Rhythm of the Night by Anthony Seychell
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Rhythm of the night by Anthony Seychell Oh, What a night! It hadn’t been par- close to seeing them and hearing the strips showed that someone had not ticularly busy for a Friday. The usual aural STCA alarm. I thought that be- done a proper study of our changed flights on their well-established fore leaving, I should have a word working methods. Work-as-imagined routes, the adjacent ACC constantly with the supervisor about this over- was totally different to Work-as-done. ringing to request direct routings, load situation and I considered writ- the strip-printer nosily clattering ing a report about it. Too many of us People at the sharp end, like ATCOs away printing strips for the re-routing were ending up feeling overloaded and ATSEPs, often have to handle situ- which nobody uses because we are and close to losing the picture after ations where better planning and risk working in a radar environment. All the implementation of the new ros- appreciation by management could routine and soon time to go home ter and, soon afterwards, an airspace have led to improvements in service but before that there was still the reorganisation. I wasn’t quite sure delivery without significantly increas- dreaded band-boxing. Already my that I could have handled the rhythm ing workload. Management should colleague was preparing to close her of the night at the end if I had had adopt a ‘human-centred’ approach sector as her shift ended at 0600. I encountered a contingency situa- when designing, implementing or wasn’t looking forward to her sector tion. operating a system, or managing a being combined with mine. It con- tained the XYZ TMA, which included the major XYZ airport and the smaller ABC aerodrome. The shift roster was Anthony Seychell is an experienced ATM not in tune with the band-boxing safety expert who has both an ATC operational and an ATC because as soon as the sectors were engineering background. He worked previously at Malta Air Traffic combined, the XYZ night-time curfew Services in a variety of posts, the last being that of Safety Manager. ended. By the time my relief came at He joined EUROCONTROL in 2007 and currently works for the ESP around 06.25, there would already where he is coordinator of the Programme to support ANSPs in SMS be several departures climbing out Implementation (SASI) and provides support to other ESP activities. of the TMA while I would also be do- ing the pre-sequencing of the arrivals descending into the TMA. Manage- ment had decided that there was no The Ops Room of our XYZ ACC seems change, i.e. those responsible should need to man the second sector 0600 to have been designed to ensure the consider the people in the system. – 0630; it had something to do with maximum possible discomfort to the Such a ‘human-centred’ approach productivity. staff and to increase the task/work should follow established human fac- load as much as possible. Besides the tors and ergonomic principles. Shaver Ten minutes into the combined sec- poorly-planned collapsing of sectors and Braun1 have defined human fac- tor, I was already feeling that I was at and decreased staffing, it was also a tors and ergonomics as "a scientific my limit and close to losing the pic- noisy place. The single-person opera- discipline whose goal is to optimize ture. The sector was extremely busy tion meant that the ATCO was often the interaction between people and so I told the Coordinator Assistant to distracted from his watch over the the systems they use to enhance safe- answer all calls from the adjacent ACC traffic. The constant requests from ty, performance, and satisfaction. In and refuse all direct routings. Also I the adjacent ACC for direct routings simpler terms, it focuses on designing told him to find a way to silence the meant that the telephone was ring- the world to better accommodate the noisy strip-printer; it was becoming ing (or buzzing) all the time. The strip needs of people". The Human Factors really annoying and a disturbance. printer was a noisy machine and the and Ergonomics Society2 tells us that Finally my relieving colleague arrived fact that it was printing unnecessary human factors and ergonomics are and took over and I could go home. 1 - Human Factors and Ergonomics initiatives make good business sense, Eric F. Shaver and Curt C. Braun, I never had rings on the screen but I Idaho Business Review, January 5, 2009 was sure that at the end I came quite 2 - https://www.hfes.org//Web/Default.aspx HindSight 21 Summer 2015 81 FROM THE BRIEFING ROOM Rhythm of the night (cont'd) the study to help ensure that people’s erations match human capabilities created, organised and run. The staff interactions with technology will be and this maximises the likelihood of members are often the only people productive, comfortable and effec- a successful outcome. It also leads that truly know the intricacies (de- tive. Is the interaction of humans with to a better understanding of people’s tails, complexities) of their task, so systems always productive, comfort- activities, e.g. the tasks that they per- involving them in the generation and able and effective? form, the demands, pressures and operation of a system will help to in- limitations that people face and what crease support for, trust in and adher- These descriptions of human factors motivates them. ence to it. and ergonomics indicate that the ‘human-centred’ approach is not just Another important aspect of the hu- Many of us ar e nowadays familiar with about pleasing the people in the sys- man-centred approach is that it gives ‘safety assessments’, often perceived tem. It also provides an opportunity people ownership, by involving them as some sort of a mysterious rite per- to optimise the system, the perfor- in changes and initiatives. A system formed by the safety juju man which mance of the human and the tasks will be more effective if the people in leads to the pronouncement that our that they have to undertake. The ‘hu- the system have some say in how it is new system as safe and acceptable man-centred’ approach ensures that for our use. But how often is a safety the procedural and technical consid- assessment done for a soft change 82 such as a roster change, a change in work and task load. A good human Back in my days as an ATCO I the remuneration/reward structure impact analysis can materially con- felt that there was a song that or even changes in the staff selection tribute to the effective reduction described our work very well: processes? As we saw in our initial of the work and task load. The hu- The Rhythm Of The Night by the scenario, the band-boxing occurred man-centred approach to change Italian group Corona3. The first when traffic was actually increasing. management brings a number of part of its lyrics went: Was a proper safety assessment of benefits: the task load performed? It is obvi- Rhythm is a dancer, ous that reducing staff and collapsing n Proactive identification of the It's a soul's companion, sectors while the traffic is increasing people affected by the change, People feel it everywhere, may not be a very good idea. Often particularly those in roles that Lift your hands and voices, changes are considered individually have the potential to impact Free your mind and join us, and no assessment is performed at safety; You can feel it in the air, a system level. But this is critical be- n Proactive identification and cause the risks affecting task perfor- prevention of human error as- Although I didn’t dance the air- mance can only be understood if the sociated with a change; craft, I felt that that there was a change in the task(s) is considered in n Reduced resistance to change. certain rhythm in the work and context and thereby fully understood. people felt it, especially the ones Despite all the advances in technol- in the air. Going back to our original scenario ogy and the introduction of more in the ACC, we have already seen that and more automation, the humans The ATC/ATM world has changed the Ops Room was a noisy place. Of- are still the main means of mitiga- considerably since my ATCO days ten we contribute a lot to noise our- tion when our system somehow because ATC is a dynamic busi- selves without even noticing. There fails because they act as key de- ness and traffic is almost always have been cases where the incom- fences to help in controlling the risk. increasing. We are making use ing/outgoing controllers do their Our centre was a busy ACC but the of more and more automation briefing handover at the supervi- amount of traffic was not the cause to handle traffic but traffic is only sors’ desk, the vicinity of which then for the ATCOs’ feeling of overload. one factor affecting workload. becomes a sort of a chat-club with A study would have indicated ‘clas- We need to look more at the hu- each participant contributing that sic’ system failures – the contribu- mans in the system and adopt a little bit more to the noise level. This tion of staffing as the biggest con- human-centred approach so that might naturally induce the ATCOs, tributor to the overload situation we can better understand human especially those choosing to work with the working environment and abilities and limitations.