ABSTRACT
During the design and manufacture of any product, the group of individuals or organizations responsible for delivering it are well defined and controlled. Regular reviews throughout both phases allow the client to assess progress against clearly defined parameters. The concept of small groups of people working cohesively and empowered with some level of autonomy in their job was realized by Elton Mayo during a number of workplace experiments conducted between 1924 and 1932. Empowerment in fulfilling tasks can be an equally thorny issue if an organization feels that not controlling every aspect of their undertaking in fine detail will somehow impinge on the quality or cost of its output. Safety metrics are equally subject to this conundrum of misinformation in that their verisimilitude is based entirely on how they are set and measured.
