A framework for identifying and analyzing sources of resilience and brittleness: A case study of two air taxi carriers

Abstract

The increasing interest in resilience engineering (RE) has led to a demand for frameworks that undertake safety assessments from such a standpoint. However, the few existing frameworks have drawbacks, such as not analyzing the sources of resilience (SRs) and the sources of brittleness (SBs) side-by-side. Moreover, they limit themselves to investigating resilience in pre-determined units of analysis (e.g., teams), neglecting the fact that resilience might be in any element of a socio-technical system. This article introduces a framework for identifying and analyzing SRs and SBs jointly, which do not constrain the identification process to any specific unit of analysis within the investigated system. The sources should be identified and analyzed across five categories: the opposite SR or SB; the risk from the SB; the effectiveness of the SR; those originating from either internal processes or the external environment; those arising from formal or informal practices. A case study of two air taxi carriers illustrates the application of the framework. Relevance to industryResilience engineering (RE) is an emerging safety management paradigm concerned with normal work, rather than emphasizing learning from incidents. The proposed framework allows the identification and analysis of the most salient sources of resilience and brittleness. It can be applied for investigating resilience at any unit of analysis within a socio-technical system, supporting the identification of strengths and weaknesses from the RE perspective.