The Power of What If: Assessing and Understanding Risk

• Published in: Professional safety Vol. 65; no. 6; pp. 36 - 43
• Main Authors: Lyon, Bruce K., Popov, Georgi
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Des Plaines American Society of Safety Engineers 01.06.2020; ASSE
• Subjects: Accident prevention; Ammonia; Business machines; Change management; Chemical reactions; Chemicals; Clean Air Act-US; Continuity; Disaster management; Disaster recovery; Emergency management; Emergency preparedness; Explosions; Food processing; Forensic engineering; Meat; Methods; New technology; Occupational health; Occupational safety; Procurement; Refrigeration; Risk assessment; Safety management; Strategic planning; Threat evaluation
• ISSN: 0099-0027; 2163-6176

Key Takeaways The concept of using the what-if question to determine potential effects is important and fundamental to assessing and controlling risk. It is essentially reasoned curiosity for the purpose of discovery to reduce uncertainty. The traditional what-if analysis has limitations as a hazard analysis technique. It does not estimate risk levels and, therefore, does not distinguish which hazards present the greatest risk. By coupling the what-if methodology with an estimation of risk, a powerful and valuable tool can be added to the risk management tool kit. The authors propose such a tool with a modified what-if risk assessment that incorporates risk analysis and evaluation. A case study is presented to illustrate its application. Two small words, when asked in the form of a question, can be most powerful in reducing risk and uncertainty. For serious injuries and fatalities that have occurred, the question is what if the causes, conditions and controls were better understood? Would it have been possible to prevent such incidents from occurring? What if, indeed. However, the time for the OSH professional to ask, "what if?" is before such incidents occur: during the planning, designing, developing, installing, operating and maintaining of systems. What-if analysis and assessment can be a most powerful tool in controlling risks to an acceptable level throughout the life cycle of a system. For example, in chemical operations, the question becomes "What if an operator mixes two incompatible chemicals?" or "What will happen if sulfuric acid and sodium hypochlorite (better known in its less concentrated form as bleach) are mixed in a quantity that could produce a cloud containing chlorine and other toxic compounds?"; "What if the cloud impacted workers on site and members of the public in the surrounding community?" Such questions can be critical in understanding the effects and preventing or reducing operational risks.