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Learning Curves: A Bitter buy Undeniable Risk!

Learning Curves: A Bitter buy Undeniable Risk!

Guest Post by Malcolm Peart (first posted on CERM ® RISK INSIGHTS – reposted here with permission)

Despite our collective educational establishments that purport to teach so that people can learn, ‘education’ is not necessarily learning.  Mark Twain wrote disparagingly that “Education consists mainly in what we have unlearned” and also that he never let schooling interfere with his own education.  Education is not necessarily knowledge and real learning comes from the application of theory tempered with experience which will make for better decisions and better outcomes.  Benjamin Franklin’s words from over 200 years’ ago “Tell me, I forget. Teach me, I remember. Involve me and I learn” still ring true today.

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Subjective Fragility Function Estimation

Subjective Fragility Function Estimation

I needed multivariate fragility functions for seismic risk analysis of nuclear power plants. I didn’t have any test data, so Lawrence Livermore Lab paid “experts” for their opinions! I set up the questionnaires, asked for percentiles, salted the sample to check for bias, asked for percentiles of conditional fragility functions to estimate correlations, and fixed pairwise correlations to make legitimate multivariate correlation matrixes. Subjective percentiles provide more distribution information than parameter or distribution assumptions, RPNs, ABCD, high-medium-low, or RCM risk classifications.

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Reliability Techniques For Analyzing And Improving Fault Tolerance

Reliability Techniques For Analyzing And Improving Fault Tolerance

When designing equipment and processes, engineers leave a safety margin that ensures equipment remains functional when a fault or defect is affecting it partially or wholly. Minor defects affecting production assets should not cause immediate breakdowns. A fault-tolerant system remains operational for predetermined intervals before undertaking corrective measures. Faults affecting the operation of different systems emanate from more than a single source. [Read more…]

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GAO: CSB Not Meeting Its Statutory Mandates

GAO: CSB Not Meeting Its Statutory Mandates

According to a recent report (Aug. 2008) from the Government Accountability Office (GAO), the Chemical Safety Board (CSB) is not in compliance with its statutory mandates.  The CSB is an independent federal agency charged with investigating industrial chemical accidents and has been in operation since 1998. GAO report states that CSB is not investigating all chemical releases that have a fatality, serious injury, substantial property damage, or the potential for a fatality, serious injury, or substantial property damage. [Read more…]

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‘Facebook’ Maintenance & Reliability: The Illusion of Performance

‘Facebook’ Maintenance & Reliability: The Illusion of Performance

I used to be on Facebook many years ago in an effort to keep up with old friends. However, I began to realize the forum was often used to create an illusion that someone wanted their community to have about them. I knew many of these people creating such illusions, that is how I know they were ‘illusions’. Their ‘Facebook Family’ simply was not their reality. 

This is not a paper about the pro’s and con’s of social media forums such as Facebook, but more about our propensity to create illusions, or prisms in which we want others to view our work initiatives. While I could apply this concept to many personal and business situations, I’m going to limit it to our general views of Reliability, Maintenance and to a degree Safety (as a by-product of effective Maintenance and Reliability). 

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Communicating with FINESSE: Why is Framing So Important?

Communicating with FINESSE: Why is Framing So Important?

“I just got through with a telephone call,” stated a concerned voice on the other end of the line. “We addressed the wrong issue. I am not saying you. It was collectively all of us. They wanted to sell all parts of the business unit and completely get out of that aspect. We addressed them retaining ownership but having someone else operate it.”


“That is not right,” I replied. “We solved the problem they wanted us to solve, and they bought off on it. “We can develop some solutions for the other problem, but that will take some time and effort.”


“How do you know we solved the right problem?” my client asked. “They have gone over everyone’s head and say we didn’t.”

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Anticipatory Leaders Leverage Future Facts (TM)

Anticipatory Leaders Leverage Future Facts (TM)

Guest Post by Daniel Burrus (first posted on CERM ® RISK INSIGHTS – reposted here with permission)

We cannot turn back the clocks and undo the damage the pandemic has done, but we can move forward with an anticipatory mindset and a firm plan of action. For many decades now, and in all industries, digital disruption has been on an exponential curve upward. Because the pandemic forced us to turn to technology for help on both a personal and business level, the pace of technology-driven change increased dramatically, far beyond merely exponential levels. Now that this change has been set in motion, the question remains: What do we do now?

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Is Your Organization Making The Right Decisions?

Is Your Organization Making The Right Decisions?

Eating a few fries this one time will not increase risks of a heart attack. Plus I like the fries from this joint. I’m ready to order!!

That was a relatively easy decision; however, there are certain decisions that are more complex and may have significant implications to your organization’s future including organizational safety.

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Locomotive Failure Reports

Locomotive Failure Reports

Sir George Findlay was a prominent British railroad manager. He was the general manager of the London & Northwestern Railway, a major company that underwent nearly 20 years of expansion under his leadership. 

His 1895 book, The Working and Management of an English Railway, described an organization for railway track maintenance. The basic gang had four people responsible for 4 miles of track. Supervision and management included inspectors, a chief inspector, and a divisional civil engineer. Each division also had draftsmen, masons, and other special crafts at their disposal. 

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