How Safe Is Safe Enough? ― Leadership, Safety and Risk Management

Safety is not easy, it is a full time effort, and is equally important whether people are on the job or on personal time. If an organization is serious about mission success, it must take 'risk' seriously as well. Leaders need to be involved in the risk game at every turn, and understand the key elements (discussed throughout this book) that help them to win. Winning the risk game is what safety is all about. As in operational success, risk management requires the best human faculties to achieve victory; talent of organizational players and commitment from top leadership rule the day. The book covers leadership, safety programs, and risk management for organizations and individuals. It helps in professional development, grooming current and future leaders to understand their roles in safety and risk management. Central to the author’s message are: Seven truths of safety that the author discovered as a senior safety officer. Four roadblocks to achieving zero mishaps that must be aggressively addressed. Nine elements to risk reduction, with which leaders must become familiar. He establishes the importance of an organizational leader’s role in the safety/risk management game and provides the answer to, ’How safe is safe enough?’ Often, managers at various levels do not have an understanding of what goes into a safety program, this book tells them, from an expert's view. The readership includes: executives and middle management; all leaders as a professional development book and students. It is also a supplemental textbook for safety and risk management courses.

Col Greg Alston is Deputy Chief of Safety for the US Air Force at the Pentagon, Washington DC. He is also an Adjunct Assistant Professor with Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University, and has taught undergraduate and graduate level courses since 1988. As fighter pilot in the United States Air Force, he has flown many types from AT-38s to F-117A Stealth Fighter in the US, Europe and Asia. His safety experience began in 1991 as the Chief of Flight Safety Programs in the Pentagon, in Washington D.C. Col Alston was re-assigned in 1999 to become the Director of Safety for the Air Combat Command at Langley AFB, Virginia, overseeing safety activities for approximately 170,000 people and 1700 aircraft, and leading the safety program to all-time lows in mishap rates for two years straight, records that still stand today. His ERAU courses include Aircraft Accident Investigation, System Safety, Aircraft Structural Safety, Safety Program Management, Advanced Aerodynamics, Meteorology, Air Carrier Operations, Organizational Behavior, and Strategic Management. He is on the advisory board for Embry-Riddle's Center for Aerospace Safety Education.