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Old 7th April 2009 | 23:29
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Gen. Anaesthetic
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Practical risk management tools

Can't say I've seen airline specific examples of this sort of thing, but there are risk management standards used around the world that are typically cited when presenting risk analyses. AS/NZ 4360 is the one I am most familiar with having worked and studied in the risk space for a while. That said, in my experience its use tends towards establishing some sort of credibility as opposed to being a truly practical tool. It is essentially a genericised process whereas risk management is rarely something that can be made generic or completely objective. Thus I find that people tend to lean on the standard too much without allowing their professional experience to count for much.

Perhaps you can see where I am going with this. In doing a risk analysis such as this you need to have a clear understanding of why you are doing this and who it is for. An obvious statement, but the concept gets lost often enough. The method and the content of the risk analysis really needs to incorporate all of the experience and knowledge that the organisation has, rather than trying to get people to sit around a table and come up with risk scores that at the end of the day are still highly subjective (such a process usually makes people frustrated and they end up feeling that this whole risk management thing is a big fat waste of time). To do this you need to be out there talking to the different parties and building you're own picture and then relying on the impressions you get to write something intelligent and useful. Easier said than done perhaps but in doing so you are also building an awareness of risk management throughout the organisation which hopefully will mean more people will come on board as they see what you are trying to do.

The beauty of a problem such as this one is that this is a repeatable process. Presumably this is not the first route the airline has considered so the lessons of establishing previous routes will help break down the different subject areas into manageable chunks. For example ground handling, air traffic services, etc'. Of course you also have to tie all the pieces together given that a huge challenge of any airline operation is ensuring the timing of operations doesn't result in too many unmanageable peaks and inefficient troughs.

Of course data is also essential. Once again I imagine you have data relating to delays in the current operation, unserviceability statistics and so on that will lend at least some level of objectivity to the risk analysis.

Hm. Now that I've written this much I'm interested to learn more about what you are trying to do!! A company with whom I have no affiliation with whatsoever but I believe they are pretty good in this area is Aerosafe (aerosafe.com.au). I'm pretty sure they operate all over the world in aviation risk management.

Hope that helps.
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