Even in the beginning, "classification" services were all about assessing risk. In the 1760s, when the industry was in an embryonic form, captains, ship owners, and merchants would huddle in London's coffee houses to swap industry stories and forge deals by sharing the risks and rewards of transporting cargo by sea.

Almost simultaneously, these first "underwriters" realized the value of assessing the condition of the ships they were insuring, and an industry was born. Worker safety may be the raison d'etre of modern classification societies, but marine historians know that it was initially an afterthought, a byproduct of assuring the safe transport of cargo.

Modern class provides technical solutions and expert advice to help offshore owners and operators manage an ever-widening spectrum of asset-related risk. (Photo courtesy of Thinkstock)

Providing protection

Protecting increasingly valuable cargo – and eventually the people who moved it – necessitated the creation of technical rules, codes, and standards that ostensibly ensured a common understanding and global application of best practice.

Marine engineers and naval architects who supported the early commercial fleets eventually found demand for their work in other industries, initially in the energy sector both before and after fuel-sourcing moved offshore.

As the transport and energy sectors evolved, rules, codes, and standards were updated to reflect new technologies and requirements, just as the modernization of industry prompted class societies to expand their brief to assure not only the safety of people and property but the environment as well.

Engineers and technical specialists working for today's class societies provide technical support to many industries that operate high-risk capital-intensive assets ranging from merchant ships, rail networks, and chemical plants to civil nuclear facilities and deepwater drilling rigs.

The role of the class society continues to evolve, particularly in support of an offshore industry that becomes more technologically complex every day as it ventures into more difficult environs in search of the last stores of fossil fuels. Nowhere is the modern-day industry more dynamic than in Brazil.

Essentially, basic class and statutory services – such as verification and certification – no longer fully satisfy the needs of modern offshore practitioners. A host of technical consultancy activities is needed to supplement what has become a "class-plus" menu, from which clients have the option to select bespoke, integrated solutions to fit often complex, technical requirements. Meeting changing needs To deliver best practice across this increasingly diverse portfolio of technical services, elite class societies have had to annually increase the resources committed to R&D often, for financial reasons, in tandem with commercial allies, governments, and academia.

But because class is a service provider, the evolution of its technical expertise and service offering is driven by the changing demands of and on its client group, the asset owner, or operator.

For example, a maturing asset base in the energy sector is driving demand for asset integrity solutions as owners look to extend the lives of their assets without compromising safety or operational efficiency.

At the same time, the shift to recovering fossil fuels from comparatively remote areas such as deep water and the Arctic is driving demand for an unprecedented level of new, innovative technical and risk-related solutions as terms such as "FLNG" (floating LNG) and "ice-strengthened" become industry buzzwords.

The post-Macondo era is seeing many multinationals look to third parties for technical solutions and validation as the value of independent assurance receives greater recognition and, in some cases, becomes mandatory. The transition away from prescriptive assurance processes toward safety-case models, which allocate resources proportionate to the risk, is driving demand for bespoke risk management strategies that can fit a diversity of risk profiles.

In short, modern class societies have to offer technical solutions that recognize an industry's legacy while driving the research and employee development that will help to ensure that same industry builds the infrastructure and systems it needs to meet the future challenges of comparatively new markets like those being explored by Brazilian operators.

Organizational integrity

Planning for the future always involves a degree of uncertainty. But from operational and safety perspectives, what is clear is that owners and operators in asset-intensive industries need to better understand the influence the workforce has on asset performance.

Huge advances have been made in the technical construction of offshore infrastructure and the systems that support it in the past 20 years. Assets and systems are now safer by design.

The next significant incremental advances in workplace safety will come from a better understanding of the influence of the human factor. There is overwhelming evidence that 80% to 90% of seaborne incidents and near misses are due to weaknesses or failures of the workforce.

No matter how good the technical integrity of an offshore asset and its systems is, the organizational integrity of the workforce is the single biggest risk factor.

For elite class societies, promoting greater understanding of organizational integrity is one of the next frontiers. Organizational integrity is a measurable quantity that relates to the operational reliability of an asset. It is the human part of the interaction among people, plants, and processes that assures operational efficiency and workforce safety.

Optimizing it requires an explicit understanding of safety critical tasks, those activities in which safety margins depend on human vigilance and performance.

There also must be genuine leadership, from top management down through supervisors, supplemented by good hazard awareness and safety intervention by employees.

Policies and procedures need to control work activity risks by setting meaningful and usable guidance without creating excessive paperwork. They need to be accessible to all employees.

Work plans should avoid unnecessary risk (such as too much night work) and ensure enough alert personnel are available for the duration of the task, with production peaks anticipated and managed.

As skills shortages become more acute, it will become progressively more important for class to help asset owners measure and manage the competency of their workforce.

Class societies now carry out inspection activities. (Images courtesy of Lloyd’s Register)

Skills shortages can mean rapid promotion or over-promotion, eroding the competence of the workforce. Assuring employee competence is no longer just a prerequisite of operational reliability in Brazil and elsewhere. It is now a safety regulation in many parts of the world.

It also is no longer adequate to demonstrate individual employees have been trained; knowledge and skill assessments need regular appraisals, and third-party audits ensure integrity and objectivity.

Optimizing a company's organizational integrity requires employee promotions to be based on more than technical skills; they need to take into account behavioral aptitudes for supervision, communication, and performance management.

An effective system of two-way communication is required, one where employees have the confidence to report concerns and near misses so the asset owner/operator knows safety issues are being reported.

Accountability is a key, but it needs to be managed through a system of governance that emphasizes learning and the continuous improvement of working methods, supervision, and safety standards. If improvement is required, there should be a supportive process for change management that ensures any change is understood and that improvements are embedded and durable.