Availability organisational analysis: Is it a hazard for safety?

This main issue of this article analyses the possible way to use for availability improvement, the organisational analysis methodology initially developed for accident safety investigations. As the last decade examples in the industrial world prove that some organisational weaknesses could either impact safety or availability, we have for purpose to make some important clarifications, with the help of the organisational paradigm, and grounded on our knowledge of safety accidents or local inquiries in hazardous technical complex systems.We will first give our definition of an availability event, by comparison with a safety event and recall what is for us an organisational analysis. Then we will consider the safety organisational paradigm pathogenic factors in wondering if these factors could also be seen as pathogenic factors for availability; or if specific availability pathogenic factors can be inferred from these safety pathogenic factors.In the end we will try to assess the common points and the differences between an availability oriented organisational analysis and a safety oriented one, with a particular attention to possible negative follows-up on safety issues and to the methodology issue.

Research highlights► Organisational availability event. ► Availability organisational pathogenic factors. ► Availability oriented organisational analysis versus safety oriented organisational analysis.