Management Involvement in Root Cause Analysis
Management Involvement in RCA
What is the easiest way to tell a good root cause analysis program from a bad one?
The involvement of senior management.
How do you know if a root cause analysis program is about to fail?
Senior management changes and the new management shows
no interest in the root cause analysis program.
What level of senior management is involved in the best root cause analysis programs?
All the way to the corporate board.
That is some simple advice.
How Important is Management Involvement?
The answers to the three questions above show that senior management involvement is extremely important to the success of any root cause analysis program. The better the root cause analysis program, the more senior management involvement counts. That’s why I thought I’d take this time to explain how senior management should be involved in a root cause analysis program.
How Management Should Be Involved in RCA
Corporate Board
I’ve seen a few leading companies where the Corporate Board was knowledgeable of the safety/process safety/quality improvement programs. The best had a senior manager who was responsible for reporting key reactive and proactive statistics to a special board committee with primary responsibility for safety and other improvement efforts. The committee, that included the CEO, also was provided with overviews of the most serious incident investigations and summaries of improvement efforts.
This board’s interest ensured that people paid attention to the programs and that budgets weren’t slashed for key improvement initiatives (because they were supported by the board).
VP/Division Managers
Of course, VPs or Division Managers were interested in their division’s reactive and proactive improvement performance. What VP or Division Manager wouldn’t be if the Corporate Board was going to see their statistics. They wanted to be able to manage performance so they became involved in improvement efforts. The held divisional meetings to review progress. They understoor the root cause analysis system that was used so they could review the root cause analyses of their biggest problems. They ensured their Plant Managers and Unit Leaders trained in the root cause analysis system and were responsible for plant/unit improvement programs.
Plant Managers
Involved Plant Managers demand good root cause analysis and schedule reviews of detailed root cause analyses of significant problem investigations. They make sure that their key improvement programs are staffed with well trained, insightful leaders and that they have plentiful staff and budget to perform investigations, review reactive and proactive statistics, provide training throughout the plant, and look outside the company for improvement ideas. They are the site sponsors of the improvement programs. They are trained in the root cause analysis tools being applied at the plant. Because they are trained, they offer insightful critiques of the investigation presentations. They reward employees for their participation in root cause analyses and the improvement programs.
What Does Your Company Do?
Is your senior management involved in performance improvement?
Do you have best practices for management involvement that I’ve missed and should be included here? Please leave a comment below and explain what your company does.
What do you need to do to improve your management involvement?
If you have support, are you ready for management turnover?
Rome wasn’t built in a day. Don’t worry if your program doesn’t have all the management support that it needs. But don’t ignore your program’s shortcomings. Work on getting more management support all the way up to the corporate board.
When your corporate board asks insightful questions about accidents or performance improvement initiatives, you know you have achieved a level of support that most improvement managers can only dream about. The best questions you will ever hear is:
“What else should we be doing to improve?”
