Identifying the team skills required by nuclear operations personnel.

Abstract

The purpose of this study was to identify the team skills required by nuclear power plant operations team members. An initial domain familiarization consisted of a review of company documentation, observations in the control room, on-plant and in the simulator, and role interviews. In the second phase, critical incident technique (CIT) interviews were carried out with 38 operations team members on three British nuclear power plants. A total of 314 statements concerned with teamworking skills were identified from the interview data and used to develop the nuclear team skills taxonomy. The taxonomy had five categories: shared situation awareness, team focused decision making, communication, co-ordination, and influence, with 16 component elements.