Ground Handling Safety Continued from page 15 to know about. We’re not looking to fire people because of the screw-ups, necessarily, we’re looking for how to prevent those screw-ups from hap- pening again and again and again.” In addition to ASAP, Schick points to similarly useful models. “There are info share models where everyone signs non-disclosure agreements, then they go in and lock the door, and what’s said in the room stays in the room,” Schick says. “Free sharing of this kind of infor- mation has always led to success in all other industries and in this one especially. You get better by looking at your problems together, talking about them, and putting some heads together to work out the best solu- tions. It’s like, ‘Okay, we’ve all figured out a lot of different ways to break stuff. Now let’s take everything we’ve learned and talk about how to prevent breaking stuff.’ Once you have some authentic data in front of you and some trends you can analyze, that’s when you start to be able to see some patterns, make some predictions, and identify some spots where we need some modifications to our training programs, to our auditing programs, to how we go about things to bet- ter control our operations. NATA has been in the forefront of getting the Safety Management Systems and ground audits to the operators, helping to standardize all the FBO operations across our membership so our customers know they’re going to get predictable and safe service on the ground. I think this kind of data sharing is the logical next step, now that those standards have been established across our membership.” Schick and France have been consulting with Russ Lawton, Director of Safety and ASAP Program Manager for the Air Charter Safety Foundation, to discuss ways to adapt his organization’s model to fit the needs of the NATA membership. “The classic approach to a safety incident was always, ‘You made a costly mistake, you’re fired.’ The person responsible would be walked off the property, and the bosses would feel good, thinking, ‘We got rid of the person who made the error, so that fixed the problem.’ But, more often than not, it didn’t. It was just left to the next person to come along and make the same kinds of mistakes, and we realized all these companies were setting their people up to fail,” Lawton explains. “And, worse, we were indirectly encouraging people not to report safety incidents at all, because they didn’t want to be walked off the premises and they didn’t want the FAA to come after them. We started offering good protection through ASAP for people to report safety incidents in exchange for us being able to talk about what hap- pened and try to come up with some bigger-picture fixes. We learned that there are two sure ways to kill a re- porting program: The first is to burn the reporter by making an example of him or placing blame. Everybody sees that and says, ‘Okay, I guess I won’t be talking about my incidents!’ And then the other way is to do noth- ing with the information, say ‘This is nice we have these safety reports here,’ but never do anything mean- ingful with them. Then people think, ‘Okay, I guess there’s no point!’ So the follow-through is important, too.” “The voluntary self-reporting program, conducted in cooperation with the FAA, is used to identify and reduce possible flight safety concerns and mitigate risk. The ASAP sys- tem uses employee input to identify significant safety concerns and issues, as well as operational deficiencies, non-compliance with regulations, deviations from company policies and procedures, and unusual events. Each report is then investigated, and corrective actions determined, based on a non-disciplinary approach to flight safety,” Lawton explains. Some kinds of incidents are specifically not protected under the ASAP model—in- cluding intentional non-compliance, reckless conduct, criminal activity, substance abuse, alcohol and in- tentional falsification—but for the most part the model encourages employees and companies to report and share data about safety inci- dents without fear of punishment. “Ultimately, we learned, it’s bet- ter to know what happened, what your take on it is, and how you’ve THE WHOLE IDEA IS TO MAKE IT A COOPERATIVE EFFORT 16 Aviation Business Journal | 4th Quarter 2015
