By Forrest Richardson, CSP, ARME
Director of Safety, Fit For Work
- Strong safety performance comes from an organization’s ability to adapt and respond as conditions change in real time.
- Modern safety thinking views people as the solution, not a liability.
- It’s possible to emphasize both compliance and successes.
“No injuries, no accidents, no violations” has traditionally defined safety success. However, the complexity of modern operations requires an expanded view of risk management. Safety is not simply the absence of accidents, it is the organization’s capacity to adapt, respond, learn, and succeed under changing conditions. For safety and HR leaders navigating increasingly complex operations, this shift in thinking is becoming more relevant.
What is “Safety as Capacity” in Workplace Safety?
Safety as capacity is a modern safety concept that focuses on how work actually succeeds in real-world conditions.
Safety as capacity focuses on:
- Adaptive performance: Recognize problems, break processes down, and identify both successes and failures throughout
- Organizational resilience: Prepare for change by maintaining adequate people and resources in the right places at the right times
- Learning from normal work: Understand each step of a job and its hazards; identify the difference between written standard operating procedures (SOPs) and what’s truly happening
- Human problem-solving: Reduce barriers to the thinking process that disrupt problem-solving, such as the need to protect image or avoid failure, and incorporate more people and perspectives
- Operational flexibility under pressure: Maintain focus on controllable elements during high-pressure situations to reduce emotionally charged decision-making, and place emphasis on a forward-thinking, adaptable mindset throughout the team
Why Safety as Capacity Matters Today
The modern operational reality is challenging. Organizations regularly face staffing shortages, production pressure, rapid operational change, increased automation, and complex systems interactions. Safety procedures and approaches must adapt to provide usable, accessible, and relevant information.
Standard Job Safety Analysis (JSA) documents are one area with opportunity for great impact. They are typically long, designed for OSHA compliance, but often difficult to use in real work environments. Updating JSAs to integrate ergonomic information in a condensed format creates shorter documents that highlight physical and cognitive stressors along with hazard triggers, making them a usable reference for managers and frontline employees. While written procedures alone cannot anticipate every operational condition, they can be optimized for the continuous adaptations necessary to maintain production and safety simultaneously.
Traditional vs. Modern Safety Thinking
Traditional and modern safety thinking are now frequently referred to as Safety I and Safety II, thanks to the work of safety thought leaders, including Sidney Dekker and Erik Hollnagel. Dekker and Hollnagel recently collaborated on “The Ironies of ‘Human Factors’,” exploring human factors in process engineering and safety, particularly the challenges and limitations that arise from applying machine language and rules to humans.
Dekker’s emphasis on human-centered safety systems, such as the Human & Organizational Performance (HOP) framework, and Hollnagel’s Functional Resonance Analysis Method (FRAM) both focus on learning from successful work to improve safety and overall performance. Modern safety thinking views people as the solution, not a liability.
Key differences at a glance:
| Safety I (Traditional) | Safety II (Modern) |
| Prevent failure | Enable success |
| Focus on incidents | Focus on everyday work |
| Humans are liabilities | Humans are assets |
| Rule enforcement | Adaptive capability |
| Reactive investigations | Proactive learning |
Applying Safety II principles should not come at the expense of Safety I as both layers are essential. The difference is in approach. Remember, people are often the reason operations succeed despite complexity, variability, staffing shortages, and changing conditions. They are not simply the source of error.
In Practice: Applying Safety as Capacity in a Warehouse Environment
A warehousing employer with a multi-story conveyor system consistently experienced issues with safety gates being tied open. Initial conversations with management suggested workers rarely interacted with the gates. Further inquiry with frontline employees yielded very different feedback. When pallets of product were delivered, they often needed to be moved to different locations. Since the safety gates were gravity-fed and designed for one-way use, pallets would frequently get caught on the gates when transport in the opposite direction was required.
The employer required a solution that would support the functional need to move pallets while also supporting a safe work environment. The resolution was a combination of high-powered magnets to hold the gates open, in addition to employee training on the importance of closing the gates from a distance of at least six feet from any leading edge immediately after moving product through. Monthly inspections and good employee communication to monitor process compliance and success were strongly recommended.
Common Misconceptions
Safety as capacity does not mean ignoring compliance, eliminating accountability, removing procedures, or accepting unsafe behavior. It is possible to emphasize both compliance and successes by focusing on:
- Designing systems that support human success
- Understanding why workers adapt
- Learning from normal work
- Building operational resilience before failure occurs
Real-World Organizational Benefits
Adjustments to safety processes and procedures require significant time and energy, so what makes the investment worthwhile?
Operational benefits are significant, with the first four serving as primary drivers for all that follow:
- Better employee engagement
- Reduced fear-based reporting barriers
- Improved learning culture
- Better management-worker trust
- Fewer serious events
- Improved near-miss reporting
- Faster hazard identification
Business benefits are a direct result of operational benefits:
- Higher operational reliability
- Reduced downtime
- Better retention
- Improved morale
- Increased organizational resilience
Practical Steps for Safety Leaders to Apply Safety as Capacity
The journey to achieving maximum organizational benefits begins with leadership. The cognitive overload of complex, high-pressure production environments often create resistance to the increased work that comes with change. Developing a practical plan with small, incremental steps that ease the burden of adoption is key:
- Observe normal work, not only incidents
- Ask employees:
- What makes this job difficult?
- What workarounds are necessary because the current procedure doesn’t fit the process?
- Measure operational resilience indicators:
- Fatigue
- Variability
- Staffing pressures
- Equipment reliability
- Reduce blame-focused investigations
- Strengthen frontline involvement in risk decisions
Conclusion
The future of safety leadership is shifting from controlling workers to building systems that strengthen human performance, adaptability, and resilience. Organizations that embrace safety as capacity are often better prepared to manage complexity, maintain production reliability, and protect employees in dynamic operating environments.
Ready to move beyond compliance? Connect with the Fit For Work team to explore how safety as capacity can be applied in your organization.
Forrest Richardson has served as the Safety Division Director for Fit For Work for 24 years. He has over 30 years of experience in environmental health & safety (EHS) compliance management and leads national, regional, and local EHS Compliance services for Fit For Work. Forrest holds the Certified Safety Professional (CSP), Associate Risk Management Enterprise (ARME), and Certified Safety Manager (CSM) certifications. He also facilitates the Fit For Work Safety Specialist professional development track, supporting EHS podcasts, white papers, blogs, and safety newsletters.
Forrest proudly served in the United States Army 25th Infantry Division, Big Red One and 1st Calvary 227th Assault Helicopter Divisions. He is a professional member of the American Society of Safety Professionals, serving as chapter president, and supporting national professional development conferences. As a guest speaker he supports national, regional, and local professional development conferences across general, construction, and oil and gas industries.
