Defining and Assessing Safety Culture in High Reliability Systems

Waters, L. K., Roach, D., & Batlis, N. (1974). Organizational climate dimensions and jobrelated
attitudes. Personnel Psychology, 27, 465-476.
Two questions were addressed in this article: what are the dimensions of climate, and whether
the perceptions of aspects of climate related to either objective or subjective indices of individual
behavior in, or attitudes concerning, the organization. To answer the first question, a factor
analysis was conducted using 22 perceptually based organization climate scales adapted from 3
questionnaires developed by N. Margulies; G. H. Litwin and R. A. Stringer; and R. J. House and
J. R. Rizzo. The 22 scales measured disengagement, hindrance, esprit, intimacy, aloofness,
production emphasis, thrust, consideration, structure, responsibility, reward, risk, warmth,
standards, support, conflict, identity, conflict and inconsistency, formalization, adequacy of
planning, selection based on ability and performance, and tolerance of error. A five-factor
solution, consisting of the following was found most significant:
(1) Effective organizational structure,
(2) Work autonomy vs. encumbered by nonproductive activities,
(3) Close impersonal supervision,
(4) Open challenging environment, and
(5) Management and peer support or employee centered orientation.
To address the second question, the factor analysis dimensions were related to 105 radio and TV
employees’ subjective reports of satisfaction, involvement, intrinsic motivation, effort, and
performance. The results revealed that factor 5 was significantly related to all the job attitudes
except self-rated effort and performance. Factor 1 was most salient in satisfaction with
interpersonal relationships and opportunities for recognizable advancement. Factor 2 was most
related to job involvement, and factor 4 was most related to intrinsic motivation and satisfaction
with task-involved self-realization. The findings provide evidence that various climate
dimensions are differentially related to several job-related attitudes.
Weick, K. E. (1987). Organizational culture as a source of high reliability. California
Management Review, 29(2), 112-127.
For organizations that the major learning strategy of trial and error is not available, an
unconventional means by which organizations achieve high reliability was explored. The point
was that people needed ‘requisite variety’ to cope with complex systems, otherwise, they would
miss important information, and make incomplete diagnoses and shortsighted remedies. In this
sense, the traditional way to achieve high reliability, namely training, could in fact create errors.
It is suggested that one way to match the variety of complex systems was by networks and teams
of divergent individuals. The collective requisite variety could be enhanced by effective
delegation of responsibility, high level of trust and face-to-face communication. Another way to
achieve high reliability was to take a more dynamic view of reliability and employ appropriate
reward structures where high reliability gets more incentives. To achieve high reliability, people
should enact their environment. Reliability requires centralization and decentralization, and it is
suggested that culture could make both occur simultaneously. The author argued that story
telling is an effective way to establish reliability culture, and a system which values stories,
storytellers, and storytelling will be more reliable.
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