FAA Office of Aerospace Medicine 
Civil Aerospace Medical Institute

Report No: DOT/FAA/AM-24/18

Title and Subtitle: The Development and Implementation of a Safety Culture Survey for High-Performing Aviation Organizations

Report Date: October 2024

Authors: K.Worthington, P. Hu, D.Schroeder, I. Choi

Abstract: A positive safety culture requires an intentional approach and periodic assessment to determine wherethings stand and where improvements can be made. To fulfill requirements of the Aircraft Certification, Safety, and Accountability Act (ACSAA, §132(c)), the FAA developed and deployed a novel survey to help assess safety culture in the regulatory environment. The survey was developed in substantial part by leveraging insights from both the scientific literature and existing regulatory frameworks of safety culture. The survey measures the ten core traits set forth in the Harmonized Safety Culture Model developed by the International Atomic Energy Agency. As designed, the survey covers important aspects of any safety-critical workplace, including individual and leader commitment to safety, just and reporting culture, competing pressures, resource allocation, problem identification and resolution, workload and work planning, and others. This report provides (a) an overview of the safety culture survey development and design; (b) a study examining safety culture perceptions within a large participating FAA line of business; and (c) a brief discussion of survey administration best practices and follow-up. The value of the survey is that it provides a comprehensive assessment of safety culture perceptions in regulatory organizations; however, its utility is only fully realized when used judiciously and when the results are acted upon as part of a larger strategy for managing safety culture change.

Key Words: safety, culture, survey, assessment

No. of Pages: 44