This pattern is concerned with effects of prescribed career trajectory amongst tightly coupled groups of workers in safety critical, control room settings. The career trajectory prescribes that workers progress through roles with increasing complexity and responsibility. This is considered to builds in extra dependability in such 'systems'. Workers in the uppermost roles which involve, for example, coordination and supervision have thoroughgoing knowledge and experience of positions below their present standing and therefore, how these different 'sub-roles' work to compose the overall activity. This builds into the system the ability to monitor, supervise, assess and explain to others, as well as being able to fluidly assist and take over the roles of others as required. This pattern is highly related by setting and by activity to OverlappingResponsibilities .
This organisation of career trajectory is considered to have a number of benefits for a socio-technical system in terms of dependability. For example, it ensures that those in more responsible roles have knowledge and experience of the activities that feed into their work, or that must be coordinated to achieve their work. Furthermore, those workers with chief responsibilities can have an overall view onto the operation of the 'system' as a whole. This arrangement provides for overseeing, supervision, advice and explanations by those in more 'senior' roles and allows for them to assist with or take over duties concerning the constituent 'tasks'.
This pattern has been described in two settings so far. The focus is on describing career trajectory that progresses through roles and the relationship of this to work achievement for small, collocated or proximally located groups of workers in two control room settings (or centres of coordination). The examples presented come from a naval navigation bridge and an ambulance control room.
This pattern is illustrated with vignettes from the following field work:
* NavalNavigationSecondExample. How the career trajectory that progresses through roles facilitates dependability through fluidity of roles, overall knowledge and supervision in higher positions in naval navigation.
* AmbulanceControlFifthExample. How the career trajectory that progresses through roles facilitates dependability through fluidity of roles, overall knowledge and supervision in higher positions in ambulance control.
This phenomenon of career trajectory that moves through progressively more complicated and more responsible roles attempts to build dependability into these safety critical control room socio-technical systems. As a point on work design it is worth detailing what this seeks to achieve in terms of checking and redundancy:
* Those in higher roles are 'experts' in the roles of those below them.
* Those in higher roles have an overall view of the system.
* Those in higher roles can supervise and assist those in less senior roles.
* Those in higher roles can carry out the duties of those in less senior roles if and as required.
Depending on the purposes (e.g. navigation, coordinating outside resources), size (i.e. small/few roles), environment of implementation (e.g. tightly coupled, safety critical) and so forth there may be good reasons to seek to implement such a system. When considering technical support or innovation for such situations there should be a consideration of how to facilitate more effective supervision, assistance, or gaining of an overall view, or managing flexibility of roles. One can consider how MultipleRepresentationsOfInformation or public artefacts (PublicDisplayedArtefact) may help in supervision, gaining an overall picture (of the past, the here and now and for planning). Another consideration may be how to allow access to the local circumstances of individuals' work from other locations, this may help understand more about individuals work, help in providing assistance and allow for more seamless movement between the duties required for different roles. Various information and communication technologies (ICTs) can be considered for these purposes. For example, shared electronic records of work, video and audio communication and so forth.