In high-risk industries, failure prevention depends on far more than surface-level fixes. But how do you get beyond quick corrective actions to uncover the true causes of incidents and under performance? In this interview, Mark Rushton, COMET’s CEO reflects on the origins of COMET, the thinking behind its investigation methodology, and the difference a structured approach makes when organisations are serious about prevention, not just reaction.

How critical is it to identify the true root cause to prevent future incidents? What typically happens when organisations rely on quick fixes or temporary solutions?

In short its crucial!  When a close call, an incident or a non-conformance impacts an organisation, there will, of course, be an eagerness to apply corrective measures going forward.  However, to achieve successful PREVENTIVE actions a proper root cause analysis of each causal factor is required.  You can never fix the ‘what’, only the ‘why’, so trying to fix the whole incident before establishing why it happened is usually futile despite the very best intentions.

The consequences of misaligning or short cutting the right processes are simple – recurrence of failures for the same reasons further down the line which in turn kills the belief in the value of the investigation process next time round. It’s a vicious circle.
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How did COMET’s solution come to life? What problem were you trying to solve, and what makes you most proud of the platform we’ve built?

COMET began life at a business in Seattle, a specialist parts manufacturer for the aerospace industry. It was a response to the inability of the then proprietary market options to prevent the recurrence of their ‘frequent hitter’ incidents and non-conformances.  Our team had a background with more than one of these and a frustration that it was still very difficult to understand performance or more importantly under performance at any scale.  That frustration was further fuelled by long and illustrious investigator careers in both criminal and industrial sectors and exposure to the worst possible outcomes that, when analysed, were not only preventable but, in some cases, predictable.

We knew early on that root causes were pack animals and never occurred in isolation, so building a structure that could track and correlate them at scale was key.  We also knew that root cause outcomes weren’t affected by the consequence of their occurrence, so building a version of our methodology that was a lighter touch for use in low-level, low consequence events would give us the opportunity to address root causes before any significant harm came of the organisation, all without overburdening HSEQ and operational teams.  Applying proportion was a very important lesson learned!

Root Causes don’t change based on failure type either – they are agnostic in nature. This was a big thing we wanted to teach our early adopters back then – if you limit RCA to just Health & Safety related events, you miss out on a big chunk of ROI or, as we like to measure, ROP! (return on prevention

We are very proud of the journey to date, and having significantly invested in the technology to support the core methodology, we’ve become a credible part of the EHS Enterprise Technology landscape. Seamless integration with parent systems is now relatively straightforward, and as our investment has scaled, useful, AI-assisted tools are now featured across the platform, too.  


How does COMET differ from competition?

This is a field where the traditionally widest-used solutions (including 5-whys!) have generally been adopted to try to prevent repeat failures – all usually on a case-by-case basis... being frank, they all have limitations, and this has allowed COMET to flourish.

COMET offers a new standard, with technology and learning from cumulative data at its heart. Whilst numbers and standalone outcomes have some value, illuminating the systemic detail that brings the real contributors to organisation wide failure offers MUCH more.  All of this is presented by next generation dashboards designed by investigation domain experts – and populating actionable detail from day 1. We call this moving ‘from counting to colour’. Data is only data until you can use it to inform better decisions – COMET makes that easy. Actionable Intelligence should be a given in today’s tech-smart environments.

Tools include proper human factors analysis (which aids the all-important just & fair culture), AI-assisted on-demand help, and in-built guidance on building the right preventive actions. Common pitfalls are all addressed – and there is no double handling or duplication of data as reports are automated from the COMET platform.

We also know that making a change can seem daunting, so we’ve worked hard to address and remove the barriers most common to a ‘first-time’ successful transition.


Can you share how COMET has helped organisations globally, and the kind of results we’ve achieved?

In line with the USPs explained above we’ve helped many organisations, big and small, in all corners of the globe, to achieve:

  • A consistent & deep understanding of ALL their incidents and unplanned business outcomes.
  • The ability to isolate the root causes that give them most of their pain, the systemic ones!
  • Preventive actions that are smart & achievable.
  • More effective preventive spending – making sure every ‘£’ allocated is spent where it’s needed most.
  • Getting on the front foot and to understand their performance AT SCALE.


What is your message to organisations considering adopting COMET for Investigations &  RCA?

We urge businesses across all high-risk industries to take an obligation-free look at COMET. We de-risk any interest completely using comparison and free trial options, and we offer simple, competitive enterprise pricing with no hidden costs.  Our training costs less than the rest but sacrifices nothing when it comes to quality, and our support is 2nd to none.  We promise it won’t be time wasted!

Looking back at COMET’s 22-year journey, what are the biggest changes you’ve seen in the industry, and where do you see the future heading?

Whilst we are still employed (much more regularly than we’d like!) to investigate the very worst industrial incidents and non-conformances, HSEQ maturity in the past 22 years has come on in leaps and bounds. Smart businesses are much more proactive and have invested in better supply chain collaboration, operating procedures, cultures, barriers and control measures to better their performance day in and dayout.  

Whilst ‘zero harm’ will always be unlikely, striving for it hasled to a focus on the now incremental gains that combining people and technology in just the right blend can realise.

A bright future is one where ALL businesses with aspirations to work in our major accident hazard industries follow a similar path to those who have helped us get to where we are today and continue to push for better still...

Learn more about COMET for Investigations & Root CauseAnalysis