When a patient dies, the doctors involved conduct a post-mortem. They gather together and review the actions taken, procedures used, and medicine given, then work to determine:
Why the patient died
What caused it and
How it can be prevented in the future.
In the military, we follow a similar process called an after-action review (AAR) after every mission. We define it as a simple process to capture the lessons learned from past successes and failures, to improve future performance.
I talked about this recently on the Acta non Verba podcast. Check it out!
I have started performing a proactive version of this called a pre-mortem. Instead of waiting for the patient to die, or for failure, before I set out on a task with a high risk of failure, I imagine that I have failed, and then ask, WHY?
What are the most likely points of friction?
Were my errors because of a lack of:
Information
Understanding
Planning
Or were they errors in execution?
Once I identify the potential failure points, I can determine the warning signs that I am approaching them, and consider potential solutions.
This doesn’t guarantee that I won’t fail, but it does prevent needless and catastrophic failure.
Until next week,
Keep Walking Point
John
If you have any questions or feedback about today's newsletter or if you'd just like to reach out, email me at john@walkingpoint.org. I’ll do my best to respond as quickly as possible.
