High Reliability Organization Theory As An Input To Manage Operational Risk In Project Management

This paper demonstrates how adoption of High Reliability Organization Theory (HROT) delivers value to mainstream organizations. It presents the terminology that encompasses High Reliability Organizations (HROs) and how researchers define the characteristics and core principles of such organizations. These organizations have been well studied by professionals from numerous disciplines allowing us to understand what makes an HRO successful. This paper will add to this by exploring how HROT may be applied to mainstream organizations and elaborates on the importance of mindfulness specifically as it relates to sensitivity to operations. The findings are synthesized into an actual project that successfully leveraged HROT principles to improve reliability and address operational risk. The paper concludes that there are considerable opportunities to exploit HROT in project, program, and process management to achieve high reliability and value in a non-HRO.