In a mature Safety Process/SMS these four (4) elements play a critical role in delivering VALIDATED data to management so that the data can be analyzed and properly responded to in order to INTERVENE in the conditions/actions/attitudes BEFORE an event delivers undesired consequences.

The late great Trevor Kletz said it best three decades ago in his first series of books, What Went Wrong?

"In cases like this, managers have been known to say afterwards, “I didn’t know this sort of thing was going on. If I had known, I would have stopped it.” This is a poor excuse. It is a manager’s job to know what is going on and this knowledge cannot be learned by sitting in an office, but by visiting the site, carrying out audits, and generally keeping one’s eyes open. When an accident discloses a poor state of affairs, it is stretching credulity too far to claim that it was the first time that risks or shortcuts had been taken. They are usually taken many times before the result is an accident."

Source: What Went Wrong?, 3rd Edition, Trevor Kletz, 1994