How lists of the ‘dumb stuff’ can save us from disaster

I am a checklist fanatic and really appreciate Atul Gawande's persistent attempts to push this idea, especially in health care...
Uvealblues

A recent study in the journal Science showed that rats stop thinking and resort to habit when they are under extreme stress. Humans might well do the same.

Nonetheless we appear to believe that in our professional lives, such stress will produce an adrenalin-fuelled surge of clear and brilliant thought. It doesn’t. And in the ensuing muddle, mistakes – sometimes fatal – are made.

Atul Gawande, a surgeon, Harvard Medical School professor and staff writer for The New Yorker, has written a welcome book to convince us of the distinction between un avoidable failures and those we can avert. The Checklist Manifesto is a slim volume but it is packed with vivid writing heart-stopping anecdotes and statistical surprises.