Oil and gas has spent decades improving equipment, procedures, barriers and management systems. Yet when operations become abnormal, one element remains at the centre of almost every critical decision — the person interpreting what is happening.

That is why human factors have become an increasingly important part of safety-critical training.

Technical competency remains fundamental. A driller needs to understand the well. A supervisor needs to understand pressure, barriers and well-control procedures. A confined-space team needs to understand atmospheric hazards, isolation and emergency response.

But knowing the technical answer does not automatically guarantee the correct decision will be made under pressure.

Routine operations create familiarity.

That familiarity is useful, but it can also influence how people interpret information.

Imagine a drilling operation where several small indicators begin appearing. Individually, none appears particularly significant. The crew is busy, the operation has been progressing normally and there is pressure to complete the task.

Does somebody recognise that those indicators collectively suggest something has changed?

More importantly, are they prepared to say so?

The International Association of Oil & Gas Producers identifies human-performance areas including situational awareness, decision-making, communication, teamwork and leadership within its well-control resources. These recognise that effective well control involves both technical systems and the way people interact with them. (iogp.org)

Situational awareness begins with recognising what is happening now.

What are the pressures telling us?

What has changed?

What information does not fit what we expected?

But good situational awareness also requires thinking ahead.

If this continues, what happens next?

That question is relevant far beyond drilling.

During confined-space operations, it may involve recognising deteriorating atmospheric conditions. During lifting operations, it could be noticing people moving toward an exclusion zone. During forklift operations, it may be recognising that visibility has become restricted.

Workers need the confidence to stop, reassess and communicate when conditions no longer match the plan.

Training should give them opportunities to practise doing exactly that.

Communication becomes particularly important when authority gradients exist.

A less experienced worker may recognise something abnormal but hesitate to challenge a supervisor. A driller may notice an unexpected trend but initially rationalise it because other members of the team appear unconcerned.

Good safety culture depends on people being able to raise concerns early.

This is one reason scenario-based training can be so valuable.

Instead of simply asking a participant what a procedure says, the trainer can provide incomplete information, introduce changing conditions and require the group to communicate, prioritise and make decisions.

The discussion afterwards can be as valuable as the scenario itself.

Why did you make that decision?

What information influenced you?

What did you miss?

Who communicated effectively?

At what point should the operation have stopped?

Well control demonstrates particularly clearly why technical and human performance cannot be separated.

IWCF’s Enhanced Well Control programme was developed for experienced personnel and combines technical well-control knowledge with crew resource management principles. The programme uses simulation and real industry incidents to develop areas including leadership, communication, situational awareness and decision-making. (iwcf.org)

There is an important lesson in that approach for the wider training industry.

Sometimes the most valuable training scenario is not the one where everything goes according to plan.

It is the one where something changes.

Procedures remain essential. They provide consistency, establish controls and capture lessons learned across industry.

But procedures still require people to interpret conditions and recognise when the situation in front of them is moving outside what was expected.

At AWCC, this is increasingly important across our training — from IWCF and TURBO through to confined-space rescue, High Risk Work and safety-critical short courses.

Where appropriate, training should challenge participants with questions and changing scenarios rather than simply providing answers.

Because the objective is not to make training unnecessarily difficult.

It is to create a safe environment where people can practise making decisions before those decisions carry real consequences.

Equipment will continue to improve. Technology will continue to provide better information. Procedures will continue to evolve.

But somebody still has to recognise what that information means and decide what happens next.

That is why developing human performance should sit alongside technical competency as one of the most important outcomes of safety-critical training.

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