Toward High Reliability Project Organizing in Safety-Critical Projects

Abstract

High reliability organizations claim to be special organizations that have consistently demonstrated safe performance in operating environments, which are simultaneously of high technical complexity, high consequence, and high tempo. This article argues that the literature on high reliability organizing, which emerged through studying day-to-day operations in the nuclear industry, air traffic control industry, and U.S. navy aircraft carriers, might hold important lessons for how the project management community can approach the management of safety-critical projects–projects in which safety is of paramount importance. Its aim is to consider how high reliability organizing might be realized in these safety-critical projects.