Together with new technological improvements comes a considerably increased burden on people when systems fail, therefore it is essential that systems are designed with the operator and maintainer in mind. These issues are addressed using Human Error Analysis. This describes a range of techniques that analyse, in some detail, the tasks that are performed by people in routine, error recovery and emergency conditions. For each of the tasks, the scope for error and error recovery is assessed accounting for the information supplied to the operator, the time pressures, environment and any other tasks that are being completed by the operator.

Human error analysis then enables the key acts and errors that present a risk to be identified and recommendations made as to how the risk can be reduced. The recommendations may include redesign, changed procedures, improving information available, or changing workload, for example.