How to Map SIMOPS Risk Before Shutdown Work

SIMOPS risk grows when two safe tasks become unsafe because they happen in the same space, at the same time, under different supervisors. This guide shows senior EHS leaders how to map simultaneous operations before shutdown work starts, so permits, contractors and critical controls do not collide in the field.

Why SIMOPS risk is different from normal task risk

SIMOPS means simultaneous operations, a condition in which independent work fronts create new hazards through proximity, timing, shared energy sources, access constraints or conflicting controls. OSHA's Recommended Practices for multiemployer worksites emphasize communication and coordination before work begins, while OSHA 29 CFR 1926.20(b)(2) requires frequent and regular inspections by competent persons on construction sites.

The Headline Podcast exists for real conversations with constantly learning people, and shutdown work belongs in that spirit because the neat plan on the wall rarely matches the moving work in the plant. Andreza Araujo and Dr. Megan Tranter often return to a leadership question that fits SIMOPS exactly: who owns the decision when several good plans create one bad interface?

The trap is treating each permit as if it were a separate island. A welding permit, scaffold build, line break and electrical isolation can each pass review, although the combined plan may put smoke near an air intake, block rescue access, overload supervision or send two contractors into the same exclusion zone.

Step 1. Freeze the shutdown map before permits are released

A SIMOPS map starts with the physical and time-based layout of work, not with the permit forms. The EHS manager should freeze the first version at least 72 hours before mobilization, because late discovery of work-front conflicts usually turns into field improvisation instead of risk control.

What most shutdown plans understate is that a schedule is not a risk map. A Gantt chart can show that mechanical cleaning, scaffold erection and electrical testing happen on Tuesday, while hiding that all three require the same access road, the same standby team and the same competent person.

Build one visible map with locations, time windows, contractors, energy sources, isolations, lifting paths, hot work points, confined spaces and emergency routes. Use the existing control-of-work audit logic as a starting point, but add the interface layer that normal permit review often misses.

Step 2. List every work front by energy and exposure

Each work front should be described by the energy it can release and the exposure it creates for other groups. Mechanical, electrical, thermal, chemical, pressure, gravity, vehicle and stored-energy sources must appear in the same table, because SIMOPS risk often sits between categories rather than inside one task.

As co-host Andreza Araujo argues in *Safety Culture: From Theory to Practice*, culture appears in what leaders inspect and tolerate. A shutdown team that inspects permits but tolerates invisible interfaces is not controlling work, because the relevant exposure is happening between teams.

For each work front, write four fields: task, energy, exposed group and control dependency. A line break may depend on upstream isolation, a scaffold may depend on vehicle exclusion, and a confined space may depend on ventilation that another task can interrupt. The map should make those dependencies visible before the first crew signs in.

Step 3. Find control conflicts before the field finds them

A control conflict happens when one task weakens, blocks or contradicts the control required by another task. CCPS guidance on SIMOPS risk assessment focuses on hazards created by the interaction of activities, which is why a shutdown review must test combined controls rather than only individual task controls.

The practical issue is not whether the permit writer knows the task. The issue is whether anyone has authority to see across permits, contractors and shifts. A hot work blanket that protects one crew may restrict egress for another, while a temporary barricade that protects a lift may delay rescue access to a vessel entry.

Use a simple red-mark review. Mark every control that can be affected by another work front, then assign one owner to resolve the conflict before authorization. This is where a normal JSA before high-risk work needs a second pass, because a good JSA can still be blind to a neighboring job.

Step 4. Assign one interface owner per risk cluster

SIMOPS risk needs an interface owner whose authority crosses work packages. Without that owner, each supervisor can be technically correct inside a narrow scope while the combined operation becomes unsafe.

Across 25+ years leading EHS in multinationals, Andreza Araujo has seen that risk information only protects people when it changes authority, timing or resources. In shutdown SIMOPS, the authority question is usually sharper than the technical question, because somebody must be able to pause one job to protect another.

Group the map into risk clusters such as hot work near flammables, lifting over access routes, confined space entry near ventilation changes, energized testing near mechanical work and mobile equipment near pedestrian flow. Give each cluster one interface owner, one deputy and one escalation path to the shutdown manager.

Step 5. Set stop points before production pressure arrives

A stop point is a predefined condition that pauses work until the interface is revalidated. Shutdown teams should define stop points before production pressure rises, because the worst time to negotiate authority is when a restart deadline is already slipping.

On Headline Podcast, the phrase visible felt leadership often appears as a test of whether leaders enter the difficult conversation before harm occurs. For SIMOPS, visible leadership is not a speech at the kickoff meeting; it is the decision to stop a bundled work plan when the interface has changed.

Use at least 5 stop-point triggers: scope change, weather change, isolation change, contractor sequence change and emergency-route obstruction. Link those triggers to barrier decay, since many serious exposures begin when a control is still documented but no longer present in the field.

Step 6. Run a 30-minute SIMOPS board review each shift

A SIMOPS board review is a structured shift meeting in which supervisors validate the map against the next work window. Thirty minutes is enough when the map is prepared, but it is not enough when leaders try to discover the work during the meeting.

The review should not become a status meeting where every contractor reports progress. Its purpose is to expose interference. The facilitator should ask what work moved, what control changed, what route is blocked, what permit depends on another permit, and what job should wait because the combined exposure has changed.

Use a visible board with columns for work front, location, interface, control dependency, owner and decision. The board should end with a decision, not a discussion. If the team cannot decide whether the combined exposure is acceptable, the work waits until the shutdown manager or interface owner resolves the conflict.

Step 7. Record decisions in a form leaders can audit later

SIMOPS records should show the interference found, the decision made, the owner named and the field verification completed. A record that only says reviewed and approved does not help leaders learn whether the process actually controlled risk.

The stronger leadership habit is to keep decision evidence close to the exposure. In more than 250 cultural transformation projects, Andreza Araujo observes that organizations mature when they can trace a field decision back to the risk it was meant to control, instead of relying on memory after an incident.

After the shutdown, audit three things: conflicts found before work, conflicts found during work and conflicts missed until field crews escalated them. That audit connects SIMOPS to safety risk appetite, because executives need to know which combined exposures the organization accepted, delayed or stopped.

Comparison of permit review and SIMOPS mapping

Each shutdown day without a SIMOPS map leaves the organization dependent on individual supervisors noticing cross-task conflicts while schedules, contractors and restart pressure keep moving.

Conclusion

SIMOPS risk mapping protects shutdown work by making task interference visible before separate permits create one uncontrolled exposure.

For the Headline Podcast community, the useful leadership move is to ask where safe plans become unsafe together. Listen to the conversations at Headline Podcast, then bring this SIMOPS map to your next shutdown readiness review.