In this special Risk! Engineers Talk Governance episode, due diligence engineers Richard Robinson and Gaye Francis discuss the recent IT outage that affected systems worldwide and the importance of criticality and resilience.

Main take-aways include:

• The outage was predictable and foreseeable. It was a critical incident.
• You can't gold plate a single system so that it won't fail.
• The importance of redundancy – ensuring you've got another independent system that doesn't rely on the primary system.
• Engineering organisations are required to look at the credible worst case scenarios that can happen and what you can do and put in place to make sure that they're managed
• You need to positively demonstrate due diligence about what you're doing. And due diligence means that you take into account the credible critical issues.
• When doing these reviews, you have to talk with the senior decision makers, who understand the business’ critical requirements.

If you’d like to find out more about Richard and Gaye’s work, head to https://www.r2a.com.au.

The book they refer to is Due Diligence Engineering and can be purchased online at https://www.r2a.com.au/store/p/r2a-engineering-due-diligence-textbook.

In the final episode of season three of the Risk! Engineers Talk Governance podcast, due diligence engineers Richard Roberson and Gaye Francis discuss the theme of criticality and design in the context of climate change and sustainability due diligence.

They discuss:

• The consequences of redirecting rivers for irrigation,
• Why the Victorian Government built the, to now, unused desalination plant, and argue if they should be considering the potential impacts of global warming,
• Three possible design solutions: Sun shields, increasing cloudiness, and fertilising the Southern Ocean to address climate change, and
• How knowledge, technology and costs of design solutions are constantly changing.

The textbook where the three design solutions are highlighted is R2A’s Engineering Due Diligence which you can find at https://www.r2a.com.au/store/p/r2a-engineering-due-diligence-textbook

For more information on Richard and Gaye’s due diligence work, head to https://www.r2a.com.au/.

And if you have any comments, feedback or topic ideas for Season 4, email us at admin@r2a.com.au.

In this episode of the Risk! Engineers Talk Governance podcast, due diligence engineers and Co-Directors at R2A Richard Robinson and Gaye Francis, discuss town planning disasters and the need for consequence planning.

This follows Gaye’s recent conference paper at the International Public Works Conference where she detailed the VCAT decision around the major hazard facility and the planning law associated with it. But in this podcast, they reflect on other natural hazards like floods, bushfires, dam breaks and how town planning can address (or fail to address) these before they happen.

The biggest question they ask is rather than a focus on recovery, why aren't we building resilience into our infrastructure and/or seeing how we, as a community, build to be able to withstand some of these disasters? And how this is a shift from thinking from risk planning to consequence planning.

They also discuss the mismatch between town planning requirements and WHS/OHS legislation.

If you’d like to learn more about Richard & Gaye’s work, head to R2A at https://www.r2a.com.au

In this episode of Risk! Engineers Talk Governance, due diligence engineers Richard Robinson and Gaye Francis from R2A discuss how standards stifle innovation.

They highlight the frustration of engineers who are designing to standards rather than focusing on solving the actual problem at hand. They argue that standards are often lag indicators and may not keep up with the rapidly changing world and provide examples of how standards can lead to shortcuts being taken and hinder the adoption of new technologies.

If you’d like more information about Richard and Gaye, head to https://www.r2a.com.au

In this podcast episode, due diligence engineers Richard Robinson and Gaye Francis discuss the concept of risk appetite versus zero harm and the confusion it creates at board levels because they're trying to put all of their risk issues into a single statement.

They discuss how a risk appetite is about balancing risk and reward, whereas zero harm is about nothing bad happening, and this gets uncomfortable when applying risk appetite to human safety.

The outline the commonly applied risk paradigms and how a synthesis of risk appetite in commercial and safety practice does occur in project due diligence.

For more information about Richard & Gaye's due diligence work, head to https://www.r2a.com.au

In this episode of Risk! Engineers Talk Governance, Richard Robinson and Gaye Francis discuss Code of Practice and WHS/OHS confusion in relation to a presentation they delivered to the Dam Owners and Operators' Forum in Queensland recently, called "How do we do ALARP? Meeting a duty of care."

They explain how the Code of Practice doesn’t align with WHS/OHS legislation and if you conduct an “augmented ALARP” as suggested by the ANCOLD (Australian National Committee on Large Dams) Guideline it does not promote innovation or an efficient due diligence process. and that this exists in a number of industry guidelines.

They also discuss the Oroville & Edenville Dam breaks (USA), how risk is multidimensional, how many industry guidelines have the same issues, and considering reciprocity as part of diligent decision making.

Discover more about Richard and Gaye’s work at https://www.r2a.com.au.

In this episode of the Risk! Engineers Talk Governance podcast, Richard Robinson and Gaye Francis discuss the relationship between art and engineering.

They draw parallels between the roles of artists and engineers, highlighting the importance of composition, execution, and management in both fields. They outline the different types of engineers, such as creators, managers/consultants, and specialists, and the need for all three types in successful engineering organisations. Richard emphasises the importance of recognising and focusing on one's strengths in order to have a satisfying and successful career.

Their conversation also touches on the challenges of small businesses, the role of innovation, and the limitations of relying solely on standards in engineering.

If you’d like to learn more about Richard and Gaye’s work, head to https://www.r2a.com.au.

In this episode of Risk! Engineers Talk Governance, Richard Robinson and Gaye Francis discuss control and reasonableness in WHS/PHS legislation.

They explain that the WHS/OHS legislation is a statutory statement of the common law duty of care and a defence against negligence, and that there’s two primary controls for negligence defence: no power defence (lack of control) and doing every reasonably practicable thing to address the matter. The aspect of control is built into the reasonableness decision in the legislation.

The episode also covers:

• the importance of not getting caught up in arguments about responsibility and instead taking collective responsibility for addressing hazards.
• Lord Atkin's question "Who is my neighbour?" and how the legal ruling relates to design process and retrospective design review.
• the benefits of the due diligence approach in bringing key stakeholders together to collectively address safety issues.

The Criminal Manslaughter booklet mentioned can be found at https://www.r2a.com.au/store/p/r2a-criminal-manslaughter-directors-booklet

For more information on Gaye and Richard’s due diligence work at R2A, head to https://www.r2a.com.au/