The Checklist Manifesto by Atul Gawande

The Checklist Manifesto: How to Get Things Right by Atul Gawande

My rating: 4 of 5 stars


More complex than the title suggests. A manifesto on doing difficult, complex, absolutely vital things correctly as much of the time as possible. I talked about this when I read his Better, but he's hitting really close to home with me on this stuff. I'm not a doctor, but it doesn't help to know that there are literally tens of millions of dollars in insurance policies ready in the event I fuck something irreparably up when I know a mistake could wreck careers, fortunes, lives. So how do you complete complex, circumstance-dependent tasks on a time limit and do it right every time? The actual answer is that you don't. But this book is about how you get really close.

Smart, revelatory, focused. One of those books I can really believe in because it spoke to my experiences by validating the usefulness of a lot of my mental habits, and catching me flat-footed in moments of cognitive blindness. No, self, there is no such thing as 'smart enough' not to need a checklist. You might be able to remember a 10-digit phone number told to you once three weeks ago, but you can't beat situational bias, subconscious corner-cutting, all the other brain failure modes by being smart. You just can't.

Anyway. Navel gazing. Good book about how we do madly complex tasks – vascular surgery, building a skyscraper -- correctly. With teamwork and the heroism of tiny details. And checklists.




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