Use of HSE staffing assessment method CRR 348/2001

1. Creating the environment for business
Staffing arrangements that ensure
capable teams
Andrew Brazier
Principal consultant
Entec UK Ltd.
Gadbrook Business Park
Northwich, Cheshire CW9 7TN
01606 354866
andrew.brazier@entecuk.co.uk
www.entecuk.com

2. Creating the environment for business
Contents
Identifying the individual and team capabilities
required to operate safely under all circumstances
Minimising factors that affect capabilities in the short
term
Ensuring capabilities can be maintained over the
longer term
Staffing assessment methodology
– Developed by Entec on behalf of the HSE
– Lessons learned from applying the method

3. Creating the environment for business
What defines an individual’s capability?
Physical and mental attributes
Training they have received
The tests and exams they have passed
Their experience of the job
Their experience of specific tasks
Their knowledge and understanding of the systems
they work with.
Their ability to deal with all events they are
likely to encounter

4. Creating the environment for business
What makes a team capable?
Individual capabilities
Team work
– Structure (hierarchical/self-managed)
– Communication
– Inter-personal skills
Information
– ‘Live’ process data
– Technical information
(design/procedures)

5. Creating the environment for business
For emergency scenarios this involves
Detecting
– searching, reading and monitoring displays
– hearing alarms
Diagnosing
– consulting documents & colleagues
– thinking
Responding
– using controls (in the field, in the control room)
– raising the alarm & mobilising emergency services
Working effectively under time pressure, threat of
harm in an unfamiliar situation

6. Creating the environment for business
What can make a capable team incapable?
Distractions
– ‘Noise’
– Competing tasks
– Morale
Trauma
– Stress/fatigue
System inadequacy
– Unreliable control/communication systems
– Human-machine interface
Poor health of team members

7. Creating the environment for business
HSE concerns
The ‘physical’ ability to detect, diagnose and recover
from scenario’s in time to prevent accidents
Willingness to initiate scenario recovery actions
Training, development, roles & responsibilities
Teamworking and the role of support staff outside of
the ‘normal’ team
Management of organisational change
Management of safety
Entec commissioned in 1997 to develop a method for
assessing the adequacy of staffing arrangements

8. Creating the environment for business
Specification of the staffing assessment method
• Support duty holders in obligations to assess & manage risks
• Focus on loss of containment events with off-site potential
• Bring staffing issues into the open
• Be valid for the operational circumstances found in the
chemical and allied industries
• Enable duty holders to obtain a clear cut indication of
whether their staffing arrangements are unsafe
• Gauge the impact of staffing changes prior to implementation
• Practical, useable & intelligible to duty holders & inspectors;
− Not reliant on specialist skills
• Be structured and auditable;
• Facilitate dialogue between duty holders & inspectors.

9. Creating the environment for business
Assessment Methodology
 Method does not attempt to calculate a minimum or optimum number of staff
 There may be technological options to improve staffing arrangements as an
alternative to an increase in operator numbers
 It assesses staffing numbers plus how the arrangements are managed
– Decision trees
 PHYSICAL ASSESSMENT
YES
YES NO
NO
– Individual and organisational factors
 LADDER ASSESSMENT

10. Creating the environment for business
Resourcing
Facilitator
Secretary
Assessment team
Key people to involve
– independence
– experience
– roles
– skills

11. Creating the environment for business
Physical Assessment - The Six Principles
There should be continuous supervision of the process by
skilled operators
Distractions should be minimised
Information required for diagnosis and recovery should be
accessible, correct and intelligible
Communication links between the control room and field
should be reliable
Staff required to assist in diagnosis and recovery should
be available with sufficient time to attend when required
Operating staff should be allowed to concentrate on
recovering the plant to a safe state
1
2
3
4
5
6

12. Creating the environment for business
Assessment of physical arrangements
Are people where they need to be?
– To hear alarms, to read displays
Are there enough people around?
– Will stand-by operators be able to leave their own units
– Will off-site staff travel in in enough time
Can people do their tasks in the time available?
– Can field operators get from place to place in time
Will the communications be reliable?
– Will the batteries last
Eight decision trees provided to assess the adequacy of
physical arrangements

13. Creating the environment for business
Is Control Room (CR)
continuously manned?
Yes No
Does the CR operator go into the field?
What is the maximum time
the CRO is away from CR?
Mins.
Where does the CRO go?
Define:
Is it more than the minimum
time it takes to develop an
unrecoverable scenario?
Yes No
Yes No

14. Creating the environment for business
What happens if the CRO gets retained e.g.
treating a process problem, or he falls over?
What is the primary way that a process alarm or
trip is detected when he is away?
FAIL
Sufficient
Reliability?
No Yes
None Pager? External Alarm? 3rd Party?
Other?
No Yes

15. Creating the environment for business
No Yes
Sufficient and
robust
justification?
Yes No
FAILEND
Is there a back-up?
Yes
Define:
No
FAIL
Sufficient
Reliability?
No Yes
FAIL Sufficient and
robust
justification?
Yes No
FAILEND

16. Creating the environment for business
Assessment of individual and
organisational factors
Set of questions encourage assessment team to
consider the key issues
‘Ladders’ provided to assess adequacy
– Each rung is a description of system attributes
– Start at the bottom, how high do you get?
Minimum, acceptable levels are defined for each
ladder

17. Creating the environment for business
Ladder topics
Situational awareness
Teamworking
Alertness and fatigue (work pattern)
Alertness and fatigue (health)
Training and development
Roles and responsibilities
Willingness to initiate recovery actions
Management of operating procedures
Management of change
Continuous improvement of safety
Management of safety

18. Creating the environment for business
Situational Awareness Ladder - Questions for Operators
1) Can you think of any examples of critical situations
where you were uncertain about the state of the
process?
2) How do you monitor process trends?
3) How do you decide when to take action to improve a
process condition (e.g. alarms, trends etc)?
4) How do you track plant conditions?
5) What do you do to make shift handover easier for the
shift coming on to understand the plant condition?
6) How easy do you find it to access process
information
7) How would you like to improve the screens?
8) How frequently are you disturbed in the middle of
tracking process conditions? By what?

19. Creating the environment for business
Situational awareness ladder
There is a high level of continuity in the Operator(s) tasks during critical process events i.e.
Operators are not required to perform tasks that significantly disrupt their concentration on the
process, and they are able to delay/bring forward activities in order to minimise distractions.
During critical process activities that demand the Operator’s attention, they are not disturbed
unnecessarily by other activities such as mustering, site alarms, telephone/ radio communications,
permit raising, issuing of interlock keys, visitors etc.
Information about the process and plant condition is adequate for Operators to be confident they can
monitor ‘smooth’ running.
It is possible for operators to keep track of the process during upset/emergency conditions if they
work hard to gather all relevant information from control room displays/log books. There can be
times when they rely on other Operators/ Field Operators relaying information to them
The presentation of information makes it straightforward for Operators to gauge accurately and
reliably within the available time the condition and behaviour of the plant in normal and
upset/emergency conditions, without reliance on support.
In upset and emergency conditions all relevant Operators and Supervisors can gauge accurately and
reliably the condition and behaviour of the plant within the available time, without disturbing each
other or blocking each other’s access to information.
Operators find it difficult to keep track of the process even in smooth conditions. This may be due to
insufficient information, unreliability of sensors or displays, or they can’t attend to the process
because of other tasks they are required to perform, or distractions.
A
B
C
D
X
Y
Z
GRADE ANCHOR

20. Creating the environment for business
Case study 1
Moving operation to a centralised control room
Re-instrumentation and advanced control
Reduction in field operators from 4 to 3 in one area
Reduction of Shift Supervisors from 3 to 2

21. Creating the environment for business
Impact on staffing arrangements
Possible increased workload because of less people
on each shift
Teamwork to become even more critical, especially in
upset and emergency situations
Training plans need to be updated to reflect new
organisation
Change of interfaces with plant could affect situation
awareness

22. Creating the environment for business
Case Study 2
Change from 4 shifts to 5 shifts
Change from week on week off, to 4-3-4 3-4-4
On-call rota introduced
No job losses or change in average working hours
Impact on staffing arrangements
Change in competency profiles as shifts change (mix of
experienced operators and trainees)
Existing teams disbanded and new teams to be formed
Unknown effect on fatigue caused by the call-out rota
Reduced morale due to change anxiety

23. Creating the environment for business
Case study 3
Reduction in shift personnel from 5 to 3
Implementation of self managed teams
Team leaders to work days only
Impact on staffing arrangements
Need to change operating philosophy, initiate
shutdown earlier during a plant upset
Uncertainty about who would act as incident controller
Difficulty in covering absence as less people available

24. Creating the environment for business
Common themes (usually unrelated to
changes taking place)
Over reliance on informal training
Inadequate refresher training
Too many distractions in control rooms
– Nuisance alarms
– Visitors, contractors, day staff
No control on shift swaps, overtime etc.
Very passive approach to stress and fatigue
Poor management of the safety implications of
organisational change (including staffing levels)

25. Creating the environment for business
HSE Contract Research Report
CRR 348/2001
Assessing the safety of staffing arrangements for
process operations in the chemical and allied
industries
www.hse.gov.uk/research/crr_htm/index.htm