Neat as a Bow (Tie)

Over the past 2.5 years, GES' own Rich Evans, PE has had the pleasure of working on the Sustainable Remediation Forum (SuRF) Environmental Justice initiative steering committee with a diverse group of environmental professionals. The steering committee is led by Melvin Stroble (EA Engineering, Science, and Technology, Inc.). Melvin has been a motivational leader for the committee. Aside from his welcoming personality and consummate professionalism, one of Melvin’s hallmarks is that he always wears a bow tie. His bow tie inspired us to apply a bow tie analysis to Quality.

A bow tie analysis is a visual risk assessment method that maps out pathways of a potential hazard or risk event. The hazardous event is the center of knot of the bow tie. The left side includes potential causes and preceding events. The right side identifies consequence events and potential impacts. Bow tie analyses can aid in identifying risks, evaluating controls, and improving Quality.

In the example of a bow tie analysis, we chose the hazardous event of failing to meet a client’s Quality expectations. It’s the primary Quality risk we want to mitigate. The potential causes include unclear expectations 
and instructions, and underestimating schedule and effort. These may lead to non-compliance with specifications and exceeding the schedule and budget. On the consequence side, we may need to perform rework, may miss deadlines, and the client may complain about our performance. The potential impacts range from reputation damage to loss of the client.