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UK Civil Aviation Authority

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Performance based oversight

How we use performance-based oversight to focus regulatory activity on the areas of greatest safety risk and organisational performance.

Rationale

There are two primary functions of the Performance Based Oversight (PBO) approach:

  1. To consistently, proportionately, and efficiently allocate the use of our operational safety oversight teams or ‘field force’ 
  2. To modify the volume, type and focus of our oversight according to risk and organisational performance

The PBO process allows Sector Managers from each capability area to use the information gleaned from oversight and other safety intelligence sources to build a single cross-capability risk picture, covering all operational aspects of each regulated entity 

Outcomes

  • Consistent gathering and analysis of safety risk information about all parts of an organisation’s operations, captured in one place. PBR provides collated risks associated with each part of the organisation to enable them to be analysed together as a single regulated entity
  • Effective safety oversight coupled with industry risk management provides confidence that safety risk controls are in place and effective
  • Key aviation safety professionals and organisations reliably deliver what is expected of them
  • Contribution to Better Regulation outcomes, for example through PBO, will help deliver proportionality of the oversight regime
  • CAA achieves the best safety outcomes both current and future for the consumer with the resources available
  • Robust and auditable safety decision-making to inform resource allocation
  • Future oversight plans are tailored based on the latest assessment of an entity’s safety risks and performance to help plans be proportionate and targeted

Actions

  • Support the CAA oversight teams to deliver, further refine and standardise the PBO process across the aviation entities it is applied to
  • Design and deploy the mechanisms for incorporating risk information from simple, single privilege organisations into the PBO process
  • Provide a central PBO planning function to create and maintain the sequence of cross-capability internal review meetings and ensure the right attendees and inputs are in place
  • Lead on the continued development of the Entity Performance Tool that supports the PBO process
  •  As part of the PBR Total System, development of sector risk pictures and their integration into the RSMS with the aim of populating the 'Aviation Total Safety Risk' pictures