Recording Findings Observations, recommendations, and lessons learned Observations Overview — Recording What You Found An observation is a single finding: something you saw, heard, or read that says something about the safety culture being assessed. Observations are the raw material of the assessment — recommendations are written from them, and reports count them. Open Observations from the activity's menu. Needs Observations access. GOOD TO KNOW  This page autosaves, and offers draft recovery if a save does not complete — see Autosave & Drafts. What an Observation Holds Field What it captures Summary A one-line statement of the finding. Detail The evidence behind it — what you saw, who said it, how often, and where. ISF classification Framework, Trait, and Attribute, from three cascading pickers. Rating Your judgement, on the activity's rating scale. Themes related to this answer The themes this observation speaks to.   PRO TIP  Write the summary as a complete statement of the finding, not a topic label. "Handovers" is a filing category; "Night-shift handovers are routinely cut short because the outgoing crew leaves before the brief completes" is a finding a reader can act on. The summary is what most people will ever read.   PRO TIP  Put the evidence in the detail — what you saw, who said it, how often, and where. An observation without evidence is an opinion, and it will be the first thing challenged when the report is discussed.   PRO TIP  Write the detail with search in mind. Observations are one of the three sources the recommendation Search for Evidence tool looks through, and it matches on keywords. An observation that says "the handover brief" will be found by someone searching "handover"; one that says "this issue" will not. Classifying Against the ISF Three cascading pickers place the observation in the framework: the framework, then the trait, then the attribute. Each is filtered by the one above. If the chosen level has nothing beneath it, the picker shows No Data Available and is disabled. HEADS UP  The classification is what makes an observation appear in the right part of the report. A misclassified observation still exists but reports against the wrong attribute — and it will not be found by anyone looking in the right place.   GOOD TO KNOW  No Data Available on the attribute picker means the chosen trait has no attributes defined in the ISF. Mention it to an administrator.   PRO TIP  If an observation genuinely spans two attributes, record the stronger one and say so in the detail. Reports group by a single classification. Rating and Theming The rating follows the activity's rating scale — three options on a 3-point activity, seven on a 7-point one. Themes tag the observation with the themes it touches, chosen from the utility's list. PRO TIP  Theme observations with the same themes you used when coding survey comments and interview answers. That consistency is what lets the Themes Report show a finding supported from three directions rather than three unconnected items.   GOOD TO KNOW  Themes come from the shared list an administrator maintains. If the one you need does not exist, ask for it rather than forcing the observation under an approximate match. Finding and Editing Observations A Search box filters the list. Each observation offers: Control What it does Edit current Observation Opens it for changes. Delete current Observation Removes it from the active list.   PRO TIP  Search the existing observations before adding a new one. On a team assessment the same finding gets recorded independently by two people surprisingly often, and duplicates inflate whatever they are counted in. Deleting an Observation HEADS UP  Read this section before you delete anything. Deleting an observation is available to anyone with Observations write access. Undoing it is not. Restoring a deleted observation requires the Utility Admin role, which most assessment team members — including Team Leads — do not have. Deleting an observation does not destroy it. It is flagged as deleted, stamped with who deleted it, when, and why, and removed from the active list, from every report, and from the Observation Data Export. NSCAT asks you to confirm and to give a deletion reason before it proceeds. PRO TIP  Write a real deletion reason. "Duplicate of the handover finding recorded by MK" tells whoever reviews the deleted list whether it should come back. "Not needed" means they have to restore it to find out — and restoring changes every report it appears in. Who can undo it You are… Can you delete? Can you restore? A Team Member with Observations write Yes No A Team Lead Yes No A Utility Admin Yes Yes A COG Admin (without Utility Admin) Yes No   HEADS UP  If you are not a Utility Admin, treat deletion as final from your side. You will need to ask an administrator to restore it, and they will need to do it before the activity is locked — a locked activity cannot be restored from at all.   PRO TIP  When two people have recorded the same finding, edit one into the better version and delete the weaker one — but note in your deletion reason which observation supersedes it. That way the deletion documents itself. If Something Was Deleted by Mistake You cannot see or restore the deleted list yourself unless you are a Utility Admin. What you can do: 1.      Note what it was — the summary wording, roughly when it was recorded, and who by, if you know. 2.      Ask your administrator to open the activity's Observations page, click Show Deleted Observations, and restore it. 3.      Ask before the activity is locked. Once locked, nothing can be restored until a COG Admin unlocks it. 4.      Re-check any report you have already circulated. A restored observation reappears in reports and exports, so figures will change. GOOD TO KNOW  Administrators see the deleted list with the deletion date and time, who deleted it, and the reason given. Giving them the approximate date is usually enough to find it.   HEADS UP  An observation missing from a report is not necessarily lost. Before anyone rewrites a finding from scratch, ask an administrator to check the deleted list — rewriting it creates a duplicate if the original then comes back. Exporting Observations to PDF An Export PDF button on the Observations page produces a formatted PDF of the activity's observations. The dialog offers the same options as elsewhere: include themes, ratings, and demographics; colour output; Full or Summary detail; a None / Draft / Confidential watermark; and an optional password. PRO TIP  Export to PDF for circulating findings to people who do not use NSCAT, and to Excel — via Observation Data Export under Reports — when you want to work the data yourself. The PDF is for reading; the export is for pivoting.   HEADS UP  Deleted observations do not appear in the PDF, exactly as they do not appear in reports or the Excel export.   HEADS UP  Observations frequently contain identifying detail. Set a password on any PDF leaving the assessment team, and use the Confidential watermark. Observations and Recommendations Observations are what you found. Recommendations are what should be done about them — and an observation you recorded is one of the three things the recommendation Search for Evidence tool can pull in as supporting evidence. PRO TIP  Record observations as you go, and write recommendations at the end once the picture is complete. Writing a recommendation against your first observation usually means recommending something narrower than the evidence eventually supports. See Recommendations and Evidence for Recommendations. A Practical Approach ·        Record observations while they are fresh — the same day as the interview or walkdown. ·        One finding per observation. Two findings in one record cannot be classified or rated honestly. ·        Search before adding, to avoid duplicating a colleague's entry. ·        Classify and theme every one. An unclassified observation is invisible to the reports. ·        Write for keyword search. You will be looking for these again when you write recommendations. ·        Review the full list before writing recommendations, to see the pattern rather than the parts. HEADS UP  Do not leave observation-writing to the end of the assessment. The detail that makes a finding persuasive — the exact wording someone used, how many people said it — is the first thing to fade, and it cannot be reconstructed from a rating. Common Problems What you see What it means Observations missing from the activity menu The activity is locked, or you have no observation read access. Page opens but nothing can be added or edited Read access without write. No Data Available on a classification picker The level above has nothing beneath it in the ISF. An observation is missing from a report It may have been deleted, or it is unclassified. Ask an administrator to check the deleted list. Deleted something by mistake Ask a Utility Admin to restore it. You cannot do it yourself unless you are one. No Show Deleted Observations button You are not a Utility Admin. Expected. A colleague can see a deleted list and you cannot They hold the Utility Admin role. Restored an observation and report figures changed Expected. It is back in reports and exports. The theme you want is missing It does not exist yet. Ask an administrator. Duplicate findings in the list Two people recorded the same thing. Merge them, then delete one — and say which supersedes it in the deletion reason. Observation reports against the wrong attribute Its ISF classification is wrong. Edit it. Autosave chip shows Save failed Read access without write, or the activity was locked. See Autosave & Drafts. A draft banner appears when you open the page A previous save did not complete. Restore and check before retyping. Recommendations Overview — Turning Findings Into Actions A recommendation is what the assessment says should be done. Where an observation records what you found, a recommendation states the problem it represents, the consequences of leaving it, the evidence behind it, and the action proposed. Recommendations are the output the organization acts on — the part of the assessment that outlives the report. Create one with Recommendations → New Recommendation on the activity's menu. Needs Recommendations access. GOOD TO KNOW  This page autosaves — see Autosave & Drafts. Creating a Recommendation New Recommendation starts with the essentials: Field What it holds Title A short name. This is what appears in lists. Team Code The assessment team raising it. ISF classification Three cascading pickers placing it in the framework. Once created, open it to complete the full record. PRO TIP  Write the Title as the action, not the problem — "Restructure night-shift handover briefs" rather than "Handover problems". A reader scanning a list of recommendations wants to know what is being proposed.   PRO TIP  Set the ISF classification before you go looking for evidence. The Search for Evidence tool uses the recommendation's Trait and Attribute to focus its results — classify first and the search comes back far closer to what you need. The Full Recommendation Field What it holds Title The recommendation's name. Team Code The team raising it. Finding Choice The finding this recommendation addresses. ISF Framework, ISF Trait, ISF Attribute Where it sits in the framework. Problem Statement What is wrong, stated plainly. Evidence The supporting material — see Evidence for Recommendations. Other Insights Supporting context that does not belong in the problem statement. Themes The themes it relates to. Consequences Checkboxes for the consequences of not acting. Recommendation The action proposed — "Describe the recommendation". Writing Each Part Problem Statement State what is wrong and why it matters. This is the case for the recommendation existing. PRO TIP  Write the problem statement so it stands alone. Someone reading only this field, months later, in a different department, should understand the issue without the surrounding report.   HEADS UP  Keep the problem statement about the problem. Putting the solution here — and a different solution in the Recommendation field — is a common way to produce a recommendation nobody can act on. Finding Choice Links the recommendation to the finding it addresses. PRO TIP  Set this deliberately. It is the traceability between what the assessment found and what it proposes — the first thing a reviewer checks when asking whether a recommendation is actually supported by evidence. Consequences A set of checkboxes describing what happens if the problem is not addressed. Tick every one that applies. PRO TIP  Consequences are what turn a recommendation from a suggestion into a priority. Two recommendations can propose similar effort; the one with serious consequences ticked is the one that gets resourced.   HEADS UP  Tick only consequences you can genuinely justify from the evidence. Over-ticking to raise a recommendation's profile devalues every recommendation in the report. Other Insights Context that supports the recommendation without being part of the core problem — related findings, history, or things a reader should know. GOOD TO KNOW  This is the right home for caveats — a finding based on a small sample, or a problem already known and being worked on. The Recommendation Itself The action proposed. PRO TIP  Make it specific enough to act on and be closed. "Improve communication" cannot be completed by anyone; "Extend the night-shift handover brief so the outgoing crew remains until it concludes" can be assigned, done, and verified.   HEADS UP  Recommend an action, not an outcome. "Reduce handover errors" is a goal; the recommendation should say what to do that would achieve it. Classifying and Theming The three ISF pickers cascade — Framework, then Trait, then Attribute. Themes tag the recommendation with the themes it relates to. PRO TIP  Classify the recommendation against the same attribute as the observations that support it. That alignment is what lets a report reader move from a finding to its recommendation without hunting.   HEADS UP  Changing a recommendation's ISF classification after you have gathered evidence changes where it appears in reports and can leave the evidence you collected looking unrelated to its new classification. NSCAT warns you when you do this. Settle the classification early. Finding and Editing Recommendations A Search box filters the list, and each recommendation offers Edit current Recommendation. PRO TIP  Review all your recommendations together before the assessment closes. Assessments routinely produce three recommendations that are really one — consolidating them into a single, well-evidenced recommendation is far more likely to result in action than three overlapping ones. From Observations to Recommendations 1.      Record observations throughout the assessment, classified and themed. 2.      Review the full set once collection is complete, looking for patterns. 3.      Write recommendations against the patterns — not one per observation. 4.      Link each to its finding, classify it, and tick its consequences honestly. 5.      Gather the evidence — see Evidence for Recommendations. 6.      Read them as a set and consolidate any that overlap. HEADS UP  Write recommendations after the evidence is in. One recommendation per observation produces a long list of narrow actions, and the organization responds to volume by prioritising none of it.   PRO TIP  Fewer, better-evidenced recommendations get acted on. A report with five clear recommendations backed by observations achieves more than one with twenty.   HEADS UP  Finish recommendations before the activity is locked. A half-written recommendation cannot be completed afterwards without an administrator unlocking the activity. Common Problems What you see What it means No Recommendations group on the activity You have no recommendation read access. New Recommendation missing Read access without write. Fields visible but locked Read access without write, or the activity is locked. No Data Available on a classification picker The level above has nothing beneath it in the ISF. ISF Trait or Attribute empty The level above has not been chosen — they cascade. A warning about changing the classification Expected. It affects where the recommendation reports and how its evidence reads. The theme you want is missing It does not exist yet. Ask an administrator. Recommendation not appearing where expected in a report Check its ISF classification. Several recommendations saying much the same thing Consolidate them into one before the assessment closes. Evidence for Recommendations Overview — Attaching the Proof A recommendation is only as strong as what supports it. The Evidence section on a recommendation is where you gather the interview answers, survey comments, and observations that make the case — and mark which of them matter most. It has three parts: 1.      Search for Evidence — find supporting material across the whole activity and pull it in. 2.      The evidence editor — mark each line as Normal, Important, or Critical. 3.      Export — produce a PDF or Word document of the recommendation with its evidence. Open a recommendation and expand Evidence. GOOD TO KNOW  Everything here is part of the recommendation itself. It autosaves with the rest of the page and needs Recommendations write access. Search for Evidence Click Search for Evidence to open the Find Evidence dialog. It searches three sources at once across the activity: ·        Interviews — interview and focus group answers ·        Surveys — survey comments ·        Observations — the activity's observations Filtering the search Filter What it does Source Type Tick any combination of Interviews, Surveys, and Observations. All three are on by default. Rating Tick Negative, Neutral, and/or Positive. Keyword Free text — e.g. procedure, compliance. Press Enter or the magnifier to run it.   PRO TIP  Start with Rating filtered to Negative and no keyword. That gives you everything critical anyone said anywhere in the assessment, which is usually a short enough list to read — and it surfaces supporting material you had forgotten was recorded.   PRO TIP  Then run it again with a keyword and all three ratings. Positive evidence matters too: a recommendation is much stronger when it can say "three departments described the same practice working well; the fourth does not do it".   GOOD TO KNOW  The search is scoped to the recommendation's ISF Trait and Attribute where they are set, so classifying the recommendation first gives you closer results. Reading the results Results are listed with a summary line above them — the total, and a breakdown by source: N interviews, N surveys, N observations. Each result shows: ·        An icon for its source type ·        Where it came from — the interview name, or the observation ·        Its rating, as a coloured chip ·        The text itself, quoted ·        The question it answered, where there was one PRO TIP  Read the source line, not just the text. Three negative comments from one interview is one person's view; the same three from three interviews across two departments is a pattern. The counts at the top of the dialog tell you which you are looking at. Adding what you found Tick the results you want — or use Select All and Clear — and click Add N to Evidence. They are appended to the recommendation's evidence, one per line. HEADS UP  The text is copied into the recommendation as it stood at that moment. It does not update if the original interview note or observation is later edited, and it does not disappear if the observation is deleted. That is deliberate — your evidence stays stable — but it means the wording in a recommendation can drift from the source.   PRO TIP  Add generously and prune afterwards. It is much easier to delete a line in the editor than to run the search again because you were too selective the first time.   GOOD TO KNOW  "No evidence found. Try broadening your filters or using different keywords." usually means the keyword is too specific, or all three Source Type boxes are not ticked. Marking What Matters The evidence editor has two views, switched with a toggle. Structured view Each line of evidence is listed with a menu offering: Level Use it for Normal Supporting material. The default. Important Evidence a reader should not skip. Critical The evidence the recommendation stands on. The same menu offers Edit text and Remove line. Counts at the top show how many are Critical and how many Important, and non-Normal lines carry a coloured chip. PRO TIP  Be sparing with Critical. If eight of twelve lines are Critical, none of them is — you have just made the highlighting meaningless. Two or three Critical lines per recommendation is about right: the ones you would quote if you had thirty seconds to make the case.   PRO TIP  Use Edit text to trim a long quotation down to the sentence that matters, but do not change its sense. Trimming makes evidence readable; rewriting it makes it something you invented.   HEADS UP  Remove line deletes that evidence from the recommendation. There is no undo and no restore — this is not like deleting an observation. If you might want it back, mark it Normal instead. Raw view The same field as plain text, with importance expressed as tags: [CRITICAL]The night-shift crew leaves before the brief completes.[/CRITICAL] [IMPORTANT]Three of four departments described the same gap.[/IMPORTANT] Supporting detail with no tags is Normal. GOOD TO KNOW  Both views edit the same field. Use the structured view for normal work; the raw view is useful for pasting in a block of prepared text or fixing tagging quickly.   HEADS UP  Unclosed or mistyped tags are not validated. A stray [CRITICAL] with no closing tag saves happily and simply does not highlight. If a highlight is not appearing, switch to the structured view — it re-parses the field and shows you what NSCAT actually recognized. Reading Evidence Back When you view a saved recommendation, its evidence is displayed with a filter across the top: All (N), Critical (N), Important (N). Each line carries its level's icon and colour. PRO TIP  Filter to Critical and read the recommendation as a reviewer would. If the problem statement is not obviously supported by those two or three lines alone, either the evidence is not the right evidence or the problem statement is claiming more than you can show. Exporting a Recommendation The export menu offers Export as PDF and Export as Word, both opening the same options dialog: Evidence Option Effect Include all evidence (Normal + Important + Critical) Everything. Show only key evidence Critical and Important only. Group evidence by importance level Critical first, then Important, then Normal. Highlighting Option Effect Highlight Critical evidence Marks Critical lines in the output. Highlight Important evidence Marks Important lines in the output. Sections Include or omit Problem Statement, Other Insights, and Consequences. PRO TIP  Two exports cover most needs. For the report pack: everything, grouped by importance, with both highlights on. For a briefing or a one-page summary: Show only key evidence, all three sections on. The second is usually the version people actually read.   PRO TIP  Export to Word when the recommendation is going into a larger document someone will edit, and PDF when it is going out as it stands.   HEADS UP  Evidence contains verbatim quotations and can carry identifying detail — a role, a shift, a location. Check what a filtered export actually contains before it leaves the assessment team. Evidence and the Report Builder There are two routes to the same material, and they suit different moments: Route Best when Search for Evidence in the recommendation You are writing the recommendation now and want the supporting lines attached to it. Evidence for Recommendations template in the Report Builder (admin) You want the whole activity's negative findings as a workbook to work through offline.   PRO TIP  On a large assessment, ask your administrator to run the Report Builder template first and circulate the workbook. The team can then agree which findings become recommendations before anyone starts attaching evidence one recommendation at a time. A Practical Approach 1.      Classify the recommendation — Framework, Trait, Attribute — before searching. 2.      Search broadly. Negative first, then keyword, then all ratings. 3.      Add generously, then prune in the editor. 4.      Mark two or three lines Critical, a handful Important, leave the rest Normal. 5.      Filter to Critical and read it back. If the case is not made, get more evidence. 6.      Export the key-evidence version for the people who will decide, and the full version for the pack. Common Problems What you see What it means No Evidence section You have Recommendations read access without write, or the activity is locked. Search for Evidence returns nothing The keyword is too specific, or Source Type boxes are unticked. Broaden and retry. Results all from one interview That is your finding, not a fault — the evidence is thinner than it looked. Add button disabled Nothing is selected. Tick at least one result. Evidence text differs from the current interview note Expected. Evidence is captured as text when added and does not follow later edits. Evidence from an observation that no longer exists Also expected. Deleting an observation does not remove evidence already added. A highlight is not appearing Malformed tags in raw view. Switch to structured view to see what was recognized. Removed a line by mistake There is no undo. Search for it again and re-add it. Everything is marked Critical Nothing is. Re-read and demote all but two or three. Export produced a very long document Use Show only key evidence, or turn off sections you do not need. Export failed Retry. If it recurs, reduce what you are including and try again. Lessons Learned Overview — What Others Should Know A lesson learned is something worth passing on beyond this assessment — an insight about how the work was done, or a finding with relevance elsewhere in the fleet. Observations and recommendations belong to their activity. Lessons learned are written to travel: they appear in the shared Lessons Learned Review library, where colleagues from other activities and other utilities can read them and mark that they agree. Open Lessons Learned from the activity's menu. Needs Lessons Learned access. HEADS UP  This page does not autosave. Use the save button. Recording a Lesson Use Add New Lesson Learned. Each lesson has three parts: Field What it holds Lesson text The lesson itself. Lesson Tag A tag categorising it, chosen from the available list. Required. Public / Private A toggle controlling who can see it.   PRO TIP  Write the lesson so it makes sense to someone who knows nothing about your activity, your site, or your assessment. Internal shorthand, unit numbers, and local role names all make a lesson unusable to exactly the audience it was written for.   PRO TIP  Say what happened, what you learned, and what someone else should do differently. A lesson that only records what happened leaves the reader to work out the point — and most will not. Public or Private The toggle now states its current setting explicitly and is colour-coded, so there is no ambiguity about which way it is set: ·        It reads (Currently: Public) or (Currently: Private). ·        Green for Public, red for Private. ·        The saved lesson carries a chip showing its state when you browse the list. Setting Who sees it Public Shared beyond your utility, into the wider Lessons Learned Review library. Private Kept within your own utility.   HEADS UP  Set this deliberately on every lesson. Public means readable outside your organization — so a lesson naming a specific failure, a contractor, or an identifiable individual should be Private. Check the toggle reads what you intend before saving.   PRO TIP  Most genuinely useful lessons can be written to be shareable. Describe the pattern rather than the incident — "assessments that schedule interviews across shift changes lose participants" travels safely; the same lesson naming the crew involved does not. Tags Lesson Tag is required, and is chosen from the available tag list. PRO TIP  The tag is how anyone will find your lesson. The Lessons Learned Review library shows lessons one at a time, and filtering by tag is how people navigate it — a lesson tagged carelessly is effectively unfindable. Finding and Editing Lessons Lessons are shown one at a time with paging. Above them: Control What it does Search Free-text search across lessons. Filter by Tag Narrows to particular tags. Filter by Visibility All, Public only, or Private only. From Date / To Date Narrows to a date range. Edit current Lesson Learned Opens the displayed lesson for changes.   PRO TIP  Filter by Visibility → Public and read your activity's lessons as an outsider would. It is the quickest way to catch a lesson that is either too local to be useful or too specific to be shared. Exporting Export Lessons Learned to Excel downloads lessons as a workbook, using the filters in the export dialog — activity, tag, visibility, and date range. An Export PDF button produces a formatted PDF of the activity's lessons, with the usual options: include themes and ratings, colour output, Full or Summary detail, a None / Draft / Confidential watermark, and an optional password. HEADS UP  The Excel export dialog's filters are separate from the ones you were browsing with. Narrowing the page to one tag does not narrow the export — set them again inside the dialog.   HEADS UP  Set Visibility deliberately before exporting anything you intend to circulate. Leaving it at All puts private lessons into a workbook that may travel further than they should. The same caution applies to the PDF.   PRO TIP  Excel for analysis and for the administrator's cross-activity library work; PDF for circulating a readable set to a management team. The Shared Library Lessons appear in Lessons Learned Review, reachable from the sidebar outside any activity. There, colleagues can read lessons and mark 👍 I Agree on ones matching their own experience. PRO TIP  Endorsements are what make a lesson carry weight. A lesson agreed with by fifteen people across six utilities is evidence of a systemic pattern; the same lesson recorded once is one team's experience.   GOOD TO KNOW  Lessons Learned Review is hidden from COG Admins by design. If an administrator colleague cannot find it, that is expected. Observations, Recommendations, and Lessons Record Answers Audience Observation What did we find? This assessment Recommendation What should be done? This organization Lesson Learned What should others know? Everyone else   PRO TIP  Not every finding deserves a lesson. Ask whether a team at a different site, next year, would genuinely benefit. If the answer is no, it was an observation — and a library full of site-specific detail is one nobody reads.   HEADS UP  Write lessons before the activity is locked. The reflective part of an assessment is the easiest to postpone until it is too late. Common Problems What you see What it means Lessons Learned missing from the activity menu You have no lessons learned read access, or the activity is locked. Add New Lesson Learned missing Read access without write. Save disabled Lesson Tag is required and has not been chosen. No autosave chip on this page Correct — this page does not autosave. Use the save button. Unsure whether a lesson is public The toggle states it — (Currently: Public) or (Currently: Private) — and is green or red. A lesson is not in the shared library It is Private, or the library's filters are excluding it. Private lessons in a shared export Visibility was left at All. Re-export with Public only. The export contains more than expected The dialog's filters are separate from the browsing filters. The tag you want is not available Tags come from a set list. Pick the closest, or ask an administrator. Everything read-only Read access without write, or the activity is locked.