myFRAM: An open tool support for the functional resonance analysis method

Abstract

Innovative risk and safety management models and methods are necessary for the analysis of modern socio-technical systems, which are increasingly more complex. In this context, the Functional Resonance Analysis Method (FRAM) is a recently introduced approach to deal with system's complexity, mainly for risk-related purposes. Currently, the only available IT tool for developing a FRAM analysis is the FRAM Model Visualizer (FMV), which has a static graphical-oriented structure. This paper presents the first functional version of a new open IT tool — myFRAM — developed to support the building process of a FRAM model. myFRAM helps risk and safety analysts to deal with the complexity of the representation of socio-technical systems and generate multiple support analyses. myFRAM takes advantage of FMV for graphically depicting the traditional hexagon-based model, but also allows managing data to perform a number of different analyses in an Excel-based environment. This first version can already help safety analysts in developing and exploring a FRAM model in a systematic way, and we are confident that myFRAM may become a powerful tool support for the FRAM.