In this episode Todd Conklin joins Jowanza Joseph to explore modern safety thinking: why human error is normal, how context shapes behavior, and why leadership response and system recoverability matter more than blame.

They draw on examples from Los Alamos, AWS outages, SpaceX and everyday technology to show how organizations can design systems that tolerate failure and learn from it.

Listeners will get practical insights into the five principles of human performance and how to build resilient systems that fail safely and recover quickly.

Todd Conklin joins the Brisbane Safety Differently Book Lab in Auckland for a lively discussion about leadership, accountability, and learning from everyday work. The group explores why safety is the presence of control, how leaders should respond after incidents, and why learning is the new currency of safety.

Todd shares stories about writing his books, engaging with workers, and practical steps leaders can take to build confidence and capacity while fostering a learning culture.

Part two of the RaDonda Vaught story examines what emerged after the event: investigation details, system design flaws, communication breakdowns, and the tiny timing error that mattered. RaDonda Vaught recounts how normalized overrides, software defaults, and organizational assumptions created conditions for failure.

The episode explores the chilling effects of criminalizing mistakes, the human cost across patients and providers, and the case for shifting from blame to system-focused learning and improvement.