• Lastly, carriers must review their entire safety management process when determining how to act on detected problems.

The final step in the Safety Management Cycle is for a company to take meaningful action when monitoring and tracking have indicated a problem. Taking meaningful action should correct the problem at its roots.

The process of meaningful action begins with a review of the relevant policies and procedures that relate to the problem. Are they written properly? Are people following them? If not, was there a breakdown in training or communications, or perhaps in the hiring standards? Each of the other five Safety Management Processes should be examined and revised as needed. Common solutions may include:

• Revising policies and procedures;
• Reassigning responsibilities;
• Improving the hiring and qualification standards for the positions involved;
• Deciding that employees are not qualified for the position they are occupying, which may lead to replacement or retraining; and
• Improving training and/or communications.

To see if “meaningful action” is having an impact, carriers need to continue monitoring and tracking. On the other hand, if the same problem is constantly surfacing but all other components of the Safety Management Cycle are in place and operating correctly, you may not be taking the actions necessary to address the problem.