Human Factors Engineering

Human factors are an interdisciplinary field encompassing various topics, such as psychology, technology, engineering sciences, and sociology, organizational and management theories. Therefore, human factors are best described as everything from ergonomic issues related to the design of systems and displays to the complex relationships between management’s way of communicating its objectives and how it is propagated in the organization affecting people doing normal work in the organization. Even though people are no longer considered the direct causes of why accidents occur, they still play a role in how a system may collapse and how a system can recover from the disturbance(s). This because humans are an indispensable part of all complex systems

Previously, the safety focus was on the human role at the sharp end, and now it is clear that humans play an essential safety role at the blunt end. From the initial design to maintenance, people must be considered at all levels, including commissioning, inspection, regulations, and decommissioning to a system’s operation.