In Praise of the Checklist
Utilizing simple checklists has tremendous benefits in many work situations, but they can also help us stay on track in our personal lives.
What I read: The Checklist Manifesto: How to Get Things Right (paid link) by Atul Gawande. Published January 4, 2011.
I read The Checklist Manifesto when it was first released. Great book. It clearly demonstrates the power of checklists and Gawande backs up his assertions with solid data.
The gist of Gawande’s point is that despite people being educated, skilled, competent, and well-meaning, they often make mistakes because they missed a simple step or decision point along the way. This happens even when the process being undertaken is something they’ve already done many times.
That means we need a different strategy for overcoming failure, one that builds on experience and takes advantage of the knowledge people have but somehow also makes up for our inevitable human inadequacies. And there is such a strategy—though it will seem almost ridiculous in its simplicity, maybe even crazy to those of us who have spent years carefully developing ever more advanced skills and technologies.
It is a checklist.
Gawande’s book had an impact on me when I first read it. How could something as simple as a checklist have such power to keep important processes on track? The data is quite clear that it can. Missing vital steps in hospital and surgical processes is one of the examples given.
The team took me through the results for each of the eight hospitals, one by one. In every site, introduction of the checklist had been accompanied by a substantial reduction in complications. In seven out of eight, it was a double-digit percentage drop.
Having read how powerful the introduction of simple checklists can be to improve outcomes, I wondered if that might be true in my own life as well. Might a simple checklist, or multiple checklists, serve me in the same way it serves hospitals, airline pilots, factory workers, and countless others for which checklists have improved overall outcomes.
I gave it a try. Based on my own personal experience, checklists can help. One of the things checklists do is reduce the decision fatigue we all experience throughout each day. Checklists replace having to make the initial decision of what important things to focus on with a simple reminder to pay attention to a certain step along the way.
Everyone’s personal checklist(s) is likely to differ. Every day I start the morning by quickly reviewing and acting on my checklist.
Review calendar, email inbox, and main notes file (in which I keep currently important notes about all sorts of things).
Think about what I want short- and long-term in the body, mind, service, people, and stuff areas of life. (I wrote about this in “My Chaotically Organized Life.”)
Decide what must be done for the day and write them down.
Decide what would be nice to get done for the day and write them down.
Prioritize and reorder the most important things from 3 and 4.
And so on.
I keep my checklists short. Usually no more than 10 items. If something requires being broken down into more granular prompts, it’s possibly a candidate for a separate checklist.
For example, when I publish a post to one of my subscription newsletters, I follow a series of steps I’ve standardized over time to optimize that process. After hundreds of posts, you’d think I’d know all the steps and never miss one. But now and then I do. Checklists help even the most routine of exercises.
Consider adopting a checklist or multiple checklists into your daily routine. If you need to be convinced of the power of checklists, I recommend you read Gawande’s book.
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