Errors in organizations: Opportunities for crisis management

In the traditional crisis management literature organizational errors are seen as something entirely negative, even though error-free organizations should be considered as a chimera (Clarke, 1999). At-tention to errors is an important characteristic of so called high reliability organizations (HRO). These organizations have a safety culture that function proactively and errors are understood as vital sources for resilience, learning and improvement. The aim of this paper is to discuss the role and importance of informal communication, co-workership and leadership for the error reporting system and safety cul-ture at a university hospital. The paper is based on interviews with managers, nurses and physicians. We will also suggest how crisis management as a research field and practice can develop by focusing errors, which recently has received increased interest among researchers (e.g. Christianson, Farkas, Sutcliffe, & Weick, 2009; Goodman et al., 2011; Hunter, Tate, Dzieweczynski, & Bedell-Avers, 2011; Sutcliffe, 2011).