Human Factor

CSX face to face classes are  here again....and in my 14 years of railroading I have learned that people really do just want to eat the pizza and go home. Face to Face class used to be one day, but now they are two. Two days of being subjected to corporate culture. Well.. one day is training, and we watch videos of people giving interviews, about the mistakes that they have made. Mistakes that could have cost them their lives. Mistakes that could have been devastating to all involved. 

We hear them talk of the serious failures that THEY made. We don't hear about the serious mistakes and bad decisions that others have made that were mostly to blame. We hear them talking about the loss of situational awareness. We hear them in the videos made for "company use" pleading.... in a grand deal for their jobs. The stories are warnings, but they remind me of videos made by people that have been kidnapped. The interviews remind me of the videos that we see of journalists making "news" reports for the terrorists. 

While I understand that it is my job to be safe, I fully understand that it is the companies job and responsibility to provide a safe place to work.... In my 14 years of railroading, I have decided not to argue with the bosses at these face to face meetings, In some ways they are just as much victims to this despicable whip, that the company so slyfully imposes on our backs with these "face to face" classes....

If I had a say, I would tell the corporate culturists to go fuck themselves. 

Excuse the language, but I feel that for me to accept that it is "human factor" that poses the greatest threat to safety, I would have to agree to the elimination of the human spirit. To err is human. The corporate structure relies on numbers. This"human factor" that the corporate culturists speak of.... can not be eliminated and to work for such a goal is idiotic. 

To make this THE goal,  to me is as insane as the Nazi's goal of the elimination of the inferior race, allowing for the rise of the master race. 

We harp on run through switches, yet we operate millions of switches safely. We harp everyday on numbers in the double digits, while billions of dollars are being extracted from our labor. We are told to work safe, and that it is human factor that we must eliminate. We are told that the rules are written in blood, yet is is not the corporate culturists that bleed. We are subjected to propaganda that uses images of our children, to convince us that safety is a way of LIFE, yet we must eliminate HUMAN FACTOR?

I'm calling bullshit. It is not Human Factor that "causes" accidents, 

It is root causes that create incidents. 

When we eliminate the root causes.. all of them, let me know. Fatigue, bad training, 6sigma hurry up... new hires being trained by new hires...inexperienced management....

 and the list goes on and on........

when these systematic failures have all been eliminated, then I will ask the creator, if it is Human Factor that we must eliminate?

Corporations are not people, the corporate structure is not capable of human experience, so I suggest to our bosses... cut the crap.. unless you really have become machines....

JP Wright