boxes!
  • Matt Thorne
    • Safety Culture–Hudson’s Model
    • Culture – Edgar Schein
  • Peter Ribbe
    • Is there “Common Sense” in safety?
    • Who wants to be a safety professional?
  • Phil LaDuke
    • Professional Conferences Are A Sleazy Con
    • Hey Idiots, You’re Worried About the Wrong Things
  • Admin
    • Study Reveals an Unexpected Side Effect of Traffic Safety Messages
    • Humanising Leadership in Risk, Shifting the Focus from Objects to Persons
  • Dr Rob Long
    • Culture Silences in Safety Symbolism
    • Culture Silences in Safety Mythology
  • Rob Sams
    • The Learning (and unlearning) that Revealed my Vocation
    • I’m just not that into safety anymore
  • Barry Spud
    • Things To Consider When Developing And Designing Your Company SWMS
    • Bad Safety Photos
  • Sheri Suckling
    • How Can I Get the Boss to Listen?
  • Simon Cassin
    • Safety values, ideas, behaviours and clothes
  • Safety Nerd
    • The Block isn’t portraying safety as it should be
    • Toolbox Talk Show–PPE
  • Wynand Serfontein
    • Why The Problem With Learning Is Unlearning
    • I DON’T KNOW
  • Zoe Koskinas
    • Why is fallibility so challenging in the workplace?

Most commented on

Forecasting Safety

The Banned Objects Index – A New Development in Safety Culture

The Unconscious and the Soap Dispenser

Dumbs for Safety

The Real Barriers to Safety

Safety as Faith Healing

Who Said We Don’t Need Systems?

Why Safety Controls Don’t Always Work

How to use signs, symbols and text effectively in communicating about risk

Safety Should NOT Be About Safety

FEATURED POSTS

Just Tell Your Mind to Stop It

Why Safety Isn’t a Choice You Make

The Great Heinrich Hoax

Can There Be Other Valid Worldviews Than Safety?

The Moment of Decision in Safety

Social Psychology of Risk Doability

Toward Zero, A Failed Goal

Semiotics and the Unconscious Messages We Send

Making the World fit the Safety Worldview

What’s Your Resilience Profile?

Non-Binary Decision Making in Risk

Sitting Safely at the Table

All You Love is Need

The Learning (and unlearning) that Revealed my Vocation

The Social Politics of Safety

Towards Dumb

Don’t Let Evidence Get in the Way of Safety

The Illusion Of Opposites

Nudge Nudge, Wink Wink – Improving Safety the SMART Way

Safety Surveying What You Already Know

More Posts from this Category

Subscribe to Blog via Email

Enter your email address and join other discerning risk and safety people who receive notifications of new posts by email

Join 7,420 other subscribers

How we pay for the high cost of running of this site – try it for free on your site

 

How To Make Your Own Hand Sanitizer

 

 

How to Make your own Covid-19 Face Mask

 

Covid-19 Returning To Work Safety, Transitioning, Start Up And Re Entry Plans

 

How’s the Hot Desking Going Covid?

imageOne of the benefits of the Covid-19 epidemic is a total rethink about how we live and work (https://www.abc.net.au/news/2020-03-28/coronavirus-could-reshape-how-australians-work-forever/12097124 ).

Expertise by Regurgitation and Re-Badging

One of the fascinating things about the Coronavirus pandemic is watching Safety morph into epidemiology expertise. I would like a dollar for every flyer, presentation, podcast, powerpoint, checklist template, toolbox talk and poster set that had jumped into my inbox… Read the rest

The Stress of Stasis

One of the challenging things about the Coronavirus crisis is stasis. For those without work and confined to home, for those in self-isolation, it’s like life is frozen in time. ‘Stay at home’ is the mantra. The trouble is, in… Read the rest

loading Cancel
Post was not sent - check your email addresses!
Email check failed, please try again
Sorry, your blog cannot share posts by email.