As many of you know, I love a good checklist! I’ve always been a checklist person because I like capturing and organizing my thoughts on paper. It clears my mind and gives me the mental space I need to tackle complex projects.
For anyone that hasn’t read Atul Gawande’s book The Checklist Manifesto - How to Get Things Right, I highly recommend it! He discusses the science behind checklists, why they work, and how to quell the myth of being “too good” for a checklist—because at the end of the day, we’re all human… and humans fail.
This week, an article in Forbes reminded me of a good take-away from Gawande’s book that I had forgotten: the value of creating “pause points” within your checklist. These pause points can be used to check in with your team to make sure nothing was missed. Rethinking your pause points can also help you make sure you’re using the checklist at the proper point in your process. For example, with a DO-CONFIRM list, you might perform the tasks from memory and then pause to double-check everything was completed; whereas for a READ-DO list, you’re likely carrying out tasks as you check them off. Gawande also recommends keeping these pause points brief and limiting the amount of items between pause points.
This was a timely reminder about the power of a well-made checklist and how developing a checklist entails more than just capturing a list of tasks. Time to dust off my heavily dog-eared copy of The Checklist Manifesto and extract more of Gawande’s gems!