Author: Erik Hollnagel Technical note publication date: 2015
Erik Hollnagel introduced the Resilience Analysis Grid as a method for accessing the resilience of a system by determining how it may perform in both known and unknown conditions.Hollnagel presents four capabilities or potentials that must be present for a system to exhibit resilient performance: 1) the ability to respond based on knowing what to do; 2) the ability to monitor based on knowing what to look for; 3) the ability to anticipate based on knowing what to expect; and 4) the ability to learn based on knowing what has happened. Because the four abilities make resilience performance possible, the resilience of a system can be assessed by identifying the extent to which each of the four abilities are present and supported in the system. The Resilience Analysis Grid poses a set of questions for each of the four capabilities to determine how a system performs. The answers to the questions offer a profile of a system’s potential for resilient performance. The Resilience Analysis Grid has been applied in a number of areas including railway management, healthcare, offshore logistics and emergency response, and radiation protection.
You can learn more about the Resilience Analysis Grid on Hollnagel’s website or you can download his technical note. A detailed description of the Resilience Analysis Grid is also provided in the Epilogue of the book Resilience Engineering in Practice: A Guidebook (Ashgate Studies in Resilience Engineering)