The Simple Genius of Checklists • Hacker News Board

Re: The Simple Genius of Checklists

#71

Post by WalterBright » Fri, Jun 28, 2019, 12:05 AM UTC

CGamesPlay wrote: post #66

WalterBright wrote: post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I just use a text editor.

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.

I started using a checklist when flying internationally. I got tired of forgetting the right plug adapter, for example, and paying $$$$ for a replacement at the airport store. Or having to find a store that sells cuff links.

I often bring two plug adapters, as there's always another guy at the conference who forgot his :-)

Re: The Simple Genius of Checklists

#72

Post by peter303 » Fri, Jun 28, 2019, 12:42 AM UTC

blunte wrote: post #29

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…

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.

Re: The Simple Genius of Checklists

#73

Post by JBlue42 » Fri, Jun 28, 2019, 12:50 AM UTC

ls612 wrote: post #34

ncmncm wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.

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.

Currently work at a hospital.

- The CEO's semi-monthly emails have either contained a) reminders to get the flu shot in flu season and b) statements about washing hands.

- Thirty minutes of your new employee orientation is used to discuss handwashing with some funny stories about diarrhea and they go around to every single person to make sure they're washing them correctly.

- Upon entering a patient room, anyone entering is supposed to wash their hands

- Anyone can call out a doctor and ask if they've washed their hands and there are signs to make patients comfortable asking them to do so as well.

So yeah, 2019 and people still need all that as reminders.

Re: The Simple Genius of Checklists

#74

Post by JBlue42 » Fri, Jun 28, 2019, 12:55 AM UTC

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.

Re: The Simple Genius of Checklists

#75

Post by secfirstmd » Fri, Jun 28, 2019, 1:40 AM UTC

euler_angles wrote: post #6

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 creativi…

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...

Re: The Simple Genius of Checklists

#76

Post by mgnn » Fri, Jun 28, 2019, 1:41 AM UTC

efa wrote: post #16

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.

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".

Re: The Simple Genius of Checklists

#77

Post by bsder » Fri, Jun 28, 2019, 1:59 AM UTC

ncmncm wrote: post #8

euler_angles wrote: post #6

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 creativi…

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.

> 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.

Re: The Simple Genius of Checklists

#78

Post by ex3xu » Fri, Jun 28, 2019, 4:21 AM UTC

mgnn wrote: post #76

efa wrote: post #16

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.

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".

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...

Re: The Simple Genius of Checklists

#79

Post by mdpopescu » Fri, Jun 28, 2019, 6:23 AM UTC

ls612 wrote: post #34

ncmncm wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.

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.

Ah... you're in for a nasty surprise. [1]

Among this cohort, the mean self-estimated handwashing rate was 73% (range, 50%-95%), compared with the covertly observed rate for this cohort of 8.6% before and 10.8% after patient contact, with an individual mean rate of 10% (range, 0-33%).

[1] https://www.mja.com.au/journal/1996/164/7/teaching-hospital-...

Re: The Simple Genius of Checklists

#80

Post by mgnn » Fri, Jun 28, 2019, 6:30 AM UTC

ex3xu wrote: post #78

mgnn wrote: post #76

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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".

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...

That's strange, my edition doesn't have appendices. Thanks for the page though.