The role of the human factors for the resilience of dynamic systems

Abstract

This article explores the critical role of human factors in enhancing the resilience of dynamic socio-technical systems, particularly European critical infrastructures, against large-scale disruptions. It highlights the complexity of socio-technical systems due to the interplay of human and technological elements. It emphasizes the need to shift the perception of human factors from liabilities to assets. The EU's Horizon Europe program (HORIZON-CL3-2025-01-INFRA-02) is discussed, which funds interdisciplinary research integrating Social Sciences and Humanities (SSH) with Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics (STEM) to improve infrastructure resilience. The article identifies key gaps in aligning human and technological factors, addressing silos, and ensuring maturity in technologies, skills, and regulations. It proposes measures such as creating cross-disciplinary platforms, aligning the Human Readiness Level (HRL) with the Technology Readiness Level (TRL) and the Manufacturing Readiness Level (MRL), and integrating human factors into modeling and studies. The paper advocates threat-agnostic resilience and emphasizes the importance of empirical studies and frameworks such as HUNTER and HFACS to analyze human errors and enhance system reliability. As sub-modules of the author's proposed design, the ‘human factors for’ (HF4) dynamic systems will help researchers integrate HF4Resilience, HF4Recovery, HF4Energy, HF4Modelling, and HF4Cyber.