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Britt Howard, Group Director, Assurance Americas, Worley
Information Technology process safety 

Process Safety Leadership

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By Britt Howard, Group Director, Assurance Americas, Worley

Disclaimer:  The views expressed in this article are those of the author alone and do not represent the company views.

Process Safety Leadership is profoundly important because a lapse in a process safety situation can lead to work family members and the community surrounding the workplace being negatively impacted. The negative impact can include serious injuries, negative environmental impacts, property damage, and interrupted production.

Process Safety Defined, but Not Limited to – Managing and influencing the Safe Operation and Processing of Hazardous Materials (e.g., reactive chemicals, flammable materials, explosive materials, and toxic materials). Safely managing the operation and processing of materials includes providing the appropriate layers of prevention and protection to reduce the frequency and severity of process safety events and learning from these events.

The basic elements of Process Safety Leadership Includes:

  • Anticipation – Consider the potential process safety hazards and act on signals (e.g., new process, near misses, and noncompliance to expectations) that indicate the potential for process safety events.
  • Recognition – Identifying and acting on the obvious signals that indicate potential for process safety events.
  • Evaluation – Ensuring the appropriate critique and measurement of process safety risk is assessed by subject matter experts.
  • Execution – Applying the appropriate process safety controls to manage process safety hazards.
  • Resilient – Maintaining a proactive level of Process Safety by embracing new technology, assuring that process safety hazard controls are consistently applied, learning from local and external process safety events, and facilitating all work family members to feel empowered and valued in the process safety management space.

Process Safety Leaders Anticipate – Understanding the process and Process Safety hazards is a must to effectively anticipate how and what type of process safety event could happen. From a leadership perspective, recognizing and acting on the signals that indicate probable process safety events is paramount. When I was the corporate process safety leader for an independent energy company, I studied the investigation material that came from the Texas City BP incident to learn what process safety gaps were applicable to us. I focused on ensuring we closed out process safety audit action items, we provided training in frontline process safety leadership, and we applied accountability at all levels of our organization in the process safety management space.

Process Safety Leaders Recognize – Identifying and acting on the obvious signals that indicate potential for process safety events is a must to prevent and minimize the negative impacts of process safety events. Identifying and controlling process safety event risk at all stages of the process life cycle is a must:

  • Design Engineering Phase
  • Material Procurement Phase
  • Construction Phase
  • Functional Process Verification / Commissioning Phase
  • Safe Process Operation Phase

The negative impact of a missing or poor Process Safety Leadership Process can lead to serious injuries, negative environmental impacts, property damage, and interrupted production.

Process Safety Leaders Evaluate – Ensuring the appropriate critique and measurement of process safety risk is assessed by subject matter experts is one of the responsibilities of a Process Safety Leader. Process Hazard Operability Workshops and alike are critical for work family members in different roles of the process work structure to share their thoughts on process safety risk and mitigation recommendations.

I have led and participated in hundreds of Process Hazard Operability Workshops during the time I served in HSE roles for chemical plants, refineries, and gas plants. Process Hazard Operability Workshops are a focused collaboration for work family members that have a connection to the hazardous process to think of what hazards are present, what is the worst that could happen in the process event space, and what can be implemented to prevent such occurrences from happening. During my 18 years of serving in the process safety space directly, I experienced several process fires, runaway reactions, significant toxic material spills/releases, and explosions on assets with which I worked.

Process Safety Leaders Execute – Applying the appropriate process safety controls to manage process safety risk in all phases of the process life cycle (e.g., Design Engineering Phase, Material Procurement Phase, Construction Phase, Functional Process Verification Phase, and Safe Process Operation Phase). Executive Process Safety Leaders own the resources to implement the process safety risk mitigation plans that are necessary to prevent or minimize event probability and severity.

Process Safety Leadership includes the term influence in the definition. Influence means more than motivating others to think, behave, or react a certain way, in my opinion.

Influence is Getting Others to Do What You Want Them to Do Because They Want to Do It

Ultimate Process Safety Leadership is Getting Others to Manage Hazardous Processes Because They Want to Rather Than Because They Must Meet a Regulatory Requirement

Process Safety Leaders are Resilient – Maintaining a Proactive level of Process Safety by embracing new technology, assuring that process safety hazard controls are consistently applied, learning from local and external process safety events, and facilitating all work family members to feel empowered and valued in the process safety management space.

Many process safety events happen because of a breakdown in individual and collective process safety leadership (e.g., a lack of learning of the process, not reporting discrepancies between process operating procedures and how the process is managed in the plant, not reporting near misses, not applying accountability when procedural expectations were not followed, and not separating the personal safety performance from the process safety performance). Process Safety must be maintained as part of the culture of the work family, organization, and industry.

The negative impact of a missing or poor Process Safety Leadership Process can lead to serious injuries, negative environmental impacts, property damage, and interrupted production. Process Safety Leadership is profoundly important and must be applied individually and collectively for all hazardous processes.