Shipping operator K Line needed to instil a culture of openness around on-board safety risks amongst its seafaring staff. The company called in safety and culture experts Propel Sayfr, who in partnership with Attensi created a unique gamified simulation training solution.
SAYFR is an interactive 3D simulation of the seafarers’ working environment, designed to educate best practice and to test their abilities across a range of realistic scenarios. After rolling-out SAYFR, K Line met its ‘reported near misses’ key metric target for the whole year within one quarter.
When a single incident could result in loss of life and millions in financial penalties, good safety culture is non-negotiable for any maritime operator. 75% of maritime losses are attributable to human error1. And while it’s hard to find a shipping or offshore company today that does not claim to be an ‘industry leader’ in the field, the practical reality of creating safety culture comes with significant challenges.
For “K” Line LNG Shipping, these challenges are only too familiar.
The ultimate target of any safety initiative that the company undertakes is to eliminate major accidents. Taken as a measurement however, the binary nature of whether an accident did or did not happen does not provide much in the way of tangible insight.
For K Line, improved reporting of near miss incidents was considered a more actionable metric to improve upon.
Attensi, in partnership with safety and culture experts Propel Sayfr, had the solution that K Line needed. Together, the two companies collaborated to create a new flagship simulation training solution – SAYFR.
SAYFR users are immersed in a 3D graphical recreation of their workplace environment and challenged to complete a range of scripted scenarios. Each is designed to simulate the kind of processes and mishaps that can lead to onboard incidents. These range from the mildly negligent to outright disastrous, and all have multiple possible outcomes.
Each scenario features interactive conversations with voice-acted characters, representing the typical exchanges that seafarers will have with real-life co-workers. Correct answers are rewarded with points and star ratings upon completion. Incorrect answers will cost users points and negatively impact their final rating. But they are also addressed with real-time feedback to explain mistakes and wrong decisions.
For K Line, SAYFR proved to be a shrewd choice in its pursuit of safety excellence, according to Improvement Manager, Soeun Choi.
“Many companies say failures and errors are something to learn from, and that they should be reported whenever possible. But for many of our seafarers, it was not always clear why they should report. The main purpose of our project with SAYFR was to improve the level of maturity of the safety culture. To move from one of ‘cover-up’ to excellence culture, where our people learn from errors.”
After introducing SAYFR, the number of reported near misses at K Line increased dramatically. The company had set a new annual target for this key metric. But following the launch of K Line’s new gamified simulation training, the target was exceeded within a single quarter.
These numbers are now the new normal, providing management with a vital line of sight into how errors occur, and how accidents can be avoided.
“With SAYFR, our people get to see the results and outcomes of mistakes rather than just as part of a discussion piece. The multiple choices allow them to visualise multiple outcomes, where before they might not necessarily have appreciated what those outcomes were,” explains K Line Deputy General Manager, Lloyd Swindell.
“The range of where the reports have come from has also massively increased. It used to be the senior officers’ job to make reports. Now they’re coming from a lot more members of the crew.”
This article is a digest of the cover story of Oil & Gas Innovation, Summer 2020. The full magazine, including the full version of this article, can be viewed here.
