Safety-II in Practice: Investigating Everyday Work in an Aircraft Maintenance Organisation
(2026) FLMU16 20252Division of Risk Management and Societal Safety
- Abstract
- Background: Traditionally, safety management is driven by incidents and accidents, which are investigated to identify their causes and prevent recurrence. This failure-oriented approach is commonly referred to as Safety-I. A more recent paradigm, Safety-II, emphasises learning from how work typically goes well in everyday conditions. While previous studies suggest that Safety-II investigations can generate detailed insights into everyday work, little empirical research has examined how Safety-II investigations influence organisational discussions and improvement actions. Objective: This study explores whether the presentation of a Safety-II investigation leads to qualitatively different discussions and improvement actions than a Safety-I... (More)
- Background: Traditionally, safety management is driven by incidents and accidents, which are investigated to identify their causes and prevent recurrence. This failure-oriented approach is commonly referred to as Safety-I. A more recent paradigm, Safety-II, emphasises learning from how work typically goes well in everyday conditions. While previous studies suggest that Safety-II investigations can generate detailed insights into everyday work, little empirical research has examined how Safety-II investigations influence organisational discussions and improvement actions. Objective: This study explores whether the presentation of a Safety-II investigation leads to qualitatively different discussions and improvement actions than a Safety-I investigation within an aircraft maintenance organisation. Method: Following a typical incident (an in-flight engine shutdown), two investigations were conducted: a Safety-I investigation focusing on the causes of the incident and a Safety-II investigation examining how one relevant work process – handovers between maintenance shifts – is typically performed. The results were presented and discussed separately during two Safety Action Groups. A qualitative abductive approach was used to analyse differences in the discussions and proposed improvement actions. Results: Three main differences emerged. First, the Safety-I discussion focused on a broad but surface level discussion of many different processes and actions related to the incident, whereas the Safety-II discussion focussed on a deep exploration of maintenance task handovers. Second, the Safety-I discussion involved retrospective judgements of human behaviour, while the Safety-II discussion developed a shared understanding of everyday work practices. Third, improvement actions differed from top-down imposed barriers aimed at standardisation and compliance, to bottom-up improvements intended to support the practical performance of handovers. Conclusion: These findings suggest that the perspective underlying an investigation, influences how the organisation perceives and performs follow-up. Safety-I emphasises deviations and the strengthening of control mechanisms, while Safety-II emphasises understanding and supporting the conditions that enable successful performance in everyday work. Both perspectives may therefore contribute to safety improvement in complementary ways. (Less)
Please use this url to cite or link to this publication:
https://lup.lub.lu.se/student-papers/record/9228027
- author
- van Dijk, Shen LU
- supervisor
- organization
- course
- FLMU16 20252
- year
- 2026
- type
- H1 - Master's Degree (One Year)
- subject
- keywords
- Safety, Safety-I, Safety-II, Investigation, Everyday work, Typical work, Aircraft maintenance, FLMU06
- language
- English
- id
- 9228027
- date added to LUP
- 2026-08-19 09:53:31
- date last changed
- 2026-08-19 09:53:31
@misc{9228027,
abstract = {{Background: Traditionally, safety management is driven by incidents and accidents, which are investigated to identify their causes and prevent recurrence. This failure-oriented approach is commonly referred to as Safety-I. A more recent paradigm, Safety-II, emphasises learning from how work typically goes well in everyday conditions. While previous studies suggest that Safety-II investigations can generate detailed insights into everyday work, little empirical research has examined how Safety-II investigations influence organisational discussions and improvement actions. Objective: This study explores whether the presentation of a Safety-II investigation leads to qualitatively different discussions and improvement actions than a Safety-I investigation within an aircraft maintenance organisation. Method: Following a typical incident (an in-flight engine shutdown), two investigations were conducted: a Safety-I investigation focusing on the causes of the incident and a Safety-II investigation examining how one relevant work process – handovers between maintenance shifts – is typically performed. The results were presented and discussed separately during two Safety Action Groups. A qualitative abductive approach was used to analyse differences in the discussions and proposed improvement actions. Results: Three main differences emerged. First, the Safety-I discussion focused on a broad but surface level discussion of many different processes and actions related to the incident, whereas the Safety-II discussion focussed on a deep exploration of maintenance task handovers. Second, the Safety-I discussion involved retrospective judgements of human behaviour, while the Safety-II discussion developed a shared understanding of everyday work practices. Third, improvement actions differed from top-down imposed barriers aimed at standardisation and compliance, to bottom-up improvements intended to support the practical performance of handovers. Conclusion: These findings suggest that the perspective underlying an investigation, influences how the organisation perceives and performs follow-up. Safety-I emphasises deviations and the strengthening of control mechanisms, while Safety-II emphasises understanding and supporting the conditions that enable successful performance in everyday work. Both perspectives may therefore contribute to safety improvement in complementary ways.}},
author = {{van Dijk, Shen}},
language = {{eng}},
note = {{Student Paper}},
title = {{Safety-II in Practice: Investigating Everyday Work in an Aircraft Maintenance Organisation}},
year = {{2026}},
}