After all the slogans have died down and the metaphors fade. After the conference entertainment and propaganda cease and the linguistic gymnastics parade has finished, the vital question should always be: by what method?

When someon e tells you how to ‘do’ something (eg. do safety differently) the next question should be: by what method? Or, how?

Spin, aspirations and ideas are not method indeed, these often disguise methodology (worldview). Slogans are NOT principles, despite an assertion by some spin doctor. A principle is a fundamental truth, and ‘blame fixes nothing’ is simply not true, it’s a slogan. In an industry seduced by so much sloganeering, Safety desperately needs a little skill in critical discourse analysis (CDA). So much of what parades about as ‘new’ and ‘different’ is just traditional safety re-framed.

Unless something is practical, learnable and doable, it remains ‘hot air’. And, in the world of risk and safety there is plenty of that, without method what remains is ‘spin’.

In SPoR, methodology and method are very clear (https://www.humandymensions.com/product/spor-and-semiotics/). Methodology is the philosophy/worldview that drives method. Similarly, your method reveals your methodology.

Whilst the methods of SPoR are complex and challenging to learn, they are nonetheless a clear method of how to do SPoR. The iCue Method is one example of a very practical doable method that works.

SPoR is anchored to semiotic methods and this makes them very different because the emphasis is on visual/verbal doing not text.

One of the reasons why SPoR methods are challenging to learn is that they require significant unlearning of all the spin, hype, indoctrination and slogans of traditional safety including, the myths of HOP, S2 etc.

First of all, in SPoR, a new worldview (methodology) is requested and only then can its methods be learned and practiced. This requires significant unlearning of many of the myths that are anchored to traditional safety such as S2. Most of the methods in safety are anchored to a STEM and technicist worldview.

A semiotic and existentialist worldview is very different than a technicist or STEM (scientist) worldview (https://safetyrisk.net/using-the-label-of-science-to-validate-safety-mythology/).

For example, I had a discussion with a statistician yesterday whose whole life has been dedicated to measurement. Indeed, he had a ‘belief’ that most things can be measured. Then I suggested to him that most of what interested me was what could not be measured, and he found that challenging.

So, I shifted our conversation onto things like dreaming and First Nations people’s worldviews. We talked about how we experience things differently and subjectively and that these cannot be measured quantitatively. Yet, we know that different worldviews are real to others that cannot be measured.

Indeed, we have seen evidence of 65,000 years of art and artefacts from Australian First Nations culture and how the colonialists interpreted Australian Aboriginals as not human. Then what followed was their genocide in the name of good. This is because the methodology (philosophy) of the colonial powers (colonialism) didn’t recognise non-measurable criteria (and Poetic criteria) for understanding civilisation.

Your methodology determines your method.

And so, even The Australian Wars that followed colonisation (see. Perkins, Gapps, Murray and Reynolds – 2025) have not been recognised by post-colonial History. Indeed, our education system and media continue to supress knowledge of The Australian Wars.

Your methodology determines your method.

When it comes to History, it all depends on how you ‘do’ History. This is the craft of knowing Historiography and hermeneutics. There is not one theory of History just as there is not one theory of Learning. Indeed, if you hear the words ‘learning’ of ‘history’ being used in safety, the first question should be: ‘what theory are you talking about?’

Your method reveals your methodology.

So, we return to method. Similarly, behaviours are not method but evidence of a method.

We are currently writing a book on investigations methods on the market and it’s is surprising that so many of these methods never declare their methodology or ethic. Yet, if you are skilled in analysis, you can see what beliefs and ethic the method hides. For example, if the method treats people like objects to be moved about as pawns, then the methodology is Behaviourist. If the focus on learning is brain-centric then the worldview of the person is Cartesian. If the focus is on Human Performance, then the methodology is Utilitarian (humans are valued by their utility). This is the Methodology of HOP, even though it is never declared. Indeed, most in HOP couldn’t articulate what their methodology is.

Your method reveals your methodology.

So, when you see what is going on at work and you are concerned about how people are being treated by a method, the key is to go back to the source. Ask about beliefs, values, ethics and moral meaning and you will find out what the methodology is. If you want some help in doing this, just ask admin@spor.com.au