Better integration of human factors considerations within safety in design

‘Safety in design’ is becoming an increasingly used approach in a variety of domains. Also known as ‘safe design’ or ‘prevention through design’, the general process seeks to eliminate health and safety hazards, or minimise potential risks, by systematically involving end-users and decision makers in the full life cycle of the designed product or system. This article focuses on the need to better integrate human factors considerations within safe design for high-hazard industries. In particular, it describes the benefits of applying a task-based approach to assist design processes. By way of presenting a safe design method for equipment used in mining, it shows the need to obtain end-user input both to better reveal design deficiencies and to identify effective solutions for future equipment. Overall, a multidisciplinary framework is advocated, in particular by blending human factors techniques and structured risk management methods with the existing equipment design processes.