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Jan Hayes

Qualifications

Dr Hayes holds a Bachelor of Engineering (Chemical) (Honours) from the University of Adelaide, a Master of Business (Leadership and Organisation Dynamics) from Swinburne University and a Doctor of Philosophy in Sociology from the Australian National University.

OHS Regulatory and Other Professional Experience

Dr Hayes has 25 years’ experience in safety and risk management. Her project experience covers a range of industries including offshore oil and gas, onshore petrochemicals, gas pipelines, mining, manufacturing and transportation (including air traffic control). She began her career in 1983 in oil and gas process plant operations, and then moved to detailed design. She was involved in the initial Australian oil industry response to the Piper Alpha incident in 1988 and has been working almost exclusively in industrial safety since then. Jan was a director and part owner of Qest Consulting Pty Ltd (one of Australia’s best known industrial risk and safety consultancies) between 1991 and 2004. Holding a number of operational roles, she managed up to 50 staff and was personally responsible for projects ranging from technical safety studies (such as safety cases, HAZOP studies, QRAs and reliability studies) to organisational psychology reviews and human factors studies.

Her current activities cover academia, consulting and regulation. She holds a Senior Research Fellow appointment at the Australian National University where her research interests include operational decision making, safety in design, professionalism and the use of standards. She is Program Leader for the social science research activities of the Energy Pipelines Co-operative Research Centre. In addition, she consults part time with a small group of clients on safety performance improvement projects. Dr Hayes is a member of the Advisory Board of the National Offshore Petroleum Safety Authority.