Why Human Error Is Not the Problem, With Jake Mazulewicz

There's a dangerous assumption still deeply embedded in many workplaces that if people would just follow the rules, incidents wouldn't happen. But what if that thinking is actually making safety worse?

My conversation with Jake Mazulewicz challenged a lot of conventional thinking around human error, procedures, investigations and safety leadership. Drawing on experience from firefighting, emergency medicine, military operations and human reliability, Jake shares a practical and refreshingly honest perspective on how people really make decisions under pressure, why experts don't simply follow procedures, and how resilient Organisations learn from mistakes rather than punish them.

This was one of those discussions that makes you stop and rethink how safety is approached day to day. Plenty of practical insights throughout that leaders can apply immediately.

Highlights from the conversation:

Human error: Signals for learning, not failures to punish
Safety rules: Why too many procedures can reduce reliability
Decision making: The four layers experts use under pressure
Resilience: Building systems that tolerate inevitable mistakes
Investigations: Looking beyond who touched it last
Psychological safety: Encouraging honest reporting and learning
Near miss reporting: Making learning simple and non-punitive
Work as done: Understanding how work really happens safely

Resources and actions:

Sign up for a future Safety Roundtable: https://safetyroundtable.co.uk/
Connect with Jake on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jake-mazulewicz/
Check on Jake Book (Seven Practical Steps: How to Build Reliability, Safety, and Trust in Technical Teams): https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0FPFQ65GX
Connect with Christian on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/christian-harris-slip-safety/

Denne episoden er hentet fra en åpen RSS-feed og er ikke publisert av Podme. Den kan derfor inneholde annonser.

Episoder(281)

The Hidden Cost of Heat, with Anna Albright

In this episode, Christian Harris speaks with Anna Albright, founder of Klima, about the true cost of heat on worker safety and productivity. Anna shares the story of a delayed flight that revealed gr...

24 Jul 0s

Safety Roundtable: The Safety Confidence Gap

In this Safety Roundtable session, Christian Harris explores what he calls the safety confidence gap. Early data from our State of Safety Survey shows 94% of respondents rate their safety performance ...

17 Jul 40min

Brad Johnson: Why Compliance Isn't the Same as Safety

Would your workplace still be safe if every regulation vanished overnight? That question sits at the heart of this conversation between Christian Harris and Brad Johnson, safety coordinator and author...

10 Jul 48min

Qualifications vs. Competence: Is Health & Safety Really a Profession? (with Dr. David Thomas)

Are more letters after your name actually making you a better safety professional, or just better at collecting certificates? In this episode of the Safety Roundtable, Christian Harris is joined by Dr...

3 Jul 1h 2min

Why Witness Memory Can Mislead Investigations | The Psychology Every Investigator Should Know

Most incident investigations depend heavily on witness accounts, but what if human memory is far less reliable than we assume? In this episode, Christian Harris is joined by Elizabeth Hyde and Dr Sama...

26 Jun 50min

Engaging the Sceptics: The Missing Piece in Mental Health & Wellbeing, With Nick Elston

Mental health and wellbeing is something every Organisation talks about, yet many of the people who need support the most never ask for it. Why? That question sits at the heart of my conversatio...

19 Jun 51min

Using Risk to Drive Better Business Decisions, With Graeme Fleming

Risk management is often viewed as something that keeps Organisations out of trouble. But what if it could do far more than that? My guest, Graeme Fleming, argues that risk is one of the most powerfu...

12 Jun 42min

A Decade of Consequences: How Sentencing Guidelines Changed H&S Forever, With Chris Green

Before you think "it won't happen here", consider this: a company was fined £10,000 for a serious machinery incident in early 2016. Just weeks later, a similar case resulted in a £1.6 million fine. ...

5 Jun 57min