The Simple Genius of Checklists

https://blog.nuclino.com/the-simple-genius-of-checklists-from-b-17-to-the-apollo-missions

by zzaner • 7 years ago

323 87 7 years ago

blog.nuclino.com

randomdent2• 7 years ago

While I agree with the overall message, Boeing would not be my first choice for best practices on safety

randomdent2• 7 years ago

Especially after reading this: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20290449

gargod• 7 years ago

Reminds me of Chernobyl, where some steps within the safety system test checklist had been crossed-out for an unexplained reason and they had to essentially guess what to do. Not that a properly maintained checklist would have necessarily prevented it.

zzaner2• 7 years ago

I actually don't know if that detail is true or if it was added for dramatic effect in the HBO series. The official record seems to state that they simply didn't follow the approved procedures for the test: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chernobyl_disaster

mjevans• 7 years ago

There are all sorts of ways they messed up with that test, the design of the system in general, etc.

A lot was learned, some of it costly stuff that we as a species really didn't need to pay for again, and some things that were new and valuable as a result of failure that ethnically could never be intentionally replicated.

One of the better lessons might be to avoid deviating from pre-planned test procedures, and for every major step to have an 'abort' path (or two) for safely entering either safety or normal operating procedures.

euler_angles2• 7 years ago

I have been a flight test and rocket test engineer. Checklists were life, especially in the rocket world. The fantastic thing about checklists is that they both keep you accountable and free your mental resources so that when something happens that one of your checklists don't cover, you know you've at least tried all the sane/expected things. I personally found that backstop freeing and allowed me to use my creativity when it was demanded by things going wrong.

ncmncm2• 7 years ago

It took three generations of flight training for checklists to become an essential part of aviation.

Note that a flight-training generation is less than a human reproductive generation; it's the time from first lesson taken to first lesson taught (plus some). It had to wait for the older instructors to retire.

We are still in transition, in medicine. Many physicians have not yet cottoned to hand-washing, yet.

supahfly_remix• 7 years ago

Many physicians have not yet cottoned to hand-washing, yet.

What?!? How many generations has it been since Louis Pasteur?

euler_angles2• 7 years ago

Maybe -- and this is just my own opinion/speculation -- this is because in my lines of work, the results of failing to follow a checklist can be at worst catastrophic and relatively immediate. In medicine, some classes of failures might be more subtle and harder to notice.

Anyone with medical knowledge, feel free to inform me if that idea is totally off-base.

ls612• 7 years ago

I don’t know about that last part. My dad is a fairly old physician and the way he tells it hand washing has been mandated by the feds for decades and the last cohort of old docs who refused to change in that respect retired circa 1990. But the culture may be different in other parts of the US or world.

bsder• 7 years ago

Many physicians have not yet cottoned to hand-washing, yet.

This isn't really true. They know it's important.

1) Have you ever washed your hands 12 times a day for a week? Think about what your hands would be like.

2) Washing hands properly takes somewhere around 2 minutes. That's a significant fraction of an hour--just spent washing your hands.

Given this, disposable gloves seem like a much better answer.

secfirstmd• 7 years ago

I started seeing the utility of checklists in the military where we have big books of checklists (battle books or tactical aides) carried in your pocket. The contain everything from how to put in a section in attack to how to call in a helicopter. They are really incredible and so useful under pressure.

It gave me the idea to great a free open source mobile app called Umbrella. It's a free, open source app with dozens of best practice lessons and checklists on digital and physical security. The idea being to help people at risk (travellers, journalists, aid workers, activists etc) have somewhere to turn to in an emergency. Everything from sending a secure mail to dealing with a kidnap. You can read more about it at https://www.secfirst.org or try the checklists for yourself https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/umbrella-security/id14537153... or https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=org.secfirst.u...

rkangel2• 7 years ago

I cannot recommend this book enough. It is a great read due to good writing and interesting case studies, and the underlying message is immensely valuable.

blunte2• 7 years ago

Would it help me identify when checklists would be effective, and then how to build a useful checklist?

Or is it more about why checklists are good?

rkangel2• 7 years ago

Both are covered. It specifically talks about two categories of problems, for which checklists are and aren't useful. Different sorts of checklists and what should and shouldn't be on there is also covered.

vmurthy• 7 years ago

Warren Buffett and Charlie Munger are big fans of checklists,too.[1]

Obviously, in a field like investing no checklist is perfect but at-least it'll help you avoid common pitfalls.

Source: Many of their shareholder's letters contain references to their approach. I found another one online.

[1]https://hurricanecapital.wordpress.com/2016/08/12/the-buffet...

thomasfedb• 7 years ago

Surgical Safety Checklists are crucial for preventing what used to be a really shocking number of wrong-patient and wrong-side procedural errors.

Taking the good kidney out instead of the diseased one is practically murder.

https://www.who.int/patientsafety/safesurgery/checklist/en/

hi41• 7 years ago

That is a really nice check list. I think it is color coded as well to present information clearly.

rb808• 7 years ago

I hate checklists. I've just done an information security checklist at work, 200 questions, lots of them irrelevant, many are very vague, often require evidence that is time consuming to put together. Next week I have a release that I have to put a change ticket in for - another 50 boxes with questions and combos. I'm ready to quit. Don't let checklists turn your company into a bureaucratic hell hole.

decoyworker• 7 years ago

Defense?

nobrains• 7 years ago

That sounds like a bad checklist.

Some improvements that can be done:

1. Divide the checklist into "required", "lower priority" and "optional" sections. Will help in just focusing on "required" for time critical implementations, and tackle the rest later if needed.

2. Eliminate requiring evidence and start trusting. If trust is broken (found via audit) then take action. Don't penalize everyone for the mistakes of a few.

3. Add examples for vague cases. Having pre-polulated dropdowns are better than open ended questions. Just add a comments column / field if needed.

4. 200 questions? Seems like overkill. And if all are necessary, then make sure management knows the time that it will take to fill, verify, rectify and submit that sheet.

epalm• 7 years ago

So what you actually hate are "bad checklists".

ukj• 7 years ago

Do you have a good checklist for writing good checklists?

matwood• 7 years ago

I would got so far to say that you're not even dealing with checklists anymore. Almost all my checklist items are yes/no. Is X done? Yes/No. Is a value between Y-Z? Yes/No. Checklists are not meant for vague questions.

Questions that irrelevant should be removed from the checklist. When things are found that have been missed, they should be added.

When used properly they do remove stress and free up mental space. If you travel a lot, making a checklist of what to pack makes it so much easier to leave the house.

memco• 7 years ago

Last time checklists came up on HN someone linked to a talk by Atul Gawanda about the checklist manifesto: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dfl8Xt8W09A. He differentiates good and bad checklists: sounds like those are bad checklists you’re working with. But not all checklists are bad.

mopsi• 7 years ago

Checklists used in aviation do not have questions or anything else that needs much thinking. They are lists of bullet points for tasks that need to be done in a particular order without missing any steps, eg: IGNITION - OFF, FUEL LEVER - CUTOFF, BRAKES - SET, BATTERY - OFF.

efa• 7 years ago

I really enjoyed http://atulgawande.com/book/the-checklist-manifesto/. Very interesting and at times frustrating. You ask yourself why more hospitals can't implement success described in this book.

subhro• 7 years ago

Very good book. This book came to my mind the moment I saw this post.

digikazi• 7 years ago

Atul Gawande is brilliant! He also gave a series of wonderful lectures for the BBC in 2014. They're still avaliable online if interested.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b00729d9/episodes/player?pa...

EDIT: I pressed "update" with my sausage fingers before I wrote anything coherent.

mgnn2• 7 years ago

I'm about 2/3 into the book, the idea is convincing, but did he put any example checklist in the book? He referred to many extant checklists, but there is no "Figure 1: a bad checklist" and "Figure 2: a good checklist, improvement for the one in Figure 1".

ex3xu• 7 years ago

They are at the end, in appendix format. The final checklist is a checklist for checklists:

http://www.projectcheck.org/uploads/1/0/9/0/1090835/checklis...

RedNifre4• 7 years ago

Can anybody recommend a good checklist app for Android? When I search for "checklist" I only find ToDo-List apps that call themselves "checklist" app.

What I'd like is something where you can set a per-checklist timeout after which the list resets everything to unchecked and maybe allow two different ways to view each checklist (or modes): 1. All at once with little check marks that you can check in any order 2. Strictly ordered checklists where you only see the current task and check it to get to the next, ideally with a "3/14" indicator or progress bar to know how far you've got through the checklist.

Which apps can you recommend?

Waterluvian3• 7 years ago

This sounds like a fun afternoon project for a web or mobile dev.

If nobody replies with a quality app that does this, I'm going to make it for myself and share it here.

OedipusRex• 7 years ago

This is my weekend project this week, ha. I'm reading Checklist Manifesto and decided there wasn't any good app for it. I'll post back here when it's done.

appleiigs• 7 years ago

Have you seen this site: http://todomvc.com/ Pick your JS framework and it's done.

RedNifre4• 7 years ago

Nice! If you decide to add NFC sticker capability (scanning a sticker opens a checklist directly) please coordinate with the other person in this thread who might also create an app. I think the NFC data should be the equivalent of "checklist://cessna172cockpit" i.e. it should just contain a reference to the checklist, not the checklist itself. OTOH having the checklist in the NFC sticker, complete with a "last modified" date might be awsome as well, if there are multiple people who use the checklist. Assuming that the whole list even fits in a sticker. Hm...

dvtrn• 7 years ago

Trello can do this repeating checklist to an extent, and it has the progress bar that shows on cards as you complete items.

https://blog.trello.com/trello-card-repeater

snarf21• 7 years ago

What is the timeout that resets the list use case? I'm generally curious.

RedNifre4• 7 years ago

Just laziness on my part, when you are done with the checklist, get interrupted and start 15 minutes later you might want to still see all the check marks still there, but on the next day, you might be doing a different task.

This needs to be configurable because it depends on task frequency and how long a checked checklist stays relevant.

It might be overkill, just having an easily accessable (but not to easy?) reset button for each list might work as well.

Also, I haven't read the book yet, so my requirements might not be the best.

sails• 7 years ago

Far from what you require, but OurGroceries is pretty flexible and could meet requirement 1 quite easily. I use it for my travelling checklist every time I go on weekends away (as well as for shopping) https://www.ourgroceries.com/overview

s3r3nity• 7 years ago

Workflowy is the gold standard for me on any platform: it's just a simple, infinitely deep outliner, with minimal features by design.

sbjustin• 7 years ago

Check out wunderlist. It also syncs to your computer. You could set up a template list and just duplicate from that for each needed instance.

roland352• 7 years ago

Google notes works for me as a simple checklist

catacombs• 7 years ago

The problem here is Google.

roland352• 7 years ago

Now that I said it is useful I hope Google doesn't shut it down!

astrobe_• 7 years ago

YAGNI. Just use whatever Notepad-like app that was pre-installed on your device.

WalterBright2• 7 years ago

I just use a text editor.

CGamesPlay• 7 years ago

To add to this: I do the same. Actually checking the items off of the list is less important than having the checklist written down.

rmbryan• 7 years ago

I've invested enough time in a personal checklist for a daily process to get to the point where I feel like the checklist is "helpful", "minimal" and "complete". If I had a printer, I would print out a stack of them and record my compliance on paper. I don't have a printer, and I'm not buying one just for this. What's the electronic equivalent for recording checklist compliance?

blunte2• 7 years ago

But where does one begin to identify the parts of life where a checklist would reduce cognitive load?

In IT, some cases are obvious (such as deploying new releases). However, if a process is so repeatable that you could have an accurate checklist, then you could probably automate the process and eliminate the need for the checklist.

I would love to know what parts of my life I could relegate to checklists so I could free my mind to focus on just the things that I excel at...

crispyambulance• 7 years ago

In critical situations where the a bad outcome is really, really negative, checklists are fine.

I've seen checklists abused, however, in project management. Where some folks are apt to generate a "one-size-fits-all" checklist for every project large or small. It ends up becoming boilerplate, and worse, people take their tasks less seriously if trivial, nebulous or non-applicable stuff is grouped onto the same footing as things which take hard work. Everything ends up being a checklist item with check-box and a date on it.

mav3rick• 7 years ago

Ironically for packing before travel.

cco• 7 years ago

Packing for a vacation or camping trip is a very good candidate. If you live in a winter climate you can create a good winterizing checklist. Weekly home upkeep is another.

deepspace• 7 years ago

Yes! I used to forget something every time I traveled. After reading Gawande's book in 2010 I started making a checklist. It took about five trips to converge on a stable list and these days travel is a breeze. Print out checklist. Do stuff on checklist, in sequence. Enjoy stress-free travel.

Too• 7 years ago

Packing for anything is perfect candidate for checklists. I even made one for going to the gym which which is something i do regularly but still very often manage to forget some mundane thing like shampoo, padlock, member card, socks, water bottle.

kemitche• 7 years ago

However, if a process is so repeatable that you could have an accurate checklist, then you could probably automate the process and eliminate the need for the checklist.

To flip this on its head though, writing (and following) a checklist for a process is perhaps a good first step to automating it.

dragonwriter• 7 years ago

However, if a process is so repeatable that you could have an accurate checklist, then you could probably automate the process and eliminate the need for the checklist.

The checklist is (a key part of) the documentation for the automated solution, and would not, as such, stop being necessary just because the automated solution existed; it would be a key resource for change management.

Automation eliminates the need for the people acting on the checklist, not the checklist itself.

peter303• 7 years ago

I have mental checklists I use all the time for routine tasks I could forget. I losealot fewer things. I get lost less frequently.

First getting up in the morning

Leave the house

Leaving the garage

Parking in the parking lot

Starting work in the morning

Leaving work

Parking in the garage

Arriving in gym locker room

Leaving gym locker room

Packing for a trip

Unpacking from a trip

The bugaboo is an interruption that could make you forget a step. Or forget to memorize something.

jowdones• 7 years ago

I'm probably the smartest guy in Romania and can tell you I got my certification that I can do 99% by making sure my usual cognitive load stays at 1%.

I was also poor, which means there was no way to enforce my internal policy which means today, 20 years later, I'm using 99% of my brain power to solve issues a simple state/high-powered enforcement checklist would do.

At my 90%+ I still dreamed of a better future. Now I only wish my own death. Tomorrow I hope and make sure you all die.

coldsnap427• 7 years ago

I'm probably the smartest guy in Romania

[citation needed]

takanori2• 7 years ago

Has there ever been a platform for experts to build and share checklists and for every/any task?

zzaner2• 7 years ago

Not that I know of but I came across this curated compilation of checklists: https://github.com/huyingjie/Checklist-Checklist

takanori2• 7 years ago

Any arguments why this would or wouldn’t work?

aeturnum• 7 years ago

Also worth mentioning the power of engaging our bodies physically and verbally to ensure we're engaging with checklists: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pointing_and_calling

runjake• 7 years ago

Checklists were life in the USAF working on heavy bombers and the nuclear PRP program.

I’ve done a procedure 100 or a 1000 times? Still going down the checklist in the Tech Manual every single time.

Humans can’t multitask well and if you miss a step, people can die and planes could crash.

wiscoDude• 7 years ago

After my partner read The Checklist Manifesto by Atul Gawande, he set out to help other organizations improve outcomes via the use of checklists. Together, we built https://www.manifest.ly

My main feedback from having witnessed thousands of organizations set up their checklists is that they can be used to help teams succeed and they can be used in an oppressive way to "ensure people do what they're supposed to do". Almost always they contain too many steps compared to what they should have and that is usually because the people creating/editing the checklists are often not the users of the actual checklist. When the users and editors are the same people, then the quality of the checklist goes up. We use our own tool on a daily bases for processes that have high risks or for processes that we don't do very often. They are great safety nets.

qwerty456127• 7 years ago

People share some IT-related checklists on GitHub already. It would be cool to see more checklists on non-IT subjects.

hellosputnik• 7 years ago

The article reminds me of Brendan Gregg's talk, "Performance Checklists for SREs".

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zxCWXNigDpA

JBlue422• 7 years ago

Tom Limoncelli had a nice article about how documentation/checklists is the beginning of automation in an IT setting.

Manual Work Is A Bug: https://queue.acm.org/detail.cfm?id=3197520

Makes a lot of sense and something I advocate for in my department.

unethical_ban• 7 years ago

What is the name of the font on that B-17 checklist? It is that mid-century engineering font that I love so much.

The Simple Genius of Checklists

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