Organisational Lucidity and the Impact of Subcontracting

Trying to assess the impact of subcontracting on safety implies grasping how subcontracting can affect the main ingredients of organisational safety. One of these ingredients is what we will call ‘organisational lucidity’: the ability of an organisation to perceive, at its different levels, what really happens within its operation processes. After listing both lucidity enabling and preventing factors, we discuss the impact of subcontracting on these factors, with reference to a study recently undertaken within a major airline concerning the impact of subcontracting on flight safety.