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EASA Resilience

Old 15th Nov 2021, 09:13
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Question EASA Resilience

EASA has a requirement for ‘Resilience’ training within CRM;- ORO.FC.115 Crew resource management (CRM) training, with AMCs and guidance material.

However, where and how does EASA specifically define Resilience ?

Definitions are quoted in non EASA documentation, but without any link to a specific EASA document.
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Old 15th Nov 2021, 21:22
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I would recommend you to contact John at EASA, very attentive chap
at EASA web site under community/ga
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Old 16th Nov 2021, 13:43
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Airgus, thanks.

I assume that this is the ‘John’ forum:-
https://www.easa.europa.eu/community/airoperations

Unfortunately my quest started here with the latest edition of AirOps news:-
https://www.easa.europa.eu/community...ber%202021.pdf

This refers to an Airbus publication on ‘resilience’ training:-
https://mms-safetyfirst.s3.eu-west-3...resilience.pdf

Which quotes -
‘Resilience is used to qualify and evaluate human performance when faced with unexpected disruptions in operation. EASA has defined flight crew resilience as, “the ability of a flight crew member to recognize, absorb and adapt to disruptions”.’
I an unable to find the EASA definition as used by Airbus, thus my Pprune question to breakout of the EASA loop.

In addition, the Airbus article and IATA ref does not align with the EASA ORO view of residence (or at least my interpretation); e.g. mental flexibility, performance adaption (AMC1), and ability, process, …(GM5), much of which is already in some CRM teachings.
Overall, EASA’s position is confusing in using a mixture of dictionary ‘resilience’ (can this be trained) and aspects of Resilience Engineering (which considers capacity to act from systems view.)
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Old 9th May 2022, 13:12
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Resilience

Hi there,
I see you were looking for definitions re: resilience. I am researching resilience at the moment for a project we are currently working on. Would be happy to chat regarding resilience ito EBT, CRM, etc.
Best regards
Mike
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Old 19th May 2022, 01:52
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Hi Mike,

I would be interested in the project too.

BD
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Old 29th May 2022, 10:13
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I found a definition in EASA operational documentation, but now have mislaid the location.
This is no great loss after considering the wider academic and practical views of Resilience, which indicate (my interpretation) that the introduction of resilience development within CRM is misplaced, misapplied.

Whilst many aspects of resilience can be viewed as an extension of CRM (resilience development), CRM for management, its application fails to appreciate resilience’s basis of a systems view.
Resilience involves a new way of thinking about safety.

CRM - team safety management; Resilience - ‘system’ safety management.

Resilience is a concept, which like ‘safety’ can be considered as something to have, or something which is done. Whereas safety is more often viewed as either-or (SMS vs CRM), resilience requires the combination of both views, especially activities (thinking, adapting); and critically within a system of man-machine-environment.
The activities should be founded on Safety-II (in combination with Safety-I), with systems thinking - having a holistic viewpoint.

Resilience does not require a definition. The need is to explain the Concept of Resilience as a necessary evolution of safety management in ever increasing complex operations; as a new way of thinking, managing uncertainty.

CRM would benefit from using a Safety-II viewpoint, with emphasis on awareness and understanding, which with systems thinking could aid safety management in complex, uncertain operations.
First, a change in mindset, a new way of thinking about safety; safety management. Thence acceptance that everything is uncertain, judgements opposed to decisions, guidance opposed to regulation.
It is very difficult to impose (change) behaviour, thinking, on individuals, teams, or the overall system.
Concepts cannot be regulated, they have to be understood and embraced.
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Old 5th Jun 2022, 02:35
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Hi Mike V1Software and PEI_3721 ,

Video worth a watch if you have a free moment:
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Old 7th Jun 2022, 06:44
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‘… worth a watch if …’ ?
The video promotes a psychological view of resilience, often seen in ‘pink and fluffy’ versions of CRM; show a video - training complete.

The concept of resilience in aviation requires specific explanation.
Resilience behaviours involve thinking, a holistic approach within an ill defined complex system.

Thinking, and thence acting, involves tacit skills.
We would not expect to be able to land an aircraft, any aircraft, in all situations and conditions after watching a video. Such behaviour involves skills, these depend on understanding the objective, the mechanism of action (an aircraft - landing; an operation - resilience), which are acquired primarily by demonstration.
Learn by watching, understand by doing, again and again, in as many scenarios as can be encountered.

“An improvement program must be directed at what you want, not what you don’t want. When you get rid of something you don’t want, you don’t necessarily get what you do want.” Ackoff.

Re previous opinion #6, misapplication of resilience;

http://www.ep.liu.se/ecp/023/002/ecp2307002.pdf
and
https://lup.lub.lu.se/luur/download?...ileOId=9061089

Last edited by PEI_3721; 7th Jun 2022 at 07:26.
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Old 7th Jun 2022, 16:10
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Resilience in Aviation

Thanks for posting those two documents which I have read. Both informative and both suggest that there is a somewhat of a disconnect between the regulatory authorities, operators and the individual actually performing the tasks (pilots in this instance).

Resilience, in my mind, can be both systems resilience (operator resilience) and individual resilience (pilot). Operator resilience is about the organizations ability to absorb disruptions and is more systems dependent, albeit combined with individuals performing the required tasks who are no doubt influenced by their own individual resilience. A pilot's resilience is dependent on the individual. Personally, I am researching resilience regarding pilots as both IATA/ICAO and EASA suggest that resilience is an output of Evidence Based Training (EBT) ie: a pilot signed out as proficient in an approved EBT training program should be resilient - that's the theory at least. We have developed an EBT system for an operator (going into final user test 1 July 2020) and in our research of EBT we discovered resilience. Therefore, if a resilient pilot is a product of an EBT operator how do you measure resilience, or do you even need to measure it? The easy answer is just not to measure it, but is that right?

Interestingly, Airbus (Safety First, Training Pilots for Resilience, October 2021) suggest that pilot resilience is dependent on their competency and their confidence. NASA (Wing, et al, 2020) assert that the attributes required for resilience include Anticipate, Monitor, Respond and Learn. A little more detail on these attributes:- Anticipate future events or situations,
- Monitor both its own performance and environmental factors,
- Respond to expected and unexpected events, and to
- Learn from experience

Furthermore, a lot of the research around pilot resilience revolves around the 'startle' effect. This is appropriate and required in the context of aviation. However, I would suggest that pilot resilience is also affected by operational challenges encountered on the day eg: pax late boarding, additional cargo requiring weight-and-balance re-calcs, adverse weather, ATC challenges, etc., etc. On top of that how does fatigue affect pilot resilience?

The big question in my mind can resilience be measured?

Best regards
Mike

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Old 7th Jun 2022, 16:13
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BoeingDriver99 you are welcome to contact me to discuss your thesis on resilience. Sent you a mail with my email address
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Old 10th Jun 2022, 08:02
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Mike, ‘a disconnect in regulation’, I agree, but what to do about it.

Your ‘definitions’, constrain resilience; a problem with this is the loss the systems viewpoint, and a tendency to revert to old views of safety management.
The view of the individual (pilot), could be visualised as a system with analogy using the SHELL model. The simple human centred radial connections (HF CRM), would be joined up to form a system of all of elements interacting with each other, - a ‘system’ spiders web. In addition, a systems view is required for all of the factors within each element. Perhaps the concept maps (page 27 -) in the ‘Reliance on Resilience’ ref attempts to consider this - but these are not systems maps
A crew view (CRM) would consist of two or more interconnected and interacting SHELL diagrams with increasing complexity.

Using the same analogy, an operator or regulator ‘system’ would have to encompass every aspect of every diagram, every element, etc, etc. Hence Hollnagel’s intractable system, uncertainty in everything.
From this the need is to manage uncertainty in operations. This would involve the attributes which you identify, but they could be better considered as capacities, potential for managing uncertainty, before, during, and after the fact.

The behaviour associated with these (tacit) capacities is difficult to impart in training; and should not be, (cannot be), measured. This questions the use of ‘Evidence’ based training, opposed to a need for ‘Experience’, improved knowledge and judgement in uncertainty, adding to the way we think. These critically start with awareness - situational understanding.
Outward behaviour might be observed, but this requires simulation of an uncertain situation. Although potentials cannot be seen directly they might be discussed via questioning and debriefing.
Even if instructors believe that they have created realistic (uncertain) situation, their views cannot be related to the trainees’ because there is no correct answer in uncertain situations, no predefined outcome, no SOP. It is these aspects which the industry has to appreciate in their revised thinking about safety.

It is interesting to see the differing approaches to the word ‘resilience’. Academic vs practical, the latter invariably involving compromise, which inappropriately remains under the ‘resilience’ title because that is what the regulator specified.
Thus after the search for a definition, it might better not to have one, neither to use the word resilience at all. The need for change is in safety viewpoint, thinking, how to manage uncertainty, enhance the skills of awareness, judgement, in unforeseeable situations.

“… with popularity has come noise and confusion as the label (resilience) continues to be used in multiple, diverse and, sometimes, incompatible ways.

https://www.researchgate.net/profile...ication_detail
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Old 11th Jun 2022, 04:45
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I would say that these concepts are very much on the academic side of things and heading towards abstract to the point of not being usable in any form. "The behaviour associated with these (tacit) capacities is difficult to impart in training; and should not be, (cannot be), measured." This is great to note in academia but of no practical use in training and flight safety. I detect a hint of post-modernism in that direction.

The system of commercial aviation as we know it is constrained by it's own environment, regulations and the people involved and any attempts to reduce risk/improve safety/proactively get ahead of the black swan event have to be thought of, created and implemented within such a framework. Straying outside of that framework is great for thought experiments but unless it can be broken down into implementable ideas then it is of no practical use.

However at the same time; as we reach a point were the engineering side of things means that the failures are more and more likely to be human-led there is a need for aviation safety systems and regulatory authorities to update their thinking and drag themselves into the 21st century - EBT being a prime example of that.

Also I think that a lot of safety discussions in an abstract and practical sense focus on the 'system' being update and applied to the 'user/pilot' and does not take into account the variability in the 'user'. Pilots are not all the same, with the same skills, motivations, intelligence and resilience. Training and recruitment needs to start taking these factors into consideration.
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Old 16th Jun 2022, 17:39
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Boeing, significant agreement with your views, however:

- given the extent and speed of change, and increasing complexity in operation, the industry must do more than just note academia, not dismiss it without thought. Academics provide many theories, industry holds the responsibility to translate these into practical activity.

- we should not expect to have a neat, practical solution when considering complex situations.*
Improved understanding is required to help think about issues in different way, to learn, monitor, etc.

- “… failures are more and more likely to be human-led”. A significant aspect of changing our thinking about safety is to consider joint activity; the human-machine as an entity, or with wider interaction, as a system; view the human as a help within the overall system.

- a system focus should include the variability in operations, also the ambiguities and assumptions, but not to seek a human focussed solution.
What if pilot selection, training, operational performance have reached an ill defined limit due to the complexity of modern operational situations, systematic interactions.
We should not expect to ‘improve’ the human, instead understand, adapt the system to the human. (James Reason)

The EASA implementation of Resilience in CRM appears to have mis-judged these points. Inappropriate focus on the human.

- “… safety systems and regulatory authorities to update their thinking”
They themselves, and then all of us must adopt the concept of Resilience, use holistic (systems) thinking, embrace safety-II, before expecting any meaningful change within the industry.

Resilience is a process looking for viewpoints from which to aid safety.

Is current safety management activity hindering the view by considering resiliences as a solution opposed to activity with a new perspective ?

http://scpsystem.weebly.com/uploads/...s_thinking.pdf
Are current systems of safety management and regulation contributing to the problem - the ‘mess’.

* http://www.demos.co.uk/files/Connect...ts_-_web-2.pdf
We should be gardeners, not architects; tend to what we have, avoid partially effective, costly destabilising interventions.
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Old 8th Jul 2022, 21:26
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The recordings from the EASA Safety Week 2022, which included SMS / Resilience, are now available online:
https://www.youtube.com/playlist?lis...yCeA5MJHZ3cXUY

There did not appear to be very much content directly relating to resilience, none for CRM.

The SMS aspect of resilience focused on the recovery from covid, etc, which by implication those operators who are still in business must have been resilient. However, there was no indication of how that was achieved nor what might be learnt about the concept of resilience.
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Old 29th Aug 2022, 21:44
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The document below is a view of (or around) the subject.
It identifies the need to change our view of safety in complex adaptive systems - all operations. There are indictions of a Safety-II mindset and holistic thinking which relate to ‘resilience’ (defined but not used).

https://flightsafety.org/wp-content/...world_rev1.pdf


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Old 2nd Sep 2022, 13:36
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The roots of the ‘How Operators Can Create Safety in an Uncertain World’ are in a previous “Defining Resilience’ article:-
https://flightsafety.org/asw-article...ng-resilience/

Th Aero Safety article retains the old view of safety opposed to a new view, Safety-II, and also divides resilience amongst individual/teams and the organisation, overlooking the important ‘system’, combined view.
Resilience is defined from a dictionary, organisational management view without correlation to aviation. (The subsequent article corrects that).
Many training aspects are already within CRM or EBT. The focus is on ‘safety events’ - risk, old safety, opposed to the adaptation required to continue to manage normal operations; thus a drift towards failure in examples.

How Operators Can Create Safety in an Uncertain World’ lacks emphasis on the need and extent of change, quoting “… a move to support safety management”, “… not a wholesale change”; whereas other ‘Resilience’ and ‘Safety-II’ texts emphasise ‘a change from … to’, proposing a new way of thinking about safety management.

The text misrepresents the concept of a complex adaptive system; ‘expected events are not necessarily just ordered (complicated), nor all unexpected events complex - they are just unexpected.
Accepting uncertainty is important, but the emphasis on understanding complexity (can it ever be understood) detracts from the need support the human in adjusting to the uncertainties in normal operations, by understanding why normal operations succeed; the awareness, knowledge, choice of action. Seeking to achieve more of what goes right.

This document has value, if only as another view of the concept of Resilience which is difficult to comprehend and apply, but don't expect to be able to ‘create safety’ based on this, if ever.

However as a ‘foundational support document’, it appears to be misplaced by locating it within the ‘Learning from all operations’ initiative - more on that later.
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Old 5th Oct 2022, 16:17
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An recent interesting view from EuroControl

Building a Basis for Resilient Performance

Note the revised ‘working’ definition of Resilience, page 8, and the emphasis on activity.
and that Resilience is “an investment to facilitate that things go well,” which is closely associated with Safety-II

https://safetysynthesis.com/onewebme...T%29%20Web.pdf
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Old 2nd Nov 2022, 08:39
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Perhaps it isn't so surprising that the working industry has difficulties with these concepts, where apparently the academics also have problems in understanding / implementation;-

In particular:-
https://www.dropbox.com/sh/3kdztka0j...Shorrock+2.pdf

All presentations:-
https://www.dropbox.com/sh/3kdztka0j...xtqrOASpa?dl=0

From the meeting;-
https://humanisticsystems.com/5th-in...ll-operations/
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Old 10th Mar 2023, 13:43
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Resilience Engineering news letter March 2023; aviation content.

https://www.resilience-engineering-a..._March2023.pdf

Note:
Gitte Furdal Damm; many of our adaptations have become normal.
Where is EASA Safety II, do they still believe in it; need to adapt SMS.

Laura Maguire; continuous contextual learning.
… learning becomes knowledge about how the system functions under different conditions.

Tom Laursen; Two views of procedures, the need for change.
EuroControl leading aviation again.

Burnell and Waites; a difficult read, but some valuable ideas … an approach to learning grounded in the belief that context is the most important element of any data collected.
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Old 3rd Jul 2023, 08:01
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Safety-II and Resilience Engineering in a Nutshell

A compact and readable introduction and explanation for Safety-I and Safety-II, and Resilient Engineering in safety management. FRAM is briefly discussed; perhaps better suited to the professional analysts, but many similarities with systems thinking.

"Safety-II and Resilience Engineering in a Nutshell: An Introductory Guide to Their Concepts and Methods"
https://www.sciencedirect.com/scienc...0d73f0cfd5067a
(view pdf)


Also a good range of references;
e.g. 'The imperfections of accident analysis'. https://www.icheme.org/media/12669/lpb270_pg02.pdf

,

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