Risk! Engineers Talk Governance

New Zealand's Health & Safety Amendment Bill — Leading the Way

In this episode, due diligence engineers Richard Robinson and Gaye Francis discuss New Zealand's Health and Safety at Work Amendment Bill and explore why New Zealand is leading the in workplace health and safety. They break down the key changes in the amendment, including a sharper focus on critical risk and what this means for both large organisations and small PCBUs.  The conversation touches on the real-world prosecutions that appear to have motivated the reform, including the White Island volcanic eruption and the conviction of the former CEO of the Port of Auckland. Richard and Gaye also reflect on how many organisations are getting too consumed by lower-level compliance activity while the critical risks get deprioritised or ignored entirely.   If you’d like us to cover a specific topic or have any feedback we’d love to hear from you. Email admin@r2a.com.au. For further information on Richard and Gaye’s consulting work with R2A, head to https://www.r2a.com.au, where you’ll also find their booklets (store) and a sign-up for their quarterly newsletter to keep informed of their latest news and events.  Gaye is also founder of Australian women’s safety workwear company Apto PPE https://www.aptoppe.com.au.

Resilient Infrastructure, Risk & Adaptation Strategies

In this episode of Risk! Engineers Talk Governance, due diligence engineers Richard Robinson and Gaye Francis discuss Resilient Infrastructure, Risk & Adaptation Strategies. Following their attendance at the recent forum hosted by Engineers Australia's Risk Engineering Society and the Institute of Strategic Risk Management they unpack the big questions it raised about resilient infrastructure. From Victorian bushfires to the Dreamworld tragedy, to Finland's invasion-proof subways, they explore what resilience really means in practice; who defines it, who's responsible for it, and why "future proofing" is often considered optional. They discuss why resilience can't be managed in silos, how it means different things to different people, and how a due diligence and SFAIRP approach can shift resilience from a reactive response to a proactive strategy.   If you’d like us to cover a specific topic or have any feedback we’d love to hear from you. Email admin@r2a.com.au. For further information on Richard and Gaye’s consulting work with R2A, head to https://www.r2a.com.au, where you’ll also find their booklets (store) and a sign-up for their quarterly newsletter to keep informed of their latest news and events.  Gaye is also founder of Australian women’s safety workwear company Apto PPE https://www.aptoppe.com.au.

To Grok or Not? Using AI for Risk Management & Governance Decisions

In this episode of Risk! Engineers Talk Governance, due diligence engineers Richard Robinson and Gaye Francis how AI in Risk Management? Richard begins with a deep-dive into how large language models work, and where they fall short. He explains why AI systems are sophisticated inference engines rather than true reasoning machines, and why that distinction matters enormously for high-stakes decision-making and risk management. The conversation covers the parallels between AI and Monte Carlo simulation (great for likely scenarios, unreliable for rare critical events), the growing wave of fabricated legal citations produced by AI tools, and why the common law system itself mirrors how large language models operate. Gaye and Richard then bring the discussion back to governance and what does responsible AI use look like for boards and organisations? Who carries liability when a decision is based on AI output? And how do you ensure the sources AI cites are actually real? They conclude by agreeing that AI is a powerful tool for gathering information faster than ever before, but it demands that essential second layer of human thought, verification, and documented decision-making.  They reiterate that thinking, and SFAIRP, is hard.   If you’d like us to cover a specific topic or have any feedback we’d love to hear from you. Email admin@r2a.com.au. For further information on Richard and Gaye’s consulting work with R2A, head to https://www.r2a.com.au, where you’ll also find their booklets (store) and a sign-up for their quarterly newsletter to keep informed of their latest news and events.  Gaye is also founder of Australian women’s safety workwear company Apto PPE https://www.aptoppe.com.au.

SFAIRP: Moral Imperative vs Commercial Reality

In this episode of Risk! Engineers Talk Governance, due diligence engineers Richard Robinson and Gaye Francis discuss this season’s theme of SFAIRP: Moral Imperative versus Commercial Reality and that SFAIRP is hard.  They discuss the tension between the legal and moral weight of “so far as is reasonably practicable” and the commercial pressures organisations face every day, including: * How SFAIRP is an objective test, but objective to whom, and determined when? * Why leaving the "i" out of SFAIRP matters more than you might think. * The danger of delaying design decisions until elimination options are no longer viable. * The misuse of HAZOP as a substitute for early-stage critical hazard thinking.  * Why the WHS legislation may actually be trying to bring creativity and innovation back into engineering. The season will also cover topics on AI and the human effort required to verify it, the integration of the risk curve, risk language and the creeping rigidity in how terms are used, resilient and adaptation strategies. If you’d like us to cover a specific topic or have any feedback we’d love to hear from you. Email admin@r2a.com.au.   For further information on Richard and Gaye’s consulting work with R2A, head to https://www.r2a.com.au, where you’ll also find their booklets (store) and a sign-up for their quarterly newsletter to keep informed of their latest news and events.    Gaye is also founder of Australian women’s safety workwear company Apto PPE https://www.aptoppe.com.au.

Season 6 Wrap: SFAIRP Complexities

In this episode of Risk! Engineers Talk Governance, due diligence engineers Richard Robinson and Gaye Francis wrap up Season 6 and the theme of SFAIRP complexities. Key season highlights they revisit: * Three essential components of SFAIRP: "As Far", "As Is", and “Reasonably Practicable”, * Confusion around hierarchy of controls,  * Contradictions between WHS Legislation (OHS Act in Victoria) and planning and safety law. Watch out for 2026 for Season 7. For further information on Richard and Gaye’s consulting work with R2A, head to https://www.r2a.com.au, where you’ll also find their booklets (store) and a sign-up for their quarterly newsletter to keep informed of their latest news and events.  Gaye is also founder of Australian women’s safety workwear company Apto PPE https://www.aptoppe.com.au.