This course dives deep into the real-world impact of human factors on workplace health and safety, highlighting that 80 to 90 percent of incidents are rooted in human behaviour rather than equipment failure or procedural gaps.
What you’ll learn
- The psychological, cognitive and physical factors that influence how people make decisions, respond under pressure and interact with their environment, including fatigue, stress and workload, attention span, perception limitations and the formation of workplace habits
- The science behind human error: how cognitive biases, situational awareness and mental models shape behaviour in both routine and high-pressure situations
- Environmental design principles, and how workplace layout, lighting, noise levels and ergonomics directly influence performance and decision-making
- How to spot the early warning signs of human error patterns, understand why well-meaning workers sometimes take shortcuts or deviate from procedures, and identify system vulnerabilities before they lead to incidents, using case studies and practical examples from a range of industries
- Proven techniques for designing safer systems that account for human limitations, and for improving communication to reduce misunderstandings
- How to foster psychological safety, so people feel comfortable reporting near misses and raising concerns without fear of blame or punishment
- Practical tools for human factors risk assessments, behaviour-based safety interventions and feedback mechanisms that reinforce positive behaviours while addressing problem patterns constructively
By the end of the course, managers and safety professionals will not only recognise how human behaviour contributes to organisational risk, but will have the strategic knowledge and practical skills to harness human potential as a powerful force for safety: building resilient systems that support better decision-making, and achieving sustainable outcomes that protect both individual workers and the wider business every day.
