Tripod Beta
Practitioner

This 2-day course teaches fundamental knowledge and application of the Tripod Beta analysis method as well as the underlying philosophy. It concludes with the official Tripod Beta Bronze Practitioner examination and accreditation by the Stichting Tripod Foundation.

What is Tripod Beta?

Tripod Beta is a structured method for incident analysis that was developed at the universities of Leiden and Manchester on behalf of Shell International. The objective was to find explanations for how and why undesired events occur due to human error and what contribution organizations make. Although Tripod Beta is primarily used for incident events, the method is flexible and is equally suitable for process disruptions or other undesired events.

Tripod Beta links barrier thinking with human behavior

The method combines the barrier thinking of the Swiss Cheese Model with models of human behavior.

The Swiss Cheese Model assumes that incidents occur when barriers, i.e., protective measures, are missing or fail.

However, barriers do not fail “on their own,” but are compromised through human action or omission.

Nearly all incidents occur in the effort to do good work. Employees come to work to fulfill their tasks and go home unharmed—not to make mistakes. People generally act in ways that make sense to them at that moment.

Tripod Beta therefore does not examine the error, but rather the context that made the error more likely, and thus fits very well with the New View Safety philosophy.