Safety Management
ISO 26262-2: Safety Organization, Culture & Competency
What You'll Learn
Build complete competency in safety management through structured, progressive learning.
Establish a Functional Safety Culture
Implement leadership practices and organizational behaviors that create an environment where safety concerns are raised early and resolved systematically.
Define Safety Roles and Responsibilities
Map all safety-relevant roles in a development program with clear competency requirements, authority levels, and accountability assignments.
Manage Competency and Training
Implement a competency management process with gap assessment, training planning, qualification records, and effectiveness measurement for all safety roles.
Run the Anomaly Management Process
Operate a systematic anomaly handling workflow from detection through root cause analysis to corrective action and closure with safety plan integration.
Apply Safety KPIs and PDCA
Define and track safety management KPIs to drive continuous improvement of the safety management system across projects and product lines.
Assess and Improve Safety Culture
Use structured assessment tools to measure organizational safety culture maturity and build targeted action plans to close identified gaps.
13 Comprehensive Chapters
Each chapter builds your safety management expertise systematically from foundations to advanced application.
Overview
Position safety management as the foundation that makes all other ISO 26262 activities possible. Understand the management system requirements of ISO 26262-2, their relationship to quality management (IATF 16949, ASPICE), and why culture matters as much as process.
Functional Safety Culture
Explore functional safety culture as defined in ISO 26262-2 Clause 5.4.2: leadership commitment, safety mindset at all levels, psychological safety to raise concerns, and metrics for assessing and improving organizational safety culture.
Safety Manager Role
Define the functional safety manager role: responsibilities for safety planning, progress monitoring, confirmation measure coordination, anomaly escalation, and communication with project management and senior leadership.
Roles & Responsibilities
Map all safety-relevant roles in a development organization: safety engineer, safety assessor, hardware safety lead, software safety lead, HARA facilitator, DIA manager - with their required competencies and authority levels.
Competency Management
Implement a competency management process per ISO 26262-2: define required competencies by role, assess individual gaps, plan training, track qualification records, and maintain competency evidence for confirmation measures and FSAs.
Training Programs
Design effective safety training programs: role-specific curricula for safety engineers and managers, awareness training for all project staff, practical workshops, certification pathways, and training effectiveness measurement.
Change Management
Manage safety-relevant changes per ISO 26262-8 Clause 8: change request classification, impact analysis on safety goals and ASIL levels, DIA update triggers, regression analysis, and re-verification planning.
Anomaly Handling
Implement the anomaly management process: anomaly detection and reporting obligations for all project members, severity classification, root cause analysis, corrective action, and integration with the safety plan and confirmation measures.
Lessons Learned
Establish a systematic lessons learned process: collecting insights from project retrospectives, confirmation measure findings, field anomaly reports, and FSA outcomes - feeding them back into safety process improvement.
Continuous Improvement
Apply PDCA and safety metrics to drive continuous improvement of the safety management system: KPIs for process compliance, anomaly frequency, confirmation measure findings, training completion, and safety culture score trends.
QM Interfaces
Define the interface between safety management and quality management: how IATF 16949 and ASPICE processes support ISO 26262, shared document control, joint non-conformance management, and avoiding duplication of effort.
Resource Allocation
Plan and justify safety resource allocation: staffing safety roles on a project budget, making the business case for safety investment, identifying resource conflicts between safety and schedule pressure, and escalation strategies.
Safety Culture Assessment
Use structured culture assessment frameworks: survey instruments, behavioral observation protocols, leadership interview guides, and safety culture maturity models - plus action planning to close identified gaps.
6 6 Interactive Diagrams & Tools
Experiment with visual tools that bring safety management concepts to life.
Safety Organization Chart
Interactive organizational diagram showing safety roles and their reporting lines, authority boundaries, and interfaces to quality management and project management structures.
Competency Assessment Matrix
Role-by-competency matrix with current vs. required proficiency levels, gap visualization, and training plan linkage for each safety role in the organization.
Safety Culture Maturity Model
Five-level safety culture maturity diagram from reactive through proactive, with behavioral indicators for each level and self-assessment scoring guidance.
Change Management Flowchart
End-to-end change request flow from initiation through impact assessment, DIA update decision, and re-verification planning with decision gates at each stage.
Anomaly Handling Process
Swim-lane diagram showing anomaly detection, classification, root cause analysis, corrective action, verification, and closure across project team and safety management roles.
Safety KPI Dashboard
Visual dashboard showing key safety management metrics: open anomalies by severity, confirmation measure completion rate, training compliance, and culture score over project timeline.
Tier1 Safety Management System Transformation
A Tier1 supplier with three active ASIL D programs undergoes a safety management system transformation: role definition, competency gap assessment, training program rollout, anomaly process redesign, and safety culture improvement over 18 months.
- Baseline: 2 safety engineers for 3 ASIL D programs - resource gap identified
- Role definition: 6 safety roles defined with competency profiles and authority matrix
- Training: 140 engineers complete awareness training; 12 complete advanced certification
- Anomaly process: average closure time reduced from 45 to 18 days in 6 months
- Culture assessment: maturity moved from Level 2 (Reactive) to Level 3 (Compliance)
- FSA outcome: 0 major findings on management-related assessment items at next SOP
Safety Management Transformation
Build a World-Class Safety Management System
Learn to establish the organizational foundation that makes ISO 26262 compliance sustainable - culture, competency, and continuous improvement.
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