My Favourite Human Factors Factoids

Human factors is a rich field of research and application. It encompasses how our bodies work, our minds think, and how we interact with each other and interface with tools, equipment and technology. It is absolutely ridiculous to think one can reduce human factors to mere factoids.

But it’s day 19 of this blogathon, and I need to write something firmly within my wheelhouse.

Collision Course

If you are on a collision course with something, it will not move in your field of view

Up in the sky, this typically means that the aircraft on a conflicting flight path will start as a tiny dot in your windscreen and not move across it. Plus, the geometry of angular distance and the physics of closing speed mean that it will stay small until it’s too late.

On the ground, it tends to manifest as that other vehicle staying in your blind spot (e.g. behind the windscreen post) until something goes crunch. Mindfulness of this concept is the first step to avoiding it. When flying and often when driving on an aerodrome, I would try to move my shoulders when keeping a lookout. Maybe not to this level, though…

Good Stress

People need some pressure to reach optimal performance

When charted against stress or pressure, performance is often drawn as a bell curve (or something similar) with a peak above a moderate stress level. While distress, overwork and breakdown are familiar terms, we don’t hear much about eustress and the positive impact of pressure. The moral of the story is that boredom can be just as dangerous as overload.

The Authority Gradient

The nature of the power relationship between a supervisor and their team can impact on team performance, often adversely

The phenomenon was observed on many a flightdeck, including some of those involved in some serious accidents. In this traditional setting, an authority gradient refers to the power relationship between the Captain and the First Officer. Initially, it was observed that if the Captain’s authority, whether in terms of rank, seniority, experience, competence, etc., was significantly higher than the other crew member, it would adversely impact crew communication and coordination.

Further research also found that an overly shallow gradient (i.e. near equality) and a reverse gradient were barriers to good crew resource management. Much like the factoid above, the optimal is an identifiable level of authority without lauding it over the other crew member.

These concepts are equally applicable to any team. Suppose an experienced supervisor dominates their team’s activities or an experienced team member undermines the boss, then the team is going to run into trouble. Equally, a supervisor that insists on involving everyone in every decision will not perform well over time.

Fatigue is Cumulative

All activity incurs a sleep debt and if you don’t pay that debt (with sleep) iT accumulates

You can’t bank sleep. So when you start the day, at best, you are at zero sleep required. And it’s all downhill from there!

Over the day, you incur a debt that must be paid back that night. If you don’t get enough sleep that night, you’ll wake up the next day already in debt. If that pattern continues, you’ll get to the weekend and wake up exhausted.

Culture

It's an energy field created by all living things. It surrounds us and penetrates us. It binds the galaxy together.

I love the concept of culture. I’ve studied it for over ten years and written about it here, here and here. In the last couple of years, it has hit the mainstream with people facing concepts like unconscious biases, institutional prejudice and systemic disadvantage. However, it can be a complex concept to describe succinctly because it is multi-faceted.

I like to focus on culture’s effect on behaviours. Culture acts through the group to modify the behaviour of the group’s members until it is “acceptable”. In a safety setting, this means that each individual’s approach to safety will be moulded by the group through reinforcement. Safety policies and procedures may have an effect, but only in so far as the group supports them.

As a father of teenagers, I can see that the feedback from their peers has much more impact on their behaviour than any edict I may issue.