The deployment of autonomous vehicles (AVs) requires not only technical excellence but also the cultivation of a robust organizational safety culture. While safety engineering standards and assurance processes provide essential structure, a culture that prioritizes learning, accountability, and continuous improvement is critical to ensuring public trust and operational resilience. This paper explores how UL 4600, the comprehensive safety standard for the evaluation of autonomous systems, and Safety Performance Indicators (SPIs) can be leveraged to build and sustain a Just Culture within an AV company.
UL 4600 emphasizes systematic hazard identification, safety case construction, and ongoing evidence generation. When applied beyond compliance, it provides a framework for embedding safety considerations into day-to-day engineering and operational decision making. By mapping UL 4600 clauses into organizational processes and linking them with measurable SPIs—such as rates of system disengagement, perception accuracy, or prediction plausibility—companies can create a transparent, data-driven foundation for assessing both system performance and organizational behavior.
Integrating SPIs into a Just Culture framework shifts their role from being punitive metrics to becoming learning tools. Rather than assigning blame when thresholds are exceeded, SPIs provide signals for investigation, collaborative problem solving, and systemic improvement. This aligns with the principles of a Just Culture, which emphasizes distinguishing between acceptable human error, at-risk behavior, and reckless conduct. Such an approach enables leadership to respond fairly, encourage open reporting of issues, and strengthen employee trust—all while maintaining accountability for safety-critical outcomes.
The paper argues that combining UL 4600 assessment with SPI monitoring creates a feedback loop that reinforces safe engineering practices and fosters a Just Culture. This integration helps AV companies move beyond compliance checklists to a proactive stance where safety culture is continuously reinforced by both standards adherence and real-world evidence.