AE Demonstrating Control Of Financial And Human Resources

In an SMS world the leader of the SMS program is the Accountable Executive, or the AE, who is playing the role as a sponsor of a specific project. A sponsor is a person who provides funding necessary, or a percentage of a project or activity carried out by someone else. A sponsor does not have direct inputs on the activities in the project, but can affect management decisions by withdrawing the sponsorship or increase their funding of both financial and human resources. Upon

Comprehension of the SMS is what defines human and financial resources.

the completion of the project there is no impact on the sponsor, other than the reputation of the project, or activity that was sponsored. It works the same way in aviation, being an airline or an airport, as long as the Accountable Executive can document their role as the sponsor of the project by the control of financial and human resources; the only repercussion to the operations is their pride and reputation from devastating audit findings.
It is assumed that the more funding and personnel that is assigned to a project, the more successful and safe the project will be. This wrongful assumption is supported by a requirement that a person, or position, is not designated as the role of the AE unless they have control of the financial and human resources that are necessary for the activities and operations authorized under the aviation certificate. With this requirement, an operator may be hesitant to restrict, or reject funding or personnel to the operations when the safety–card is applied.

There is no enforcement available when the AE restricts, reject or withdraw funding from an SMS program. The regulatory requirements is not directly linked to the funding itself, but to the result, or output of the Safety Management System. If an increase in funding from the sponsor, or AE, of an airline or airport as the only means to safety solutions would reduce the risk level, then it would be redundant, excessive, or even an injustice to the public to operate with a Safety Management System.

Under an SMS there is a requirement that the AE has control of financial and human recourses. Unless the operation is a sole proprietor or a corporation with 51% shares, there is no person who singlehandedly has control over these financial and human resources. With a requirement that the AE

Safety and SMS in aviation is not a contrast in colors, but shades of variables.

must demonstrate control of these resources, this demonstration task becomes to demonstrate by the quality of the safety management system itself. If the AE, as the sponsor of the program, is on a path to success or in a downward losing spiral the resources are available tools, but not the strategic solution to safety. The more resources that are inputted on the controls of an airplane in a spiral do not eliminate the spiral, but is assisting the spiral in an increasingly downward trend. For an airplane to exit a spiral it takes leadership, management, system understanding and application of resources to knowledge from data collected. Financial and human resources in aviation safety, or with an SMS, are not the solutions, but variables within the processes which are harnessed by their role within one system, for the total system to produce the desired, or planned, outcome.

An Accountable Executive who is defining the quality of an SMS system by human and financial resources only may not contribute to the safe operations of an airport or aircraft, while an Accountable Executive who is a leader within an SMS system applying strategic safety solutions is on a path of continuous safe operations.


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