The first part of this series was about seeing deviation investigations as high-value opportunities, instead of chores and drudgework. If you’ve come this far, the point has hit home with you and you might be asking yourself what can be done to boil the ocean. Well, leading others starts with leading yourself. Here are the questions I ask myself when I want to invite others to join me in this different, more exciting perspective:
• What can I do to help my colleagues see deviation investigation as high-value work?
• How often am I tempted to accept a general cause of “human error” without asking what circumstances led to that human making that error?
• How well does my team record the learnings from the investigation, not just in procedure updates, but in education and training for a wide audience?
• Do I celebrate the completion of a difficult investigation, not just as a checkbox, but as a new level of understanding?
• How many repeat deviations do you see in your work?
Vilfredo Pareto (Yes, the same fellow attributed with the 80:30 rule) said “Give me the fruitful error any time, full of seeds, bursting with its own corrections. You can keep your sterile truth for yourself.”
Do you see errors as a change to learn, to share that learning and understanding, or do you see errors as something to manage down? Do you put this into practice? How would your colleagues describe your approach to error and investigation?